University of Phoenix

I am a career law enforcement administrator. I have served 8 years as Chief of Police and 3 years as an elected Texas Sheriff. I remain behind the badge here in Austin, Texas. I have nothing but positives to say about the University of Phoenix. From the first day, I have always been treated as though I was physically there in class. The academic and financial team have both helped me in so many ways! I have worked extremely hard at UOPX and so far, have earned my Associate, my Bachelor, and I plan to graduate this year (2018) with an MPA. I am so very proud of this college as they should be proud to be employees. I am so sorry if others have had bad experiences, but personally, I would do it all again, right here at the University of Phoenix. #phoenix4life

I think that UOP was a very good investment into my future. The cost of school is consistent all around. You will be paying the same amount where ever you go. The online experience was the only way I was able to go back to school and now I have my BA in criminal justice. I am having no problem applying for job and obtaining interviews, and sadly I have had to decline jobs because of my schedule. I have three young children and I started school in 2011 after my first child was born. I have obtained a high GPA of 3.89, and think that if you want something bad enough you will get it. The biggest issue I have had would have to be with the other students. I have a high standard for my work and when you are paired with others who do not put the effort into class the way you do. you end picking up someone's slack so your grade does not suffer. The instructors were great and informative, and it is important to build relationships so you are able to ask for favors, like a recommendation letter or reference. I am on my way to applying for law school and going to UOP has qualified me enough to apply.

After reading some of the other reviews, especially the negative ones, I have to say that my experience has been completely different. I have had no problems with contacting my Financial Advisors, Student Advisors or Teachers. There is a lot of writing papers, quizzes, PowerPoint's, etc... but it is ONLINE people, what did you expect? That's really the only way for them to know that you are understanding the information since it is not in a traditional classroom. I work a full-time job, volunteer, have three children, one grandchild, and go to school...so it's not that you can't work in order to go to school online, but you do have to be organized and efficient with your time! Online schooling is not for everyone and I believe that is where a lot of the negative comments stem. UOP has offered me a chance at furthering my education, when I would not have had that chance otherwise.

I want to start off by saying that a lot of people may have one bad experience with this school, and after that they start putting down the school. The school is not bad at all. I was listening to the negative comments and was thinking about transferring to another college ( traditional setting. I talked with a professor at the other college and I was told that in the Criminal Justice field that I won't be wasting my time at UOP. He did say they are expensive, but they are accredited just like they are. I read a review that I totally disagree with based on my experience at UOP. However, it is true the admission process is quick. I've never been neglected since being enrolled here, every time I have an issue they were always there. Its totally a lie when people say that your previous credits won't transfer. All of my previous classes transferred except for one.

Completing my BS in Criminal Justice Administration with a concentration in Management from the Campus of Dallas, TX was amazing! Completion of my degree was very challenging and the quality of education provided by the instructors was superb! Of course for the full-time working family man/woman, being a UoP student is very advantageous because of the school schedule. The instructors make a huge difference on how a class is taught because of their work experience in the Criminal Justice system. I highly recommend UoP to everyone and my only word of advice is to stay motivated. When you think about it, UoP students have 7 days to complete individual and/or group assignments. No excuses for failure should ever be given! If students fail a course, it's not because of the instructor or institution, it's only the individual. My only negative and personal opinion of UoP is group assignments. I prefer to work solo and not depending on others for achievement along with dealing with individuals that do not take pride in their product or hold themselves to a high standard.

When I first started at University of Phoenix I absolutely hated it and did not do well in my classes. I felt lied to by the Admissions department, my team of Advisors was constantly changing, and grading criteria changed with each instructor. I took a long break from the school, realized UOP was my only option for a degree because of their convenient schedule, and got back on board. The 2nd go around has been much better. I get an A in every class by simply conforming my writing style and presentation style to the standards of each instructor. What has helped in the Support area is my reviews at the end of each class. If I give them a bad review in any area I get a call that same day for a follow-up and detailed review of my experience. I was constantly getting my financial aid money and GI bill funds in late, so I called and complained everyday for about 1 month, and now my financial aid Advisor is very attentive to my needs. It takes effort to not get lost in their system, but once you figure how to stand up for yourself in a professional way, the process is much easier. Learning Teams was also a big problem for me. Your grade depends on other students, and some of those students are idiots! Once I learned to be assertive and literally kick these people off of my team if they weren't participating, then I did very well. It is training for real life situations and in real life people get fired. The only thing that truly keeps me enthused about this school is the quality of the instructors. They are all professionals who are very experienced in their line of work, depending on the program you are in. All of my Criminal Justice instructors have been Prosecutors, Parole Officers, Corrections Officers, Police Lieutenants, Police Officers, etc. They have all reached a high level in their career and offer excellent knowledge of real life experience to students. I would recommend UOP to students who have completed their general education and are ready to start a core program.

I had a great experience at UOP. I do agree there were a couple of facilitators who gave away good grades, one in a humanities class and the other I'm not sure. Although in all of my core classes my facilitators were very knowledgeable and did care if I learned in their class. I never received a free A in any core class. I graduated this year and am already working. I'm putting my degree to good use and not just using it as wall decor that others might think is a joke. To those who think of a UOP degree as a joke let me just say I worked really hard to get my degree and I'm loving what my learning at UOP has done for me.

