Western Governors University

The first part of my experience at WGU was positive. In the beginning, it worked well because the classes are self paced and I was able to complete them in my own time. Navigating the home page and submitting assignments was easy. However, this school lacks transparency and honesty with their students. When I was applying, there was no mention of clinical hours and I chose this program because it was a great option for me with a full time job. I specifically asked about clinical hours because I knew... Read More I did not want to enroll in a program that required any clinical time. I found out about the clinical hours when a new tab popped up labeled "field experience" on my WGU homepage saying that I had overdue tasks. This was in my third semester. When I reached out to my program mentor, I was told that I would not have to worry about these tasks until the last semester. When I did start working on the tasks, I felt like I had to scramble because the process to find a clinical site and get approved could take over 60 days. It was difficult to get into contact with the field e None of this information was presented to me. The staff did not provide clear answers to my questions and it was difficult to get a phone call or email back from the placement coordinator for the field experience. there were no suggested clinical sites and we had to find our own preceptors. In addition to this, the school tuition increased and the school did not communicate this change either. I would not recommend this program to anyone in the future due to the lack of honesty and communication. Overall, this last semester has been very frustrating because of this. If you are thinking about enrolling in WGU for the BSN nursing program, save yourself the time and find a different school.

I would not waste your time or money. After $10K I have nothing to show for it, and it’s not for lack of effort. I busted my butt in every single class, like most other people. I work a full time job, try to maintain a normal life, and study as much as possible. 1 class kept me from getting my degree, 1. I attempted to take the exam 3 times, and it didn’t matter if it would’ve been an open book exam, the material never matched what I was studying. The PA was zero help and didn’t even line up slightly... Read More close. I would open the exam and it was like I had never seen the content before. The fact the class had a 3rd attempt exam pass study plan should have said all I needed to know. And well, here I am today, $10K less, and nothing to show for it. What a waste of a year. Mentor, worthless. CI, well I can’t say too much, all they did was provide the study plan, which never lined up to the exam. I just feel like I got cheated and robbed at the same time. Literally busted my butt for nothing and don’t even expect them to care, they have your money, they don’t care!! If I had to give advice, I’d say pick another school!!!!

Okay, well I do not want to repetitive but this school is one of the worst in terms of getting any form of education well in my experience education for elementary teacher preparation. They expect you to grasp a whole semester’s worth of knowledge and implement it to a final exam, now I know this is common even in a normal campus but in a normal campus you do not have a person staring at you while you take a test. That’s one the least ignorant things of this school, in this school a C grade is not... Read More a pass you must get an A or a B equivalent or you will not pass. This makes the work even harder because I remember failing a test and not by much it was clearly a solid C+ or a B but I could not take it again until I had to do the assignment quizzes making a simple retake of a test take you longer to do then simply receiving a C+ at a normal campus. It is also annoying that the mentors are so lazy and ignorant that all they do is check up on you once a week to see how you are doing, when you ask a mentor a question to assist you all they do is tell you too contact the teacher or the financial aid depending on what you need but they do not help you at all with anything, all mentors do is call you to check on how much work you have done nothing else like to improve a person pass his or her grades. If you want to be stared at while you are taking an already anxious filled test, a test where you need implement everything you needed to read which is a lot. I mean theirs links into links into links of stuff someone needs to read and learn, so yeah, and you want no assistance from anyone that’s even including the teacher because even teachers here have a hard time finding solutions for you. And you want to pay money for an educational institution that doesn’t accept C’s as a passing grade. Here’s the school for you. Go to a school worth it, to a school that assists you when you have problems, a school that you can find solutions within it or outside faster and more efficiently. Go to a school where you take a test, do homework in sections, so that when you come to doing the final test you can have an idea of what you are doing, and also a school where someone isn’t staring at you at everything you are doing in an already difficult test, yes teachers look at you while taking a test or pass by you to check on you and even sometimes help you on a test, but they aren’t staring at you telling you not to look into your notes or not have a mini cheat moment. And if you want to pass a class with a C because you are busy with work or other classes, then this isn’t it. Oh and when you read something in an another campus you read it straightforward you aren’t sent into links after links after links that are irrelevant or if relevant you aren’t reading it separately from your original readings. Online or offline I find reading simpler when you aren’t sent into different links. WGU is the worst educational experience I have ever experienced this wasn’t it. Please find something better, and I’m being serious.

