Learn About These Education Scams

You may be looking for the perfect degree from a reputed institution to set the path for your dream career. It has also become a trend to take up online courses for upskilling so that you can aim for a higher position in the organization or shift to a different role. It would be unfortunate to end up falling for an Education Scam and not just lose your money, but also face the disappointment of being unable to fulfil your ambitions.

Common Education Scams

With online education aka e-learning being more prevalent with each passing year, the number of online education scams are increasing too. Be aware about these Education Scams.

Degree Mills

A degree mill is any academic institution that operates without the knowledge of accrediting organizations. They offer a variety of degrees but their curriculum has not been approved. 

The degree mill will claim or imply to be legitimate but the degrees they offer have no real worth as the online college program is invalid or unrecognized. Their only goal is to collect fees from students. Some of these organizations use names that resemble those of well-known colleges or universities.

A degree mill might guarantee a degree to the student without completing any coursework or on the strength of work experience alone. For example, an online school may say that you can earn a four-year college degree in a year without previously earned college credits. 

Poor-quality Courses

There are many courses available online that are aggressively marketed and carry a heavy price tag. However, an expensive course does not always mean that the level of education will be top-notch. Many such courses have surface-level content that does not help in gaining any practical experience. The coursework may even be outdated.

Additionally, the course may lack opportunities for interactions between the students and teachers. Alumni networks, mentorship and relevant work experience such as internships are also things that are likely to not be offered in these courses. Ultimately, the student does not gain any real benefit from the course.

e-Learning Subscription Scams

A ‘free trial’ for an online learning website might seem like a good way to get an idea of the platform’s offerings before deciding to subscribe. However, watch out for platforms that make it mandatory to add payment information such as bank or card details to your account. 

If you read the fine print, there may be clauses saying that you are authorizing the learning platform to charge you on a monthly basis unless you manually cancel the subscription. Therefore, you may end up getting charged even if you were left unimpressed and never took up any courses on the platform.

Discontinuing the subscription itself might be a difficult task that requires jumping through several hoops. Worst of all, there may be no way to get a refund for the subscription fees that you have already paid, as you gave the company permission to charge you when you agreed to the Terms of Service.

Assignment Writing Scams

This scam is slightly tangential to the other scams mentioned in this article, but it is shockingly common. There are several websites that offer to help students complete their assignments in exchange for a fee. Not only are these services unethical, but almost none of them have any credibility. 

The site may falsely claim to have a roster of experienced writers, when in reality, the projects are outsourced to amateurs to save costs. Online reviews of these sites are also usually fake and they have strict ‘no refunds’ policies. Some of these companies take things a step further by extorting students. They threaten to report the student to the university for trying to cheat on their assignments unless they pay more money. 

How to Avoid Education Scams

Below are a few tips and checks that can help you spot an Education Scam:

• Verify the accreditation: If an institution is accredited, it means that the coursework has been reviewed by peers in the education field and meets acceptable standards of quality.  Firstly, check if there is any mention by the institution itself about being accredited. If there is, then try to verify with the accrediting organization whether the institution truly is recognized.
  
  
• Copycat Names: Is the organization trying to pass itself off or implying an association with a reputed institution? For example, there are many small-time online universities with ‘Oxford’ in their name that have no relation to the University of Oxford.
  
  
• Lax admission criteria: Scam universities focus entirely on getting as much money as possible from as many students, which means they don’t have any strict rules for eligibility. Unless it is an open university, easy admission could well be a trap.
  
  
• Upfront fees: Proceed with caution if the organization is asking you to pay the entire tuition fees in advance, especially if they offer a significant discount for doing so. It could mean that no one ends up completing the course. Genuine institutions will allow fees to be paid per semester or year.
  
  
• Talk to Alumni: LinkedIn is a great way to connect with people who have completed or are enrolled in the course. They can share their experiences about the course including the pros and cons, and whether it helped them achieve career goals.