Athabasca University

[MurrayMD]

All of my distance learning so far has been through Athabasca University. It's a Canadian school, fully accredited and modeled after Open University in the UK. Courses are asynchronous, a big plus in my opinion and reasonably priced for those living in Canada. Compared to my residential school experience I found that not having access to previous years' exams and homework assignments raises the quality of the program and ensures that students who just want to work hard can be recognized for their efforts.

[online degrees]

Athabasca is expensively priced for any Canadian

Fees are $661 per 3 credit course

The University of Manitoba offers online course and degrees
at approx. $345 per 3 credit course

University of Calgary $379-$439

I personally haven't seen a more expensive school than Athabasca, unless you go to the US of course.

[Kyle]

Is the price in Canadian Dollars? if so it's not that expensive it's 26,000 CAD for a bachelor degree. around 22,000 USD.

I am not from Canada but the price is reasonable.

[johann]

Hi -

McMaster University - in my home town of Hamilton Ontario (Canada) charges about $462 Canadian in tuition for a 3-unit Arts or Science course, so yes, Athabasca is more expensive.

They're both fine schools (I've gone to one, my son to both) and I think the premium you pay to Athabasca comes from:

(a) The convenience factor - you work on your own schedule and don't have to show up in a classroom every Wednesday night after work, regardless of the snow - OR pay more for on-campus parking than you do for tuition! (All right, that's a slight exaggeration, but it will add well over $100 to that 3-unit course!)

Working on their own schedule is the only way many part-time students can complete their courses - and one of the best places to do it is Athabasca.

(b) Athabasca also attracts U.S. students - they have American Regional Accreditation. The fees look very attractive to U.S students - not bad at all, when translated into U.S. dollars!

Cheers! :-)

Johann

[johann]

Hi -

In many cases, a student can save a LOT of money by going to Athabasca, even if their per-unit tuition is higher than a local school. An area in which Athabasca EXCELS is making sure Canadian students get proper credit for a Community College diploma, if they hold one.

In the U.S. it's very simple - two years of Community College = Associate Degree, pass "go" and proceed to Year 3 of a 4-year program.

In many parts of Canada (including Ontario, where I live) it's not that simple! Around here, each University administration makes up its own mind in every individual case as to what credit it will allow for a Community College diploma. And in many, many cases, it's not very much!

A local University was willing to give one Community College grad I know (with good marks) credit for TWO COURSES. Athabasca was willing to credit him with two full YEARS.

Guess where he enrolled? (He saved thousands of dollars in tuition while receiving a fine education.) Yes, those professors at Athabasca can teach! Their administration team could teach other Canadian Universities a thing or two, as well! :-)

Johann

[online degrees]

Is the price in Canadian Dollars? if so it's not that expensive it's 26,000 CAD for a bachelor degree. around 22,000 USD.

I am not from Canada but the price is reasonable.

$661 Canadian is extremely expensive for an education in Canada

If we are a resident in the province in which we study, we pay approx $280-300 per course (exam fees included)

And as mentionned before University of Manitoba has online fees of $345 and Calgary university $379-$439.

Our education in Canada is a lot less expensive than the US our fees are approx $9000+ for a degree.

Perhaps Athabasca is marketing for US students. approx $19,800 plus exam fees (if you're a Canadian)

[online degrees]

Hi -

(a) The convenience factor - you work on your own schedule and don't have to show up in a classroom every Wednesday night after work, regardless of the snow - OR pay more for on-campus parking than you do for tuition! (All right, that's a slight exaggeration, but it will add well over $100 to that 3-unit course!)

Working on their own schedule is the only way many part-time students can complete their courses - and one of the best places to do it is Athabasca.




Athabasca is not the only online school in Canada
In fact there are many more, and much more well priced.

And it is interesting, that where I am from, the government has not approved Athabasca for student loans.

[online degrees]

Hi -

In many cases, a student can save a LOT of money by going to Athabasca, even if their per-unit tuition is higher than a local school. An area in which Athabasca EXCELS is making sure Canadian students get proper credit for a Community College diploma, if they hold one.



Well, so far it has cost me a lot of money.

First off, if you want your transfer credits assessed, you have to pay a $200 fee. I know of no other university that does this.

Secondly to have your credits assess, you also need to be enrolled in a program, and have an application completed, an extra $65. Then they try and convince you that it will take 3 months to have your credits assessed, so that your better off starting your classes now -- which of course I thought it would be better to wait.

Of course the diplomas were not accepted, even though they were from an accredited school, but they were not credit courses.

