BS or bust - TESU BS in Data Science and Analytics

[Merlin]

In response to stretcharmy, WGU does not have professors. Competency-based programs don't have real teachers. You teach yourself or ask for help from other students. You get what you pay for. The tuition is dirt cheap because they don't pay for instructors with manageable class sizes.

That is not entirely true. WGU used to be less hands-on and relied more on mentors and other students for help, but that has been changing recently. They have retired the idea of course mentors; every course has at least one and usually more than one instructor now. At the MBA level, most courses have 2-3 doctorate-level instructors. They provide regular (multiple times per week) instruction via interactive webinars in addition to pre-recorded videos and one-on-one instruction via telephone and video calls. I've worked with a few of the instructors and they are very helpful.

It is still not required that students interact with a course instructor if they want to learn things on their own, but it is becoming almost mandatory that students interact with the instructors at some level. The instructors control when students are permitted to retake exams, for example. In the future, I'm sure that there will be some mandatory interaction since that is the direction that the school is clearly moving.

I assume this is because there is a growing body of students that are not adult learners coming back to complete degrees, but rather people coming in right out of high school or without much professional job experience. I also suspect that the report from the auditor at the department of education had something to do with it. Even though it was dismissed, the report suggested that WGU didn't qualify as a proper college due to lack of instructor interaction. I imagine WGU is making changes to avoid that perception.