MBA - Purdue University Global ExcelTrack

[cortesd79@yahoo.com]

Glad to have clarity on that.  Though I'm personally OK with a Purdue Global Diploma, as it is all part of the Purdue University System.  

I'm really hoping to get an update on coursework, ability to accelerate and general experience from the two or three people in the thread that were currently enrolled.  Reviews of the school on gradreports seem really bad, whereas I had a pretty good experience with WGU for my  undergrad and they are rated quite highly by enrolled and previous students.

The coursework is still pretty much the same as has been described in this thread.  I'm now 2/3 of the way through the program.  The first 1/4 of the curriculum was a mix of writing and calculations (analytics/accounting).  However, after those first 15 credits, the coursework has primarily consisted of a mix between 4-6 page papers or Powerpoint development (12-15 slides with audio).  I've found that if you budget about 8-10 hours per 1-credit module, that is usually sufficient to complete the base research and work.  

In full disclosure...since I posted in the spring, there have been some slight changes in how the program is administered.  Back around March, they introduced what is called 'Module-Gating'.  Essentially, what this means is that a student is unable to start the subsequent module in sequence until the current module has been completed (meaning the assignment has been submitted and graded).  Previously, a student could immediately start any module for which they registered at any time.  There wasn't any validation or check to ensure the modules were completed in sequence.  There also weren't any 'down' periods where you were unable to do any work because you were stuck waiting for your previous assignment to be graded.    

Technically, there is a 24-hour SLA for grading of assignments submitted during the week and 48 hours for assignments submitted on the weekend.  In all of the courses I've completed so far, I've only had one instance where these SLAs have not been met so it mostly hasn't been issue.  With that said, I did prefer the old method without the module gating, but it is what it is.  This approach forces you to be strategic in how you plan to complete and submit your work.  

Another recent change from late summer was that, previously, a term was scheduled for 6 weeks and you had the full 6 weeks to actually submit assignments.  The latest update to this policy is that while the term is still 6 weeks, the latest date you can actually submit an assignment is 2 days prior to the last day of the term.  While I understand this change was intended to allow the instructors more time for grading assignments within the term, the impact is that you've just lost 2 potential days of work.  If you take that with the 1-2 days of SLA time per module for grading assignments...it adds up.  If you're targeting to complete 6 modules per term, you'd be looking at a minimum of 6 days for grading plus the 2 days at the end of the term which comes out to 8 days of lost productivity for the entire term.  That's almost 20% of the term which is a lot.  At least, I think so.      

While I can't say that these changes are unreasonable, as a whole, it does serve as an impediment if you've previously been used to doing things differently.  

Aside from that, it's basically what I expected.  The ExcelTrack truly is self-paced and you have the ability to go as fast or slow as you want, SLAs notwithstanding.  While I did enjoy the collaborative nature of the one standard course I've taken (very first course) with the team-based meetings/assignments and do think I would have enjoyed that approach for the entire curriculum, at this point in my career and life, the flexibility and pace of the ExcelTrack were just a better fit for my lifestyle.