Then the college courses I did have were not accepted. First response courses were not accredited, since they have government approval, I was stunned, second response 'they're just not accepted'.

Now I should pay for PLAR (another $200 fee) to see if it will be accepted, of course it is better to try to challenge courses first (more $$$). Of course if you can't pass the challenge, you can still apply for PLAR (of course it is better to take the PLAR course first -- more $$$$$ )


I don't know, but I am feeling rather shammed!! I think, applying to several different Universities is an excellent idea; e.g. The University of Waterloo in Ontario, has some excellent online programs.

[johann]

Hi -

I'm glad to hear University education costs less in some Canadian provinces than it does in Ontario, where I live. As I said before, a 3-unit course is around $460-odd locally, which I think is a fair reflection of the provincial average.

I'm sorry to say that a fee to have transfer credits assessed doesn't sound that unusual to me. I know my local university charges $65 PER COURSE on successful transfer. (Even on credits earned THERE and transferred from one program to another!)

Academic quality is generally good in this country, but my own experience proves that administrative/financial chicanery and sharp practice bordering on outright banditry afflict students in Canadian universities, as they do in other countries. I think it's done to us in the name of survival, a strategy made necessary here by chronic under-funding and institutional money-wasting.

I don't expect Waterloo (fine school!) or any of the other Canadian universities with on-line programs will do credit transfer for free, either!

I sympathize with you over your disappointing experience with college credits not being accepted. I do not know personally of any other Athabasca applicant who's had this problem, when seeking transfer credit for a program completed at a recognized, provincially-chartered Canadian community college. Can you tell me:

(1) Were you hoping for transfer credit for a completed diploma program or partial credits?

(1) Were your studies at a provincially-chartered Community College - or a private "Career College," as they are known in Canada - or done overseas? If they were from a recognized, provincially-chartered college, I can't see why there would be a problem.

Yes, there are other Canadian Universities providing on-line education and I don't think there's a bad school in the bunch! However, I still say Athabasca has its advantages, including not being tethered to a September or January start and an iron-clad schedule.

I guess one school won't suit everybody, but I still think highly of Athabasca. If you find a school like University of Manitoba or Waterloo (Ontario) suits (and treats) you better - then more power to you, my friend - go for it! They're ALL great places to learn!

Wherever you go, I wish you every success! :-)

Johann

[online degrees]

Hi -
I think it's done to us in the name of survival, a strategy made necessary here by chronic under-funding and institutional money-wasting.



Yep, agree with you there!


I don't expect Waterloo (fine school!) or any of the other Canadian universities with on-line programs will do credit transfer for free, either!


Waterloo did not charge me extra fees, neither does Manitoba...



(1) Were your studies at a provincially-chartered Community College - or a private "Career College," as they are known in Canada - or done overseas? If they were from a recognized, provincially-chartered college, I can't see why there would be a problem.


Courses were provincially chartered; same courses are offered in other government qualified (non-private) Colleges.


Wherever you go, I wish you every success! :-)


Thanks!

[MurrayMD]

It's nice to learn about experiences others have had with Distance Learning in universities. When I chose AU I hadn't shopped around that much and their prices seemed to be reasonable. I'd been out of school for a long time and was more concerned that if I was to fail I wanted to do so in the privacy of my own home! As it turned out, I did well and even made the Dean's list one semester. Because I lived in Alberta I liked the idea of a school that was also in Alberta. On-campus activity consisted of science labs that were held in Edmonton where I lived as well as Athabasca and Calgary, where I commuted to and rented a motel room. My decision to go to Calgary was made in order to complete the course sooner than if I'd waited until the lab was held in Edmonton. The lab at Athabasca was attended by people as far away as Montreal.

AU's asynchronous schedule was an advantage for me. I liked to do one course at a time, finish it in about a month then write the mid-term and final within days of each other. Telephone tutoring was always available (tutor hours varied) but I felt that often it wasn't necessary. For some courses like chemistry I often did all the problems in the back of each chapter rather than just the ones that were assigned. Because of that, I felt that I got more out of AU than I would from a residential school. Residential school on the other hand still offers more choices than DE.

Just like anything else, if you are simply determined to do whatever it takes you will do fine. For me that meant lots of study time and lots of extra problems. Studying the material and following the study guides closely gave me the ability to do well on the exams. Teachers at AU are excellent and completely on par with those in residential schools. My AU professors had more time to spend with students one-on-one. I preferred "hard" courses like the sciences over the "soft" courses like English.

