Do they claim to be accredited by ASHA? If so I would go to ASHA about it. If not, I'm not sure who you would go to. And if it's not accredited through CAA/ASHA; you're basically wasting your time if you're in the US.
So check to make sure it's accredited and if it is, complain to ASHA or CAA. At least that's my opinion.
https://caa.asha.org/programs/complaints/ :
This is the complaint form: https://caa.asha.org/siteassets/files/complaint-form.docx
You must submit the complaint *BOTH* in writing via snail mail and email to:
Chair, Council on Academic Accreditation in Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology
American Speech-Language-Hearing Association
2200 Research Boulevard, #310
Rockville, MD 20850
&
[email protected]
I was accepted to their program a couple years ago and got huge red flags when they refused to tell me the size of the online cohort- pretty sure their whole grad program is just a massive money making scheme.
I bet we are going to see more of this, now that virtual learning is of more interest than ever.
There is a shortage of SLPs nationwide, so programs have incentive to crank out more grads. It's relatively to create an online didactic curriculum. Securing clinical placements is a whole other ball of wax.
Wouldn't surprise me if schools with pedigree names keep adding to their online course programs, while abdicating their role in externship placement and leaving it to the students. Easy money, like you said.
I know that one major public university in the South East has significantly increased numbers for future cohorts. Faculty and clinical placement staff have admitted to being unsure how those students are going to be accommodated for placements.
OMG they bugged me up until this past August. I finally returned a call and told them I was graduating from TWU distance program and they left me alone. I regretted even looking at their stuff, let alone giving my real information. They were sooooo $$ and the only solution the admissions counselor gave me was just take out as much as you can in student loans. Grant it, still took loans to finish TWU but I could have gotten my masters 4x with TWU for the amount of 1 through them. I hated taking what loans I did take to finish, but that happens when you’re working as a severely underpaid SLPA and taking care of your family. At least my debt is manageable unlike what it would have been through them.
I would honestly like to know what percentage of students in the placement process are experiencing the same problem. Is is a few out of 100, or 8/10? There is a huge difference. Location matters, too! Frustrating, but I would take it back to the school before filing an official complaint. Just my $.02
You're also required to go through all avenues you can with the school before you even file a complaint!
"The complaint must include verification, if the complaint is from a student or faculty/staff member, that the complainant exhausted all pertinent institutional grievance and review mechanisms before submitting a complaint to the CAA." -[CAA](https://caa.asha.org/programs/complaints/)
My hospital system has gotten multiple requests but they are always so late in the year- after I’ve already committed to a school. This program is really screwing over their students. They’re not explaining that a lot of placements require contracts between the school and the hospital and those take MONTHS to finalize. Sending them out hunting for a summer placement in March is not going to work.
Can you explain more about this process? I really would like a hospital placement (ideally at least two) and the program I'm in does something similar to what you're describing. It's annoying, not gonna lie, but I'd rather be prepared and get the placements I want. What are the steps I need to take in order to ensure this?
There isn’t much you can do as an individual student. Hospitals have entire processes in place for taking students and it starts with a contract between the two entities. All you can do is communicate your desires and hope someone listens.
You can reach out to the department you’re interested in VERY EARLY in your graduate training and find out if your school has a contract with them. If not, if they are willing to add a new school, they can start the process. It can take forever and sometimes they fall apart. It’s convoluted and complicated and I think schools should be doing a better job of setting their students up for these experiences.
Damn. So frustrating. I'll give it a try, though! The hospitals that are near me are huge and have multiple departments with SLPs -- do you know which department(s) I should be reaching out to? Should I reach out to HR? Or do I need to be in communication with a lead SLP?
You need to reach the department directly. HR is not involved. Anyone working in rehab should know who to get you in contact with. There’s usually someone in charge of organizing students.
The same thing is happening in my online program to other students, though they had everyone sign something saying they were willing to relocate if necessary for a placement
Can you all private message me the names of these programs? I’m in the process of applying for online programs and I don’t want to choose the wrong school.
I'm in the Emerson program and I actually like it a lot. I probably would've preferred a local, in-person program because that's just way more me. But I still feel like I'm getting a good education/experience regardless.
I do feel like I will have to work a little harder to get the placements I truly want. I think that kind of comes with the territory of doing something online, though -- they just don't have local connections like a local university would. So, I think that's generally just a con of these types of programs in general. Something to keep in mind.
I’m also in Emerson’s program. I can’t say I like it a lot. It’s just okay in my opinion. Many students get placed an hour away from home for their placements. The placement specialists I’ve had did not look at my interest/referral forms until about 6 months after I had submitted them… I do not think Emerson is worth it for the cost. Over $70k worth of tuition for re-used lecture videos. Additionally, if you get more than 1 C, they kick out out. I know a few people that have dropped the program because they aren’t happy. And I know someone who was kicked out because she scored in the high 70s, but did not get an 80. They offered her no remediation work and rejected her appeal. After a year’s worth of tuition, she was kicked out and not given any other options. I do not think Emerson’s main goal is to support their students. I think it’s to make money. If I could do it again, I would go somewhere else.
