Beware of diploma mills for your college education

Diploma mills are the organizations that can steal both time and money from your college education. They disguise themselves with attractive offers of earning a college degree from home or at their campus in a short period of time in almost every degree program imaginable. What they don’t tell you is that most of these “schools” are not recognized by regional and national accrediting institutions set up by the US Department of Education. This leads the newly crowned degree holder to have a degree that isn’t worth the paper on which it is printed. Knowing how to spot one of these diploma mills can be the way to make or break your future.

One of the biggest fears of students is that online colleges are not properly accredited and most of them are diploma mills. That is certainly untrue. Most online colleges are not diploma mills, and one fine example of that is here: Indiana Wesleyan University Online Degrees.

All Diploma mills seem to follow the same type of business model, and being able to recognize the following may help to prevent you from wasting any of your valuable time:

• They lack accreditation by a nationally recognized accrediting agency. There are, however, unaccredited colleges and universities that are not necessarily diploma mills. Many of these schools will be open with their lack of accreditation and can easily be found on their website. Some diploma mills may also claim accreditation by an “accreditation mill” and refer to themselves as “fully accredited”.
• Their address is a postal box or mail forwarding service or suite numbers. There is no actual learning facility.
• There is little or no interaction with professors, and only are there to serve by giving students corrections in their work or for references.
• They advertise that their degrees can be obtained within a few days, weeks or months from the time of enrollment, and back-dating is possible.
• Tuition rates are provided by a “per degree” basis, instead of “by credit” or “by course”.
• The mill will try to create a sense of urgency with prospective students by convincing them to  “enroll now” before tuition or fees are increased.
• The institution has no library, personnel, publication or research.
• Promotional literature contains grammatical and spelling errors, words in Latin, extravagant or pretentious language, and sample diplomas. This can also be reflected on their website.
• The school is advertised using unsolicited electronic mail or other questionable methods.
• Despite being situated in such a diploma mill-friendly country, the school has no students from that country, and is run entirely by non-native staff.

These are just a few items that prospective college students should be aware of. Diploma mills cost thousands of students tons of money and time issuing worthless degrees that won’t help a student be fully qualified for the career they seek. Make sure you follow the criteria mentioned above when you begin your college search to avoid this possible frustration down the line.

Indiana Wesleyan University offers fully and legitimately accredited degree programs through IWU online. Check out what they can offer you here: Indiana Wesleyan University Online Degrees.