Overall, I found AU to be an excellent school that fit my needs at the time. I plan to take more computer science courses in the future via DE although I haven't yet decided on a school. In general though I liked AU and think it does an excellent job of teaching what it teaches. I feel it sets an excellent example of what distance education is about.

[Ken]

MurrayMD,

I just recently registered with Athabasca with intentions of completing my entire B.Comm degree online.

I'm curious if you read everything and did ALL exercises for every course. Basically, I registered in 5 courses and just received all of my course materials. Upon inspection of them, I realized there is WAY more to these courses than I originally thought. For instance, on top of the books that must be read, I also received all sorts of things to access all these sites on the Internet for additional reading and questions/exercises. Did you receive and/or use all this additional material?

For example, I took Commercial Law right away. I have my Student Manual, Study Guide, and Textbook. Great. But then I find all these additional enclosures telling me to go to these websites and register with the pin numbers provided to me. It is literally like a giant spider web of reading material they gave me, and this is for every course. I feel as though by the time I'm finished 1 course alone I will have read half the material available on the entire Internet. (okay I know I'm exaggerating here but you get the idea). Did you actually use all this information? Are they expecting you to read everything? I was joking with my wife that by the time I'm finished this one law course I would have the ability to practice law (which is the ultimate goal for me anyway) as it touches on everything.

I don't know. I guess I'm just flabbergasted at all the online reading material. Surely there isn't this much in a traditional university setting.

[MurrayMD]

I just recently registered with Athabasca with intentions of completing my entire B.Comm degree online.

I was interested in that program as well but got into a science and engineering track when I realized it suited me more. I thought it was a very good degree program though.

I'm curious if you read everything and did ALL exercises for every course. Basically, I registered in 5 courses and just received all of my course materials. Upon inspection of them, I realized there is WAY more to these courses than I originally thought. For instance, on top of the books that must be read, I also received all sorts of things to access all these sites on the Internet for additional reading and questions/exercises. Did you receive and/or use all this additional material?

I did for courses like chemistry (two inorganic, one organic) and geology (98% exam average) as well as accounting (introductory and intermediate). I was told by someone to follow the study guide closely so as not to get sidetracked. All AU courses are more reading intensive than their traditional counterparts. One benefit to AU courses I found was that I always had a pretty good idea what was expected of me in order to get a good grade. English was my worst subject; I took it first just to get it out of the way then stayed away from arts courses after that. The idea of paying someone to give mediocre grades in subjectively marked courses is more of a way to support people who could earn better livelihoods as prostitutes if they had greater ambition.

But back to school, I think I covered all the material including the extra, but I know that DE courses are more reading-intensive to begin with and Law is well-known to be probably the most reading-intensive of any academic subject. I was also a little cautious and did my courses one at a time: this had advantages: one, it allowed me to wake up with the previous day's study material fresh in mind and continue where I left off; and two, it allowed me to write the midterm and final within a couple of days of each other and keep the material fresh. I put myself on a pretty tight schedule of one month per course and rarely went over the limit. I found that I could focus much better on one course at a time but that might not be the same for others.


For example, I took Commercial Law right away. I have my Student Manual, Study Guide, and Textbook. Great. But then I find all these additional enclosures telling me to go to these websites and register with the pin numbers provided to me. It is literally like a giant spider web of reading material they gave me, and this is for every course. I feel as though by the time I'm finished 1 course alone I will have read half the material available on the entire Internet. (okay I know I'm exaggerating here but you get the idea). Did you actually use all this information? Are they expecting you to read everything? I was joking with my wife that by the time I'm finished this one law course I would have the ability to practice law (which is the ultimate goal for me anyway) as it touches on everything.

I understand that law courses are much more reading intensive; I've never taken any myself although I've thought about it. I don't know of a practical way to predict how difficult a course is going to be, sometimes you get hit with a real doozer and have to bite the bullet. Once you're committed though you just have to keep on. That can be more difficult in a traditional school where once you get behind it can be very difficult to catch up. AU's asynchronous mode allows you to spend more time on your weaker areas and maybe a little less on your stronger ones and there are always those 3-month extensions as well. Law in general requires more reading so I would think it's good practice for the real thing. People starting careers in law spend a lot of time at their jobs, probably double what a government employee would spend. A lot of that time is probably spent reading.

I don't know. I guess I'm just flabbergasted at all the online reading material. Surely there isn't this much in a traditional university setting.

