What's the Worst online class you've taken?

[nicbon]

Mine by far is Managerial Accounting from BYU.

1)The book was expensive and hardly has any solutions to problems in the back of the book. And if there is an answer, they don't show you how they got it.

2) The CD explaining the lessons is dreadful. The guys voice alone will put you to sleep and he talks fast and doesn't pause, making it that much harder to follow. You can print out notes for the lesson but they're hard to follow since they are abbreviations of him talking.

3) No review sheet or any kind of study guide for the tests. They just tell you to be able to do the CD problems.

4) Can't access the quizzes after you take them. They may think you are going to show them to others across the country, so they can cheat. Stupid.

5) Extremely anal about who procters their exam. I have to drive 45 miles to a Sylvan learning Center and pay $55 an hr.

6) Tests are overly difficult.

The software and everything else is just plain terrible. If other classes are like this than BYU has a long way to go with their distance education program.

Take this class elsewhere if you can.

[dc67]

I took Environmental Geology and Lab online over the summer. It was alot crammed in to a short semester. It would have been good to actually have the lab. We had lab books but it was all on paper, no hands on.

[dharmachic]

I've been pretty lucky, I guess, in terms of online classes. I've taken over 20 so far (including my paralegal education), and while some could have been better, they weren't anything to complain about.

I would suggest looking up professor ratings on RateMyProfessors.com which I do before I register for a class, especially when I have a choice of several equivalent classes I can take, to help narrow down my selection. It's very useful to see student ratings (online classes included too) and at the very least, you will know what to expect going in.

Helen

[lovetheduns]

Ironically, the worst online class I ever had was also a Managerial Accounting. The class was online but through my college, NCWC.

To me it was obvious the professor was just NOT all that interested in teaching the course. She was entirely too difficult to get a hold of and when a course is 8 weeks long, you need a professor who is responsive and actually gives a crap. I noticed after this class she never taught another one at the college.

I ended up making almost a perfect score in the class only because I think her curve was so extreme. My classmates began to reach out to me for help because they could tell from my discussion postings that I had somewhat of a clue. I know that many of my classmates planned to give a scathing review back to the college.

The book we used didn't have a lot of solved problems in the back, the only thing the professor did do in that regard was send out the answer keys (which had pretty good explanations) from a supplemental book she owned. The tests were pretty difficult even though they obviously came from the test bank from the publisher.

Honestly, to be frank, I find accounting very hard to learn 100% online. The only other class I found to be okay online in the accounting world was personal income tax. The remaining courses I feel I would have missed quite a bit without having a professor speaking from experience about particular scenarios.

[cookderosa]

I had 2 I didn't like.

Local class: Contemporary Social Problems: WAYYYYYYYYYYYYY too liberal of a teacher for me and expected all of us to embrace her pro-feminist, pro-lesbian, anti-government, anti-military crap. I had an assignment that asked for 2 pages on how I thought George Bush ruined our country. I felt my integrity was compromised in order to pass this course.

TESC online class: Managing Stress and Tension: Turns out this is a twisted version of a self-help class. (and they are going to help you like it or not) LOL Lots of bashing of marriage and family, text written by three non-married people. Too much meditation for me. Too much "sharing" of personal information on the message board required. Total waste of time. Book is a consumable, so no chance of reselling it.

[PatsGirl1]

The worst ever are two of the classes I’m taking now- Children’s Lit and American Cinema through TESC.

CL:
I have personally read over 30 books for the class (and most of them weren’t the typical 20 page children’s book, either). You have to write 11 papers for the class, anywhere from 4-8 pages each. I ended up writing over 60 pages for those papers and was so disgusted I turned the assignments all in early just to get them over with. The mentor lost half of one of my assignments. I still haven’t had a grade posted in the grade book 3 weeks after I took the midterm.
I’ve estimated that I’ve read over 1000 pages (seriously) and wrote over 60 pages in the last 10 weeks. All of this is for a 200 level class.

Cinema:
There is NO mentor communication. He went MIA in the class and I never got a single assignment graded until week 9 out of a 12 week class. He never has posted ONE thing to the class, no one knows where he went or anything, grades just showed up. Apparently neither did any of the other students. We all (the students) were so worried that something had happened to him that I offered to call the school to see if he was ok. He doesn’t even give you a grade on any of the 6 discussions in the class in your grade book because he said, “you’ll see what I gave you when I calculate your final grade”. It’s the same with the midterm taken 3 weeks ago and no grade, just like my Lit class. I have sent him SIX emails that he never answered. The midterm was on NOTHING we wrote papers on, other than one term.

OK so all of that is the mentor, now on to the class itself. It’s really boring, I have not learned a single thing (other than apparently most people prefer movies filmed in widescreen and they’re much more expensive for the filmmakers to produce, which is why widescreen is more in stores). I thought that we would actually, I don’t know, discuss movies. Nope, we discuss the use of widescreen and why poor people in the Depression liked comedy. The class costs $500+ (I think it’s $525). *sigh* I can’t WAIT to be done.