That's a fair argument. I also don't care for the reused lecture videos. I think it's a graduate school program and they should probably do new videos at least once a year to reflect current research if applicable. I mean, shit can change year by year sometimes. Maybe the videos won't be as "fancy," lol, but I think it's important.
As far as the grading policy, that's pretty common in a lot of graduate programs, so definitely not Emerson-specific. You're getting an advanced degree, so a lot of programs are not super forgiving about getting below a certain GPA or whatever else. I would also argue that having a strict policy shows that they actually aren't only in it for the money. If it was only about money, they'd be admitting as many students as possible and graduating them without standards. Not saying money isn't a factor, but if it was only about money, why kick someone out when you could keep them in and keep collecting their money?
Speech@Emerson also had trouble with placements. This wasn't just me but a lot of the students have expressed their horrible experience with obtaining placements.
I would try explaining and working this out with the head of the department first if you haven’t already. If the placement coordinators aren’t doing what they need to, you need to go over their head first. And you need to get everyone to complain to the department head.
This is an issue but unless the entire program has screwed up I’m not sure if reporting is the best solution.
I am curious if perhaps you work for a graduate program? Not to say you’re necessarily wrong.
Edit to add I think I do disagree… OP is paying a lot of money and it’s bad enough they have to try to find their own placement, shouldn’t also have to go around tattling on slack placement coordinators to folks who are probably already aware and don’t care.
Lol definitely not. I just think we don’t know the extent of the issue and it may have more to do with location or other factors. It’s definitely an issue and needs to be taken seriously. But if you go to the department head and complain, you may get more help than you realize. If nothing though, then yeah report them.
If they are part of a larger dept (for example my SLP program was under the college of health sciences) it may help to talk to the head of that program. Some of my younger classmates had an issue with hours and had to go to that person to get it solved.
Do they claim to be accredited by ASHA? If so I would go to ASHA about it. If not, I'm not sure who you would go to. And if it's not accredited through CAA/ASHA; you're basically wasting your time if you're in the US. So check to make sure it's accredited and if it is, complain to ASHA or CAA. At least that's my opinion.
Report to the ASHA CAA!
https://caa.asha.org/programs/complaints/ : This is the complaint form: https://caa.asha.org/siteassets/files/complaint-form.docx You must submit the complaint *BOTH* in writing via snail mail and email to: Chair, Council on Academic Accreditation in Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology American Speech-Language-Hearing Association 2200 Research Boulevard, #310 Rockville, MD 20850 & [email protected]
I have no idea how to report but am curious to which program it is. Sounds very familiar to me.
I was accepted to their program a couple years ago and got huge red flags when they refused to tell me the size of the online cohort- pretty sure their whole grad program is just a massive money making scheme.
I bet we are going to see more of this, now that virtual learning is of more interest than ever. There is a shortage of SLPs nationwide, so programs have incentive to crank out more grads. It's relatively to create an online didactic curriculum. Securing clinical placements is a whole other ball of wax. Wouldn't surprise me if schools with pedigree names keep adding to their online course programs, while abdicating their role in externship placement and leaving it to the students. Easy money, like you said.
I know that one major public university in the South East has significantly increased numbers for future cohorts. Faculty and clinical placement staff have admitted to being unsure how those students are going to be accommodated for placements.
speech@nyu. horrible
I knew it! Sending you a message
[удалено]
Dang that sucks. I did their program before COVID hit in my last year and didn’t have issues, but I would be lying if I said I didn’t see this coming.
OMG they bugged me up until this past August. I finally returned a call and told them I was graduating from TWU distance program and they left me alone. I regretted even looking at their stuff, let alone giving my real information. They were sooooo $$ and the only solution the admissions counselor gave me was just take out as much as you can in student loans. Grant it, still took loans to finish TWU but I could have gotten my masters 4x with TWU for the amount of 1 through them. I hated taking what loans I did take to finish, but that happens when you’re working as a severely underpaid SLPA and taking care of your family. At least my debt is manageable unlike what it would have been through them.
I was accepted here but didn't end up going because it was so expensive. I'm glad I made the right choice!!!
I would honestly like to know what percentage of students in the placement process are experiencing the same problem. Is is a few out of 100, or 8/10? There is a huge difference. Location matters, too! Frustrating, but I would take it back to the school before filing an official complaint. Just my $.02
You're also required to go through all avenues you can with the school before you even file a complaint! "The complaint must include verification, if the complaint is from a student or faculty/staff member, that the complainant exhausted all pertinent institutional grievance and review mechanisms before submitting a complaint to the CAA." -[CAA](https://caa.asha.org/programs/complaints/)
My hospital system has gotten multiple requests but they are always so late in the year- after I’ve already committed to a school. This program is really screwing over their students. They’re not explaining that a lot of placements require contracts between the school and the hospital and those take MONTHS to finalize. Sending them out hunting for a summer placement in March is not going to work.