I had high hopes for this school. I have an associates degree, worked full time in a school environment in a non-certified paraprofessional position (and had for over a decade at the time I was a student), and thought it would be a good way to finish my Bachelors while still working full-time. What a waste of time. First, let’s talk about the courses themselves. It’s a compilation of summarized information from websites, a bunch of links to other websites (some of them are broken), and I can tell... Read More you from working in a school environment that a lot of the information that is taught is outdated. Many of the assignments involve watching random videos of classrooms from the ‘90s and ‘00s; it felt like a waste. Schools just aren’t like that anymore. The school claims to be go-at-your-own pace, but if you take too long to get something submitted the phone calls, emails, and texts come in. A lot of the times, these unscheduled calls would come at inappropriate times (while work in a classroom during the week, church time on Sundays, and even late in the evenings). The courses are not designed by the instructors, nor are they graded by them. The tasks you have to do are not traditional papers on topics like at a traditional college; they’re very specific multi-part short answer assignments. Because they’re graded by evaluators on a common rubric, you have to answer these questions in a VERY specific way, so there’s little room for creativity. The highest level of support you’ll get from the instructors is a rehashing of what the rubric states.

This school is a joke. I have an associates degree from a prior college. When it came time to transfer they did not take all my credit. I basically started over again with them. I had medical term already from my previous college that I graduated from and they didn’t even except, biology and lab as well and they would not take it. There were some other healthcare classes I took at the college I got my associates degree from that they said I needed but would not transfer over. There grading system... Read More sucks. It’s on a pass or fail basis. They make you take assessments which when you do that it’s an online Procter that is over in India. The paper assessment are a joke I resubmitted one 3 times when I fixed every time and it still was not good enough. That is why this college is cheaper than all the other ones. I hope you guys get sued like all the other colleges that were t doing right by the students.

I attended for 4.5 years. On year 2 was "talked into a program change" Almost no credits transferred from the first 2 years, at 3.5 years I was talked into a program change. Rather than providing the support and guidance and actual education, there I was losing credits again. After basically starting over twice, I was in my final term (prior to student teaching) My entire term was made up of one final exam. I had one opportunity to take it (due to scheduling at Sylvan Learning Center where the exams... Read More were proctored) The scheduled date was 6 days before the end of my term. I was hospitalized with pneumonia; I came out of the hospital to my testing the following day. I got a ride to the testing center, very sick. I was placed in a room packed with people, no windows, hotter than the dickens, no airflow at all. I had contacted my mentor to be allowed more time, but nope. Sylvan put me in the last seat available in a corner with a fan blowing in my face. I requested to be moved. I couldn't breathe, couldn't think. They didn't have any other seats available but offered to have me sit in their lobby for 2 hours for a seat to open up that wasn't in front of the fan. I agreed. I got a new seat, took the exam. Struggled like crazy to breathe while fighting a fever. I did not pass. I missed the exam pass by 3 points. I was kicked out for 6 months for failing my term. I was told I could return in 6 months. I emailed, I called. No one would answer the phone, no one answered my emails. I was literally ghosted. I would NEVER recommend this school to anyone. They should be ashamed of themselves. They got their money, that is all that they wanted.

after i failed two times, they make me pay from my own pock it. i faild two times for security+ and two network+.. thank you so much for making pay for class the i suppose to take with you, since you are the school. lets count how much that cost me security+ $392 USD network+ $358 USD and its impossible to finsish in one term, so new term is 4000$ so how is that cheap ? not to mention how expensive ITIL certification is. and on top is isc2 you have to drive to test center yea is not online. you thought... Read More is online.

im in Cloud Computing i hate WGU because of isc2. i don't like wgu force us to take the test in testing center for useless certification. im paying the school to learn online and with them instead, they tell us to go to tests with third party certs so you can pass the class. where is the school management ? why we third party certification outside WGU platform ? how is this online school ? there no teacher, no online class(yes no teacher you study at: udemy or linkedin, tests must be taking in test... Read More center)

WGU is not online. they say 100% online and you take it at anytime. A lot of the Certification Not online. don't bother going there they will lie. IS Not Online school. if you thinking going to WGU is not 100% online Please check the, must of them must take them outside of WGU which mean go to test center. so let me get this i pay WGU and i teach my self and i go somewhere else to take test ? does Wgu teach me anything from them i mean there is 10 certification thats half of the program. I Do Not... Read More recommend anyone go this school