Honestly has got to be one of the worst decisions ever. I have unenrolled and decided to go with another college. I wish I can talk to my other friends and convince them that their degrees from UOP is basically just garbage. It's just an ACTUAL piece of paper, more like toilet paper you wipe your butt with. The reality is that UOP pumps out degrees like Octomom pumps out babies. The true education that you are getting out of this school is full of ^rap. You are learning how to work as a team, yes that's fine. But, are you able to truly put what you learn into real life studies. I have too many friends with this toilet paper, and I just realized that what I am doing is just garbage. I am better off getting a degree from a far away state, then get a degree from UOP and have my employer look down upon me compared to someone that has the same degree from somewhere else. I had to sit down and think. Would I rather hire someone from UOP or someone from Houston University...... I'm going with HU. So sorry for the bad review UOP, but let's face the facts. I'm actually kind of confused that this company (which is what it really is) hasn't collapsed yet.

I would like to say my military advisor was awesome. He would check up on me Often. My other 2 advisors were great too. When I had issues in the beginning holding onto my funding she was amazing at helping me get in charge of my own funds so I would be the one to pay them with my loan/grant money. She has been absolutely amazing the whole way. I see it like the military, each branch has it's issues. And your experience depends a lot on you as a person and what kind of leaders and commands you have. UoP to me is pretty much the same way.

Just a note I was in the Associates of Criminal Justice program.. it just isn't an option above. Ok this school sucked. Plain and simple. First off they, like someone else mentioned, rush you through the admissions process, harass you once they think they are on your mind, and then neglect you once you are in. They will also tell you anything to get you going. Like that all your credits will transfer and you will have no problems getting another school to take them- LIE!!! Second, if you consider going to another college before they are "done with you" they do in fact send back a portion of your loan money so you are "in debt" to them so they don't have to give you your transcripts or release your credits. -so your damned if you do and damned if you don't. They don't inform you of this, they send you a past due notice and you are stuck scratching your head as to why you owe on a class from over a year ago. Some of the teachers are ok and are willing to work with you, others you can tell don't give a damn, you can explain situations to them and it will completely go over their head- they don't have that problem why should you. The assignments are monotonous; read the material, write a paper, read the material, post a comment, reply to other's comments, repeat. Once in a GREAT while you will find a teacher who wants a Power Point instead.. but these are RARE. If you think variety is the spice of life, then get ready for a very bland life for the rest of your academic career here. Lastly, your finance councilor will not contact you unless you owe them money, you can call, leave messages, send emails or whatever else but there will be no return calls. They have your money.. they don't care anymore. If there is a problem the only way to get through is to call and run through all the bs to get an operator, ask them to patch you through to your finance councilor, if they ask about leaving a voice mail tell them "NO" you will talk to someone else. This does two things, gets someone ELSE to look over your account, so that if your FC isn't doing something right they may notice it and be able to help, and if you insist that you can't get through to your FC they will make sure of it or they will give you the information to their supervisor, who hopefully will contact you and help you... don't count on it, but it's a better chance. To sum up; if you need human interaction, variety, fun, a usable degree, or usable credits, DON'T GO HERE!!

I think UofP is a great school and have had nothing but great experiences with all of instructors, classes, and schedules. I have almost completed my Associates degree and will be attending for my Bachelors as well. I know there are a lot of people who have attended this school and have had a bad experience, but here is a little advice, DO NOT change your degree throughout find what you are really interested in and STICK WITH IT! if you don't no matter what school you go to you will have a bad experience. I have had the same academic and financial advisors from day one, they are on top of getting me information that I request or that they feel is important. As far as the classes themselves, if you work well at your own pace and can handle teaching yourself online you will succeed and excel and have a good experience as well as ease of finding a job once you graduate.

Hi, my name is John. I don't understand where all the strong hatred for University of Phoenix stemmed from. It's true that University of Phoenix has its major flaws, but what college doesn't? I am a former student of University of Phoenix, and I must point out that the instructors I had are comparable to any decent professor at any well respected college. The people who flamed University of Phoenix for not having ANY TESTS, reading materials, and QUIZZES must have been attending another college. In a criminal law class I attended at University of Phoenix, the instructor gave 15 to 20 question multiple choice quizzes EVERY week. The quizzes were based off of the reading and lecture materials covered in class. The instructor also had my class do class activities, such as playing Jeopardy, to further test our knowledge on the reading and previous lecture materials. The team that won the class activity games received small extra credit points. On top of the quizzes every week, the instructor also assigned to the class research papers, followed by a presentation, every week. The research papers ranged between 1200 to 2500 words, and had to be in APA format; the instructor was tough on grammar errors and sentence structures as well. As for the presentations, every classmate was also graded individually for his or her part of the presentation. Recently, I transferred to Chapman University to finish my undergraduate degree program because I felt that the learning team structure utilized at University of Phoenix has more cons than pros. Every instructor at University of Phoenix has the power to individually grade classmates during presentations, but not every instructor does so. I had a few negative encounters with slackers in some groups I was in; this involved me having to work harder to pick up the slack for such group members, and left me disgruntled when the slackers still passed the course. The slackers would barely pass with a C, but the situation still left me feeling cheated in some ways. My main point in my rant here is: Not all professors at University of Phoenix are terrible as to what all a lot of the comments are saying. Similar to any college or school out there, some professors just care more than others about academic integrity and their students' academic work. I'm not trying to say that I'm completely satisfied with everything or most of what University of Phoenix does. I'm not terribly fond of the institution itself and the administration faculty staff, but I feel that I must stand up for the wonderful professors I had for all my courses taken at University of Phoenix; I learned a great deal from them. Like what someone said here in a post: it's what you make of it!