There might be for law. But in general, I found DE courses at AU to be significantly more reading-intensive than at the traditional schools I've attended. I went traditional to get a degree I thought would be more recognized by potential employers and I'd decided to go full-time anyway. I can appreciated how you must feel when seeing all that material for the first time though! I hope it all goes well for you. School can be very tough but very rewarding too.

Dave

[RobInc[BScH 99][MBA 02]]

Athabasca is expensively priced for any Canadian

Fees are $661 per 3 credit course

The University of Manitoba offers online course and degrees
at approx. $345 per 3 credit course

University of Calgary $379-$439

I personally haven't seen a more expensive school than Athabasca, unless you go to the US of course.

Having completed both my undergrad and MBA in Canada, I can think of three factors to keep in mind when considering this and the subsequent post that a "$26,000" for a Bachelors degree is a normal cost:

1. Until very recently, Canadian "universities" were public institutions, funded by our taxes. That said, $2,500 a year for Canadians and several times that amount for foreign students was during my time a "normal" cost for a Bachelors.

2. Even though there has been movement in allowing private universities,
none of them are either well known or have much reputation here.

3. When I began my MBA, at McMaster University, an AACSB-accredited MBA school, $5,000 was a normal amount for non-foreign fees. By the time I finished, big-name (but equally AACSB-accredited) MBA schools like University of Toronto, charged about double that. Also, a very large proportion of my MBA colleagues by then were foreign students who paid more than double what I did.

www.RobinCheung.Info

[johann]

Robin -

(1) You're talking grad school fees. The postings were about undergrad. It's 'way different. I was quoting McMaster University's fee at the time for a 3-unit undergrad course - and I got it by walking out to Westdale and asking! (Yeah, I could have phoned -it's a local call- but I needed the exercise!)

(2) And I think Online_degrees had a factual and salient point when he said online courses were available in Canada for much lower fees than Athabasca's, from Manitoba, other provinces and at another university in Alberta. Indeed, he had the figures to prove it! By the numbers, Athabasca does indeed charge a higher rate for on-line study (undergrad) than many other Canadian Universities. Athabasca is generally (but not universally) regarded as a very good school and many perceive its fee structure as justified, by good value. Others may differ...

(3) We're also fully aware of the foreign and domestic fee differential. Yeah, it's huge - usually 'way more than double, but that's for foreign students resident in Canada! Wasn't relevant to the discussion -at all!

Try to stay on topic! :-)

Johann

[ham]

I have been with AU in the last few years taking B.A courses on&off (along with courses with other DE providers such as Open University, Exeter, Oxford, Cardiff...so I'm in a position to tell the difference ); I also pay differential fees as a foreigner.
My experience with AU this far has been good.

The University of Manitoba offers online course and degrees
at approx. $345 per 3 credit course


my only remark is that I tried to deal with Manitoba. The choice is great, but I found a problem with them that is very common with brick&mortar schools running DE courses on the side:
* long waiting before getting replies
* none to answer the phone; counselors more clueless than I was
* inflexibility
* more demands placed on me
* poorer infrastructure

AU does not place a limit (so they said) on the number of letters of permission one might get, so I can shop around different DE providers and -most times- get credit with AU, too.
In the long run one might easily end up with 2 degrees instead of one.
They are stingy when it comes to prior learning and credits, though.

[johann]

Hi Ham -

Glad you've had good experience (as a whole) with Athabasca. Sorry to hear about the "stinginess" with prior experience and credits, etc.

I think it's a mixed bag.

Yes, I've known people with 15-20 years of progressive, responsible business/managerial/tech experience to come away with 15-20 credits for their experiential portfolio. Agreed, that's not a whole lot -- but it's just about what most I've heard from had learned to expect, on the way to creating the portfolio.

On the other side, I don't know ANY accredited/properly chartered school in ANY country that will award NEARLY as much credit for a Canadian Community College diploma as Athabasca. In this country, a two (or sometimes three) year program at a Community College (exception: British Columbia) gets you a diploma - not an associate degree.

Here in Ontario at least, the gnomes of each University "hum and haw," look at you sideways and then make up their individual, evil minds as to what credits will be awarded for a college diploma. I've seen the same student offered 6 units/credit hours at one school (two COURSES) and two YEARS at another! And yes, we're talking the same college diploma and the same university program!

Athabasca is 'WAY better than other Canadian Schools in this regard. If you have a two-year College diploma with decent marks, they'll generally give you "time served" (2 years) or close, towards a degree.

I wish more Canadian (and other) Universities would follow Athabasca's example in this regard!

Great school! :-)

Johann