University of New England

I enrolled in the Prehealth courses to meet pre-req requirements for graduate degrees, particularly as they offered self-paced online courses that were not offered by community colleges or universities in my area. Unlike prior virtual courses, there was exactly zero education provided. For example, in a prior science course taken asynchronously at a local college, there were lectures that were pre-recorded with several examples per lecture to guide the learning. This allowed the student to cover... Read More the material on their own schedule. At UNE, that is not the case. They give excerpts from open access textbooks that make virtually no sense without a lecture portion. They then link to Khan Academy videos, which are supposed to SUPPLEMENT lecture material, not replace it. On top of that, they don't even follow their own syllabus. Likely going to need a lawyer and their accrediting body to sort out the mess they made.

I recently signed up for Human Anatomy and Physiology to complete as a prerequisite. To be honest, I am disappointed and frustrated with the lack of transparency and non-linear approach to the course. While UNE advertises that all courses are self paced, there is no indication anywhere that the courses are self-taught. This perspective comes from the fact that the short 15 minute videos have zero instruction and do not really correlate with the assigned chapters or weekly labs.I have already spent... Read More countless hours trying to read chapters that were and were not assigned as well as watching additional videos through Khan Academy to help fill in the gaps. In addition, each course does not tell you in advance the cost of the additional lab equipment, camera, etc. that you will need to purchase after registering for the course. I wish I would have read the numerous reviews that reinforce this realization. It is so disappointing that I have spent so much money on a course in which I would be teaching myself. With all this being said, I am withdrawing from the course and continue my journey at a different university.

I am currently enrolled in the Chemistry I w/ Lab course, which is part of the Science Prerequisites For Health Professionals. I was astonished to find out in the first week that this course has very short lectures (12 minutes in weeks I and II) and that the students are expected to "self-teach", according to the student advisor, by reading the textbook and doing homework assignments from the textbook. The course plus the lab plus the lab kit are $1,800.00. For that amount of money, a full length... Read More lecture should be included, particularly for the type of course that requires substantial problem solving/calculations. I can learn from a textbook for free but I take courses to learn from an expert. Having just completed an online health related graduate degree, I have taken many online courses and have never had one where there was barely a lecture component. It's truly puzzling. In addition, because the learning is primarily from the not very good textbook (that only comes in digital form), I have had to watch numerous YouTube videos to learn the concepts and the weekly time commitment has been about 20-30 hours. The student advisor said that this is what is expected and that one should think of this course as a "part-time job". But the time commitment would be somewhat less if the professor invested more time in teaching the material so that the students don't have to dig for video lectures on YouTube. The work load is also very heavy and you can expect time consuming, detailed assignments with no guidance or instruction. I suspect the exams are going to be difficult as well. And the lab course is considered an entirely separate course so I would be expected to take two sets of final exams. This course is definitely not worth the money given other high quality options out there that offer complete lectures and more interaction with the instructors. If you sign up for this course, be prepared for a putative refund policy (40% in the first week, zero thereafter). Expect to spend 20-30 hours per week on the course and expect not to have much interaction with the professor and no TA support. I am planning to drop the course and take it elsewhere even though I am losing a lot of money by doing so.

I personally believed this course is a waste of time. I took the anatomy class with UNE thinking that this self paced course would have prerecorded lectures about the MATERIAL. No, the way of learning is ONLY by reading the textbooks, no lectures. I personally believe that it is absolutely ridiculous to be paying a teacher (no wait, a professor!) for do nothing! They're job is to TEACH and they are not. And I've even asked to have an assignment relooked, but the teacher (who you'd think is responsible... Read More for the grading) says "I have no control over the grade." I'm sorry, I work really hard when a professor is actually teaching the students and not being lazy. I use the book as an additional resource, not the only resource. How is one supposed to remember a 750 page textbook when the teacher is saying every single thing is important.

I signed up for the MSW program at UNE in early 2016. The course material was both challenging and interesting. I compare the course work to University of Victoria online that my spouse attended and Walden University that I previously attended to find the quality, quantity and difficulty of the work to be roughly equal. I was really excited about this university (UNE) as their reputation is very good. However, I was somewhat disappointed in the complex and confusing portal to access services. That... Read More is, the student services portal, blackboard, the library, the book store, finances and other services all operate independently. I realize this is how Brick and Mortar schools operate... each unit in a different building with its own network system and administrators (a series of small kingdoms)... it does get clunky and obstructive in the online space... that is, I felt continuously like I was burdened but he interface instead of focusing on the material I was learning. I completed 4 courses (all above 90%) but left the UNE for Walden due mostly to feeling like the interface clunkiness was holding me back and causing me undue stress. The faculty of UNE were top notch and the course material first rate, but I just did not feel part of a cohesive system of learning there.

UNE is expensive, but I felt it was worth it. The courses are all online which is best for me. I was able to work full time as a teacher and spend time with my family while earning my degree. My advisor was amazing and most of the professors were great. The work was easy for me, but I found that it taught me a lot and provided me with a degree I can be proud of. I was very disappointed that they do not offer a Doctoral degree that would meet my needs. I would have loved to continue my education with... Read More them!

This program seems more concerned with protecting themselves from litigation by non-compassionate conservatives than protecting liberal, moderate, compassionate conservative, pro gay rights and women's right students from emotional and psychological harm in discussion forums and group work. This school is around 80% female and a male student in our class expressed his very strong anti-abortion views in a discussion board. Several other students chimed in to express their support for him and congratulate... Read More him for speaking up and wrote things like, "the life to save is the life of the unborn". Despite the fact that this student was displaying textbook passive aggressive behavior and writing things like "I'll be a damn good social worker", "those people should be more responsible with their sex lives"....."many people can't have kids"....."I don't care if I sound like a misogynist"..., I was told that after expressing my concern that this student was unprofessional and acting unethically, I must have a phone conversation with him with our professor on the line and work out our problems with each other. This was beyond degrading and psychologically abusive. I was expected to give my personal phone number to a raging anti-abortion advocate and listen to him further express his feelings of entitlement to bombard us with his views on discussion boards. For every 5 incredible social workers they graduate, they go out of their way to dismiss intolerance as belief systems deserving of respect and coddle and nurture a future generation of "social wreckers" in the process. In another course, I was in a women's rights task group and one of the members decided to make a web page advocating for women to have free access to fertility treatment and another member felt female genital mutilation was an issue she couldn't imagine how to advocate against that she should provide resources for people who want to get FGM without judgement. The fertility treatment advocate actually tried to take credit for my work at the end of the course and claimed my webpage was her own. Even though you may be working full time and have a family while you take courses they expect you to do group work with people who are lazy, and don't want to work if it is inconvenient for them and display textbook passive aggressive behavior on-line. If you don't want to put up with this because you have no time and you expect maturity and accountability in graduate students, they will isolate you and publicly shame you for not working this out with those students. I suspect there are faculty members with radical ideas that should not be implemented as classroom policies who they refuse to call out for their psychologically abusive learning tactics. I love this school but I worry about being apart of something that fails to recognize their complacency with intolerance and excessive coddling of passive aggressive and socially loafing students.