I just recently decided to go to a different school because of several issues. I was working on my Associates degree and decided that I wanted to change it to a B.S. They told me that I could not change my program. Anyways, the main reason that I decided to leave was because the instructors are not on the same page as the student. On several occasions I would ask a question and the response I would get would have nothing to do with my question. You would ask one instructor for extra time on an assignment and one will say yes, the other will say no because it is Axia's policy to not allow extra time. I just found it very difficult to get through classes with instructors who did not care about their students. My advisors were awful, they never called me back, getting a hold of them was almost impossible, and by the time they got back to me the issue I had didn’t even matter anymore because it was too late. They "act" like they are sorry for not returning your call, but they could care less. I had trouble in both of my recent classes and knew that I was going to fail because my instructors would not address my questions, so I fell behind. My advisor told me if I failed I would have to pay $2,000 before I could continue! WTF?! I have been a good student with a good GPA of 3.8 and this was the thanks I got? I don't know, I am not trying to put down the school but it just seems ridiculous to me how they run it. The instructors are always on different pages then the students and the advisors are great "actors" when it comes to compassion and conveniently they are never available with you need them.

I completed my associates in criminal Justice with Axia, my experience was better than expected. I am now working on my Bachelor's and the only problems I have is when I question funding. I am using student loans which means I am responsible for paying these loan in the future. Don't I have the right to ask questions if I have them? I do not like being transferred around or getting different answers from each person I talk to. Everyone needs to be on the same page.

Excellent school. A bit pricey, but they have extensive resources, are the oldest online university, and offer so many tools and workshops for making the learning experience as easy as possible for an adult-learner going back to school. They provide online books with audio capabilities and applicable content to the degree area. UOP offers countless video feeds, self-evaluations, and resources for students taking the dreaded math courses that learn better in more unique ways than the traditional lecture format. They understand that people learn in different ways and excel in providing multiple learning resources to understand new content. The Instructors are knowledgeable and accredited in their field and often have full-time jobs in that area. The learning teams are not always fun, especially when you have lazy students, but neither is working in a team at a business always a piece of cake. It is an experience that is a must though, to prepare you for the rising trend of companies incorporating teams at work.

I attended this school at both the Associates and Bachelors levels. Half way into my Bachelors degree I had to change schools because my academic adviser had neglected to register me for over 3 months, and sat on her duff as I was leaving. They simply do not care about anything other than your money. Now because of her negligence and lack of accountability I owe the school $450!?!?!? WTF?!?! The ONLY thing great about this school is the fact that all of the books are offered free online to download. THAT'S IT!!! Teachers treated me poorly because I work in LE, I had a very close person in the family almost die and the school would not help me with my grades-they only told me "when my brother died I kept at it and didnt go to him"....WOW! Heartless I'd say. I had another counselor call me at home regularly, and she treated me as if we had been dating or something which I thought was very unprofessional. I think overall this school is best avoided. There are better options available out there. Keep looking.

I graduated in May 2008 with a Bachelors in Criminal Justice Administration. UOP has its problems, but I found my courses interesting and difficult. Yes, the learning team is a pain, as is working with different people in real life, but college is suppose to be challenging. Thankfully the USAF paid for my degree, otherwise it would have cost me $30,000. The web support is good, and the instructors are very good, mostly from the upper echelons and many have 20+ years in criminal justice experience. I think many people who hate on UOP only took one class and realized it was not a diploma mill or an "easy" way to get your degree. I hate the stigma attached to it, but most people who talk bad about UOP don't even have a degree anyways, so their laziness in proof enough to me that they do not understand a quality school when they see one.

UOP does not care about graduating students and their graduation rate is 4%. There is a high turn over in advisors, I have had 3 academic advisors in 4 months. If you decide to leave, they will STALL YOU. Ask for a withdrawal form and delay or not send form out to you meaning you have to continue. In addition, they will try to take you off the roll but not totally withdraw you so you will not be able to enroll elsewhere. If you have a problem and can prove the "facilitator" violated the rules, he or she will still get away with it. UOP places little value on retention. Lastly just too much writing, sometimes you have 4 questions to answer in one week(300-500 word count minimum), two papers to write, one with learning team and one individual. If you go here, you need to be unemployed because of all the work required. The low graduation rate shows they do not focus on retention but recruitment.