It is not even worth my time to mention the quality of the classes, because I have had to waste most of my time complaining about the ineptitude of the financial departments. I have military benefits through my husband and they took three months to get it processed... for my financial aid it has been well over two months, they just now got it disbursed to my account, but of course it will still be another 7-10 days for them to to stop bumbling around and get my refunded portion to me. The amount... Read More of stress that I have had to deal with is unreasonable and unacceptable... I would not recomend others to take courses at this school, I seriously doubt they actually have a future as an institution

in cybersecurity program there is 9 certs useless certification, you MUST take all the certification other wise you won't graduate. and NOT all the certification are online some must be take in person. there is no alternative classes for those who want to take it online so they force the students to go to the test center to take useless certification. if you fail two times in any of these useless certification you must pay from your own pocket, and for example isc2 if you fail two times you must... Read More wait 3 month to retake, some certs are expensive.

I loved attending WGU. It is the only school where I felt I got my money's worth. Coursework was cohesive to assignments and gave options to take little quizzes or to delve deeper into the content. Although some might find program mentors irritating, I generally enjoyed having someone I could count on to keep me on task and help me organize courses, tests, and students teaching to my schedule. My mentor was able to help me with class suggestions and any information about the program requirements... Read More I needed. I love that this school didn't just give me a grade and a short explanation of what I did wrong or right (which almost every professor I've had has done). WGU allows students to redo assignments until they reach competency. I got explicit details on what I needed to improve and was usually emailed by professors who offered advice. The only thing I will say is that when my program mentor told me that my new course was harder, I had to right away make an appointment with the professor, or I wouldn't get availability until the next week or two. I also love that this school gave me the option to have one-on-one video discussions with professors about my work, cohorts, recorded webinars for each section of tasks (as opposed to super long sessions of whole tasks), and detailed resource support pages that gave me access to everything I'd need to complete my assignments and tests (assignments, example papers, checklists, etc.). Usually, when I went to other colleges (2), I had to comb through books and resources to find out how exactly I was going to complete my assignment (understanding what exactly the teacher was asking me to do). At WGU I get to just spend time learning content that is actually relevant to my assignments and completing my assignments. I didn't have to comb through books and resources to try and figure out what was in tests because I knew that course content always directly related to my assessments. This school is easy in the sense that it allows you to focus only on your work and apply your newly learned skills, and hard in the sense that you don't pass a class unless assignments are completed to rubric standards. Overall, this school is the only school I feel gave me money's worth of resources and professional development. Also, this school is not for procrastinators, how fast you get done is usually up to you.

Pros: Study at your pace, excellent mentor, quick services when there are any issues, they work with you, and the school as a whole is understanding/friendly people. Cons: Grading system! The professors do NOT grade the assignments. There are a separate set of people who grade the assignment. They are supposed to grade what is required, but they fail you each time because they unnecessarily require you to do more than what is required. I had to complain about this a few times. One professor said... Read More you need to include certain words for them to accept...are they robots grading these??? Two of my previous professors had to appeal because they said they saw I included everything that was required. This is wasting everyone's time and money. Half the time, I regret going here only due to the grading system. I should have paid more for a professional, organized way to grade things...not have people who can't read or don't know the requirements to grade your assignments separately because it is very inconsistent. I find it ridiculous that the professors don't grade the papers. One of my classmates pass by being very vague, yet the other fails for different reasons.

WGU is great if you are self-motivated and persistent enough to learn complex materials on your own. Many people write bad reviews because they probably have a different expectation of what they will need to do. The truth is WGU provides you with everything you need to learn. The books are all you need, but there is A LOT that you have to learn and when you can't understand something you just have to keep reviewing it until it finally clicks. Beyond the books, you do have other resources provided... Read More by the teachers, so there are no excuses besides the ones you make for yourself. If you want to finish in one semester, you can do that, but you have to work your butt off. If you are working or have other distractions in your life, you can still finish in one semester if you are really disciplined. If you have some familiarity with the material and no distractions, you should be able to finish within 3-4 months if you study all day every day. If you want to start a program, you really need to ask yourself if you have what it takes. Are you ready to sit at your desk for 3 months while everyone else is having fun? You can keep pushing yourself when your brain is tired and all you want to do is watch some tv or play video games? To sum up, WGU is what you make of it. You can learn the material to just get by and pass the tests or you can take the time to master the material. I made sure to take good notes for the subjects that were really important to me and my future career. I'll review those notes from time to time as I start my new job. Hope you do well. Stick with it. Your future is in your own hands!