Western Governer's University

[Gator-mom]

Has anyone on here had experience going to this school? In particular, has anyone done their RN program? I'm just curious about a student's perspective of this school. I have a friend who works there and raves about it...but then she works there..lol.

[Aquitane]

Gator-mom, I used to work for them. There are some good and bad points. Please feel free to PM me for more.

[mama2landon]

Originally Posted by Aquitane

Gator-mom, I used to work for them. There are some good and bad points. Please feel free to PM me for more.

I've also been looking into this school... but leaning toward one of the teaching degrees. I'm not sure how I feel about the school so far. I started the application process, but every time I have a question it takes over a week for my admissions guy to get back with me for any kind of answer. Not impressed, at all. In fact, I was going to start in July, but I keep pushing my start date back because I just keep getting bad vibes. I don't know if its me, if it's my admissions guy, or just the school, but I don't want to start this process until I can dig a little more.

Anyway, Aquitane, would you be willing to elaborate on the good and the bad of the school for others who might be on the fence about this school? The tuition and the self-paced learning is what drew me to the school originally, but I would love to hear an insider's perspective on what it's really like.

[Aquitane]

I think the whole distance learning/being able to go at your own pace is good, if you are a motivated person.

Of course there were always procrastinators at the university who had to get a project evaluated at the last minute in order to keep their financial aid, and it always irked me!

This university is "competency based." So, as long as a project met the bare-bones requirements I had to pass it. Also students are given multiple times to submit work and get it passed. As an evaluator, I was required to "give hints" and sometimes even websites/place to go that would help them do it correctly. There were some projects I could tell people took a lot of time with and some that were just thrown together, but they both would pass, and I started to have some trouble with that.

1) I did not pass a student on a project. The student had left out a part of the project, which I detailed. The student disagreed and threatened to leave the university. I was called by a very big higher up and it was suggested I pass the project. I refused. They gave it to some else who passed it.

2) The "rules" for the work kept changing every couple of months. I had started checking projects in a new section. Students needed to cite work and photographs. The university kept easing the requirements of the citations so much that some of it, in my opinion, had students claiming work as their own that wasn't. They did not have to follow any hard and fast citation rules, and we could not "not pass" a project based on things not being cited. Um, hello, plagiarism? At a regular brick and mortar university you could be expelled for something like that.

In the end it was the combination of ethics and time that had me leave. Again, I've heard great things from people who went there who were able to get a degree there, who wouldn't have been able to otherwise due to distance, etc. I think it can work for some people.

Good luck in your searches! I hope you find something that fits!

[Gator-mom]

Thanks Aquitane for your honesty about the school. I agree that certain standards should be held up no matter what.

I'm actually enrolled in a good university now in a BSN program, but we are planning to TTC this year if we can time it to have the baby over next summer. I was looking at WGU to have as a plan B if anything goes wrong during the pregnancy that would keep me from finishing my Spring Semester. I had preterm contractions with ds#1 and I'm going to do everything I can find to prevent any issues this time like becoming anemic and not getting enough protein as I did the first time. My current school will let me drop for a year and resume the next, but that entails me having to defer student loans and all that.

I was just curious if WGU would be a decent option to transfer to so that I wouldn't have to wait quite as long to go back. Then when I realized that their tuition is 9k a semester less than my current school, I was starting to think I should maybe look a little deeper! I actually am a very self motivated/independent studier and it looks like in the RN program you still get a mentor who helps you through labs and clinicals.

But with all that said...I don't want to assume that transferring there would be a better option than waiting. I'm sure I sound neurotic planning for all this when I have no idea if I'll even be able to conceive this year or not! I'm just trying to plan for everything!