Colleagues with "fake" advanced degrees? Ordered to address someone as "Doctor" (online doctorate)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For profit universities aren’t fake. Their degrees consist of real courses and theses. You’ve decided that her accomplishments don’t meet your standards, but that’s kind of like someone who drives a Mercedes calling a Ford “fake.”

NP. It's not fake in the sense that it is a car, but it is also garbage.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As someone with both a technical and non-technical advanced degree, both of these issues are ridiculous. The person who wants to be called Dr. is ridiculous and so are the colleagues who are worried about ranking the relative prestige of the degree programs.

Relative? Most of the online programs are open-admit degree mill scams. If you pay, you progress through and get the credential. Actually, you don't even have to, you can pay your secretary or cousin or SAH spouse to do the "work", which is literally less taxing than AP courses from high school.

The joke fake credentials deserve to be called out. These frauds are sullying the efforts of people who actually EARNED a valid credential.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In the federal government and federal contracting world degrees from diploma mills are increasingly common. Fed position have education requirements.
Veterans can use their benefits for-profit schools, combined with hiring preference,making it a no-brainer: why would you go to a school where you'd have to actually study, when you can get a "diploma" that checks the box without doing much work?
There may have been a stigma associated with for-profit colleges, but it seems to be gone now. People proudly announce graduations and "doctorates" from schools like Phoenix and Capella on LinkedIn and list them in online bios on federal web pages. It's sad.

Yep. I worked with a foreign service officer with an MBA from university of Phoenix.

+1 million. I don’t want to get into the business of judging people’s schools (choice of school is at least as much about SES, social capital, etc as it is about achievement), but the degree mill bs in federal government is a serious problem. There should be some differentiation.

And PhD person in OP’s post is a joke.

[Anonymous]

OP, when you begin to focus less on improving other people and you focus more on improving yourself, you will be happier. Your hemming and hawing about your degree versus someone else's degree just doesn't matter unless you are in HR and you have a responsibility for vetting degrees for your employer. Since you aren't in HR, and that isn't your job, stay in your lane.

[Anonymous]

You are being ungracious. I bet this person just got it and is proud. I do have a PhD from a top ten program in my field and I feel terrible for people who have online PhDs. They lacked funding and social and cultural capital to make decisions about their education. But that isn't a reason to be rude or snide. I am happy this person has a job and can hopefully earn a good salary to pay back their loans. I think you might want to reflect a bit on how your colleges might view your behavior and professionalism given your SAHM tenure.

[Anonymous]

I can top all these stories. I worked for a guy who was awarded an honorary doctorate from some 5th rate regional college. He insisted he was Dr. So-and-so. Demanded the website be updated to reflect he was now Dr. so-and-so, the whole nine yards. For an honorary doctorate!

[Anonymous]

I would be suspicious of an on-line PhD only because I am not sure how it would work in regards to research. Because that is what the PhD is about. Research.

As for calling a PhD Doctor, well, I have had Gov't customers refer to me as Dr.. And in one customer setting, I am known as Dr. [first initial], not because I asked for it, but there were too many on the project that had the same first name. I did not give it to myself.

Though I have referred to myself as Dr. Evil....to my DD's friends.

Truth is, the only time I insist on people calling me Dr. is when I know I am being an A-hole. It is particularly likely when others are being pretentious about credentials.

[Anonymous]

So much insecurity on this thread. My degree is from Regular Old UMD, but I don’t look down on anyone else because I don’t feel threatened.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was out of the workforce for about 15 years, then finished my bachelor's and master's at the end of my SAHM tenure, so I'm not sure if this a recent phenom or I'm just more perceptive of it after a run-in with one of these types.

It began with a professional peer my age randomly adding "Dr." to their internal email. I got wind folks directly under this person were ordered (and corrected) to address them as "Dr. so-and-so" moving forward. "Dr." was added to their desk, board meeting and office door name plates. According to LinkedIn, the "doctorate" was picked up from Walden University, which I had never heard of:

Walden University is an online for-profit university and Public Benefit Corporation headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

I was suddenly a credential skeptic. Now I notice so many folks have shaky credentials picked up online (often from cyber for-profit schools) or from hybrid online/weekend pay-as-you-go non-selective programs at good universities that could pass as solid to masses. The persons (who are often dumb as bricks) use these credentials for end-all-be-all superiority. I noticed a correlation between lettered credentials after their name in their email signatures to lack of selectivity of the program they were in.

Does it just not matter where you get degrees anymore, it's just become a box-checking exercise for promotions and raises? I'm not being a snob, my degrees are from a barely top 100 university we lived near.

Ok Miss Snottypants. So nice you had the ability to be a SAHM AND get your degeee for a university you lived near. Not everyone is as privileged as you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As someone with both a technical and non-technical advanced degree, both of these issues are ridiculous. The person who wants to be called Dr. is ridiculous and so are the colleagues who are worried about ranking the relative prestige of the degree programs.

Relative? Most of the online programs are open-admit degree mill scams. If you pay, you progress through and get the credential. Actually, you don't even have to, you can pay your secretary or cousin or SAH spouse to do the "work", which is literally less taxing than AP courses from high school.

The joke fake credentials deserve to be called out. These frauds are sullying the efforts of people who actually EARNED a valid credential.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:99% of people who demand that others call them "Dr." are women and POC. And I say this as a woman POC. I honestly think some people just have a huge chip on their shoulder. I work with one coworker who makes us call her "Dr. Johnson" when everyone else also has grad degrees/law degrees/doctorates and are called Jim/Bob/Lisa. It's ridiculous and we do make fun of her for it. I saw her resume come through. She got the doctorate at a low ranked state school and she made mediocre grades.

I work at an organization where almost everybody is MD and PhD and your anecdotal "analysis" is way off from my 25 years of anecdotal experience.

Yeah. PhD here. I prefer to be called by my first name. If someone is more formal and wishes to call me Ms. X, I am totally down with that. The only time I insist on being called Dr. X is when others (usually men) are referred to as Dr. And I am a woman and a POC.

[Anonymous]

Ask him to look at a boil on your ass. If he asks why say you are a Dr.

I have so many fake Indian degrees at work we know folks who call out degrees are usually shady folks who graduated from fake on-line universities

PhD is always code for a lazy “career student”

[Anonymous]

Walden “University” is in fact a diploma mill.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Walden “University” is in fact a diploma mill.

+1
I get that people don't want to compare or differentiate degrees, but this one isn't even within comparison. If there's a list, this one doesn't even approach the page.

[Anonymous]

I work in a hospital. My fave is when a patient/family member introduces themselves as Dr. (but are NOT a physician). It's like seriously, you expect our attending physician - a real life MD - to call YOU Dr. because you went to divinity school or something?