photo credit: stuartpilbrow

A few years back, I attended another online school. I had always dreamed of going to college, but life and responsibilities often got in the way. Eventually I decided I would go online and picked one of the first accredited schools that I found. The school, sadly, was highly overpriced and I learned little while attending there. In fact, in one class I practically taught the class myself (something I was not necessarily qualified to do). I quit that school when I took a class with another professor that had absolutely no qualifications to teach the class I was in. At that point, I had all but given up on online education.

After a few months, I decided to go back, assuming that I could find a school that was as close to a traditional school as possible. I chose APU because they were formed to make sure that people traveling in the military would still be able to get the education they deserved. This portion of the school (it’s actually the same school and classes, just a different subset) is known as AMU (American Military University). I liked the wide range of degree options that the school offered, the fair prices (a term costs around $3,000 for 12 credits), and the numerous options for classes in general.

I also enjoy the fact that many of the professors are professionals in their field. These are people that have first-hand knowledge about the subjects they are teaching. You won’t get a person that only has book knowledge (or no knowledge at all). All of the professors that I have encountered enjoy what they do, in class, and in their field.

Depending on the classes that you want to take you can choose from 8 weeks or 16 weeks. APU/AMU offers a monthly start schedule. This differs from a traditional University, which makes you start on their schedule.

Some Interesting Facts about APU:

APU is a member institution of regionally- and nationally-accredited American Public University System (APUS), recognized as a leading education provider by numerous military, federal, private and public sector employers

According to the Military Times annual industry top-50 rankings for 2010, APU’s sister institution, American Military University (AMU), is the number one education provider to the U.S. military

In 2009, APUS received the Sloan Consortium’s Ralph E. Gomory award for quality online education and is also a two-time winner of the Sloan’s Effective Practice Award

In 2008, the National Survey of Student Engagement found that 97% of seniors enrolled at APUS had an extremely favorable view of the online learning system and would overwhelmingly attend again if they could start their college career over

The greater APUS virtual community numbers more than 70,000 classmates, 12,000 alumni, and more than 1,500 faculty and staff collaborating across time zones and borders in more than 100 countries worldwide

If you want to learn more about APU and their benefits for busy moms like me you can check out the APU Moms Portal or you can visit the APU Homepage if you want to learn anything else about the programs and the way things are done while attending this online institution.

Disclosure:
“I wrote this review while participating in a blog campaign by Mom Central on behalf of American Public University. Mom Central sent me a gift card to thank me for taking the time to participate.”

Technorati Tags: American Public University, American Military University, College, Online University, School, Overview, Moms, Education

Having more than one computer works is a necessity in this household. We tend to work with three computers. A laptop for our on the go use and two desktops (one for me and the other for Dom). We’re both in college and run multiple full-time jobs, as well as working on the computer. In short, our computers are our lifeline in many ways. We a few months after the Studio was sent back my XPS died. It would have cost me money I didn’t have to fix it, so I figured I would save up money and buy something that I would like more instead.

As it was my birthday this week I thought I was going to have that opportunity, but it didn’t work out that way. Unfortunately, while I was planning to buy a new computer for myself, Dom’s computer was slowly dying. I prefer to work on a desktop at home, but it’s necessary for Dom because it’s hard for him to work a laptop from his wheelchair. It’s easier to have a desktop for his work, too. You see Dom is in charge of all of our website building. He makes the awesome templates that design our blogs and his computers hold the huge programs that get those jobs done.

Apparently, Dell’s custom drivers were unable to be updated on the system we purchased (they are created by Dell) so he was continually having graphics problems. This turned into the inability to use some of his Adobe products. It got to the point where he was hardly able to do any of his work and if he could work, it wasn’t as effective as we would have liked it.

Well, I like to think I am pretty resourceful, so I figured whatever the problem was could be fixed. It’s not a virus or any associated malware issues. It’s a buggy computer. I purchased a new HP Pavillion for my birthday and gave it to Dom for the good of our websites. I figured I could reformat the Dell and suffer until we can make the money to replace that hunk of junk. Well, when I got it moved into my office and turned it on it started giving me crap about an error and it would not boot up. I have been trying to fix it all day long.

It looks like, at the very least, it will need a new hard drive. I am not sure I want to bother spending the money, considering I am sure that’s not the last of the problems it will see. There is a chance that it could come back on, though at this point, after hours of trying to fix it, I am not holding my breath. So, I am out a computer. Again.

The moral of the story is that I would spend twice as much before I would buy another Dell. Although, it’s worth saying that I spent $300 less on the HP we just purchased and it’s an all around much better system. The only bad thing we’ve found on it so far is the speakers, which is much better than the list of complaints we could form about our previous Dell computers.

Technorati Tags: Sony VAIO, HP, HP Pavillion, New Computer, Dell XPS, Hunk of Junk, Computers, Broken