[cookderosa]

The worst ever are two of the classes I’m taking now- Children’s Lit and American Cinema through TESC.

CL:
I have personally read over 30 books for the class (and most of them weren’t the typical 20 page children’s book, either). You have to write 11 papers for the class, anywhere from 4-8 pages each. I ended up writing over 60 pages for those papers and was so disgusted I turned the assignments all in early just to get them over with. The mentor lost half of one of my assignments. I still haven’t had a grade posted in the grade book 3 weeks after I took the midterm.
I’ve estimated that I’ve read over 1000 pages (seriously) and wrote over 60 pages in the last 10 weeks. All of this is for a 200 level class.

Cinema:
There is NO mentor communication. He went MIA in the class and I never got a single assignment graded until week 9 out of a 12 week class. He never has posted ONE thing to the class, no one knows where he went or anything, grades just showed up. Apparently neither did any of the other students. We all (the students) were so worried that something had happened to him that I offered to call the school to see if he was ok. He doesn’t even give you a grade on any of the 6 discussions in the class in your grade book because he said, “you’ll see what I gave you when I calculate your final grade”. It’s the same with the midterm taken 3 weeks ago and no grade, just like my Lit class. I have sent him SIX emails that he never answered. The midterm was on NOTHING we wrote papers on, other than one term.

OK so all of that is the mentor, now on to the class itself. It’s really boring, I have not learned a single thing (other than apparently most people prefer movies filmed in widescreen and they’re much more expensive for the filmmakers to produce, which is why widescreen is more in stores). I thought that we would actually, I don’t know, discuss movies. Nope, we discuss the use of widescreen and why poor people in the Depression liked comedy. The class costs $500+ (I think it’s $525). *sigh* I can’t WAIT to be done.

>>

LOL Sorry, I hear ya though! (keep telling yourself: check the box, check the box, check the box....:eek: )

[joel66]

I am thinking of taking Managerial Accounting at BYU. Just curious how many questions were on each of the exams and if they were multiple choice or essay based? I am taking my final this Saturday for Financial Accounting and hoping to get started on Managerial, after I test out of micro and ethics.

I think with the accountinglab software I have for Managerial accounting, I can use this in addition to the BYU material. Also, you still have the book?

Mine by far is Managerial Accounting from BYU.

1)The book was expensive and hardly has any solutions to problems in the back of the book. And if there is an answer, they don't show you how they got it.

2) The CD explaining the lessons is dreadful. The guys voice alone will put you to sleep and he talks fast and doesn't pause, making it that much harder to follow. You can print out notes for the lesson but they're hard to follow since they are abbreviations of him talking.

3) No review sheet or any kind of study guide for the tests. They just tell you to be able to do the CD problems.

4) Can't access the quizzes after you take them. They may think you are going to show them to others across the country, so they can cheat. Stupid.

5) Extremely anal about who procters their exam. I have to drive 45 miles to a Sylvan learning Center and pay $55 an hr.

6) Tests are overly difficult.

The software and everything else is just plain terrible. If other classes are like this than BYU has a long way to go with their distance education program.

Take this class elsewhere if you can.

[nicbon]

^^^^

I strongly suggest you try to take it elsewhere. You should have a few options. I have no idea why I picked BYU.

I still have the book, but I'm not done with the class. I couldn't find a used book anywhere and had to pay full price for this one. The book was expensive and not good. It will introduce a concept that seems very easy. Then have questions that are more advanced than the material presented, and usually have no answers in the back and definately no explanations.

There is a CD you have to buy too, which was expensive and not good.

No study notes and the whole course is presented in a jumbled mess with no interaction between yourself and other peers or the professor. I have tried and can not get in touch with the professor.

The tests are multiple choice. Usually a-h, sometimes less sometime more.

[Gary]

^^^^

I strongly suggest you try to take it elsewhere. You should have a few options. I have no idea why I picked BYU.

I still have the book, but I'm not done with the class. I couldn't find a used book anywhere and had to pay full price for this one. The book was expensive and not good. It will introduce a concept that seems very easy. Then have questions that are more advanced than the material presented, and usually have no answers in the back and definately no explanations.

There is a CD you have to buy too, which was expensive and not good.

No study notes and the whole course is presented in a jumbled mess with no interaction between yourself and other peers or the professor. I have tried and can not get in touch with the professor.

The tests are multiple choice. Usually a-h, sometimes less sometime more.

Wish I saw this post sooner. I couldn't agree more. Excelsior advisors said I met my BSL focus reqt's, take something easy. I took BYU Media in American Politics. What you stated is exactly what I encountered. I rec'd an "A" but rec'd no feedback whatsoever. The way they are designed though, you can get a good grade. The final was a lot tougher than I expected. Overall, not a good experience.