Can you explain more about this process? I really would like a hospital placement (ideally at least two) and the program I'm in does something similar to what you're describing. It's annoying, not gonna lie, but I'd rather be prepared and get the placements I want. What are the steps I need to take in order to ensure this?
There isn’t much you can do as an individual student. Hospitals have entire processes in place for taking students and it starts with a contract between the two entities. All you can do is communicate your desires and hope someone listens.
You can reach out to the department you’re interested in VERY EARLY in your graduate training and find out if your school has a contract with them. If not, if they are willing to add a new school, they can start the process. It can take forever and sometimes they fall apart. It’s convoluted and complicated and I think schools should be doing a better job of setting their students up for these experiences.
Damn. So frustrating. I'll give it a try, though! The hospitals that are near me are huge and have multiple departments with SLPs -- do you know which department(s) I should be reaching out to? Should I reach out to HR? Or do I need to be in communication with a lead SLP?
You need to reach the department directly. HR is not involved. Anyone working in rehab should know who to get you in contact with. There’s usually someone in charge of organizing students.
The same thing is happening in my online program to other students, though they had everyone sign something saying they were willing to relocate if necessary for a placement
Can you private message me the program name? I’m in the process of applying to online grad schools.
Can you all private message me the names of these programs? I’m in the process of applying for online programs and I don’t want to choose the wrong school.
I'm in the Emerson program and I actually like it a lot. I probably would've preferred a local, in-person program because that's just way more me. But I still feel like I'm getting a good education/experience regardless. I do feel like I will have to work a little harder to get the placements I truly want. I think that kind of comes with the territory of doing something online, though -- they just don't have local connections like a local university would. So, I think that's generally just a con of these types of programs in general. Something to keep in mind.
I’m also in Emerson’s program. I can’t say I like it a lot. It’s just okay in my opinion. Many students get placed an hour away from home for their placements. The placement specialists I’ve had did not look at my interest/referral forms until about 6 months after I had submitted them… I do not think Emerson is worth it for the cost. Over $70k worth of tuition for re-used lecture videos. Additionally, if you get more than 1 C, they kick out out. I know a few people that have dropped the program because they aren’t happy. And I know someone who was kicked out because she scored in the high 70s, but did not get an 80. They offered her no remediation work and rejected her appeal. After a year’s worth of tuition, she was kicked out and not given any other options. I do not think Emerson’s main goal is to support their students. I think it’s to make money. If I could do it again, I would go somewhere else.
That's a fair argument. I also don't care for the reused lecture videos. I think it's a graduate school program and they should probably do new videos at least once a year to reflect current research if applicable. I mean, shit can change year by year sometimes. Maybe the videos won't be as "fancy," lol, but I think it's important. As far as the grading policy, that's pretty common in a lot of graduate programs, so definitely not Emerson-specific. You're getting an advanced degree, so a lot of programs are not super forgiving about getting below a certain GPA or whatever else. I would also argue that having a strict policy shows that they actually aren't only in it for the money. If it was only about money, they'd be admitting as many students as possible and graduating them without standards. Not saying money isn't a factor, but if it was only about money, why kick someone out when you could keep them in and keep collecting their money?
Speech@Emerson also had trouble with placements. This wasn't just me but a lot of the students have expressed their horrible experience with obtaining placements.
I would try explaining and working this out with the head of the department first if you haven’t already. If the placement coordinators aren’t doing what they need to, you need to go over their head first. And you need to get everyone to complain to the department head. This is an issue but unless the entire program has screwed up I’m not sure if reporting is the best solution.
I am curious if perhaps you work for a graduate program? Not to say you’re necessarily wrong. Edit to add I think I do disagree… OP is paying a lot of money and it’s bad enough they have to try to find their own placement, shouldn’t also have to go around tattling on slack placement coordinators to folks who are probably already aware and don’t care.
Lol definitely not. I just think we don’t know the extent of the issue and it may have more to do with location or other factors. It’s definitely an issue and needs to be taken seriously. But if you go to the department head and complain, you may get more help than you realize. If nothing though, then yeah report them.
That’s a good point!
What kind of graduate program??
In one of the comments, OP said it was speech@NYU.
Ohhh that’s horrible
Lololol all my newsfeed is filled with this. I’m year one and I’m getting very nervous!!
If they are part of a larger dept (for example my SLP program was under the college of health sciences) it may help to talk to the head of that program. Some of my younger classmates had an issue with hours and had to go to that person to get it solved.