So disappointed in Excelsior. Should I bail or suck it up for the last class?

[bjcheung77]

@profstudent, congrats on finishing, the main thing is you've got the check the box degree... this will get you in the doors to most of the non competitive programs, if you have the prerequisites for semi competitive programs, you should be good on that front as well. Looking forward to see what your next journey brings, good luck, have fun...

[ashkir]

congratulations on graduating!

Excelsior and COSC's time is quickly fading. They have so many hoops to jump through and keep changing their requirements. Their costs are so high now.

[SophiaPrincess]

File a complaint with Middle States and the USDOE. 

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profstudent
I have one class left at Excelsior, and am so disappointed w

ith the school that I'm considering quitting/transferring out.

I've taken 4 credits so far at Excelsior, and they were painful. 

My main frustrations with the school:
- Financial aid is garbage. They keep changing my award so I owe more than expected. They don't understand military benefits at all, or even Pell grants. It feels like a bait and switch with them. It "looked" free, just to cancel awards and stuff me with a bill.
- Classwork is busy work. The cornerstone assignments were an ungodly waste of time. I'm about to graduate... I shouldn't have to submit 5 versions/steps to a single research paper. We did that shit in high school. I dread taking the capstone class. I like challenging classes, but Excelsior classes are high school homework. They take forever and I learn nothing. It's a checkbox degree, but I really hoped I would learn something. I didnt.
- Professors suck. I had one professor claim I didn't cite enough. She said she would've failed me, but "knew" I meant well. Um, I cited EVERYTHING. I over-cited, to say the least. There were zero factual statements in the essay that weren't cited. I've shown it to friends, a few professors from other schools, an essay tutoring website, and a dean from another school. None found anything wrong with it. I'm exceptionally careful about citing. I asked this professor which sentence was the error, but she ignored my repeated questions about this for months. I don't like being falsely accused of shit. She gave me a good grade, but I don't appreciate the false accusation.
- Registration. It is truly painful to try to register or get my advisor to be helpful. I had to send one of my previous transcripts 3 times to get Excelsior to put it on my file, even though the transcript ordering system had shown that it was been opened/viewed on the first 2 times. That made me miss a pre-req registration deadline. 
- Degree conferral isn't truly "monthly" after you finish. My degree won't be conferred until 2 months after classes end. It's still quick compared to traditional colleges, but they advertise/mention this as a perk so much. You can't see their degree conferral schedule until you're a student with a login. This isn't my main frustration with them by any stretch: busy work classes and financial aid are the key frustrations.
- Transfer credit evaluation was painful/took forever. They kept leaving off classes that ultimately counted. All the back and forth with advisors who appeared to not be able to read was beyond frustrating.
- Reputation: it has none to speak of, other than being a quick degree completion school. I knew this going in, but it's still disappointing to have a degree I will never want to tell people I have.

I'm one class away from a degree I don't want. Or, at least, a degree from a school I'm embarrassed of at this point. I don't mind online no name schools, but the trivial busy work for assignments and a professor falsely accusing me of plagiarizing/not citing (but refusing to tell me which sentence I supposedly goofed on) has me wanting to transfer out. I hoped the classes might be useful or engaging, but they weren't in any way.

I'm so bummed that I'm incredibly close to a degree I don't want from a school I'm beyond disappointed in.

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I suppose one good thing is that they have 25,000 students enrolled. It's easy to come across fellow military that went/attend there. I just am bummed at how incredibly bad the learning experience is. It makes me miss even community college or high school, at which I learned more than at Excelsior. I also didn't get falsely accused of plagiarism/bad citing- just to be given a good grade by the professor anyway.
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