The University of Phoenix (UOP) is a for-profit institution of higher education in the United States. Since its founding in 1976, the university has grown to over 280 physical campuses located throughout the United States, Canada, and Guam, an online campus accessible worldwide, and a corporate office in Phoenix.

Is University of Phoenix a joke? If you’re reading this, you’re probably trying to decide whether you should enroll at University of Phoenix. Like most people, you probably don’t know much about the school beyond the name, that it’s run by Apollo Group, and that they have commercials on TV.

Collegelearners Website will Provide information you are looking for on Is University Of Phoenix A Joke, Overview of University Of Phoenix, Requirements for University Of Phoenix.

Overview of University Of Phoenix

University of Phoenix is a large for-profit school (enrolling 72,000 students in more than 50 campuses, online and regional locations). The university, which is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, offers associate’s, bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees in over 100 programs. The University of Phoenix is a legitimate school because it has regional accreditation, which is considered more prestigious and recognized than the national kind. Due to this, credits earned by its students are transferable to other colleges. Because it is regionally accredited, there is no denying that UoP is a legitimate school. Otherwise, it would have already lost its accreditation and been shut down, too, by now.

However, it is still operating to this date. UoP is still offering classes online as well as at its many campuses and learning centers. What’s more, there are a lot of famous people who are graduates of the said school.

Some of them are politicians, businessmen, and athletes. It is unlikely for them to be successful if the school where they earned their degrees is not legitimate.

What is the University of Phoenix (UoP)?

UoP is a for-profit university that offers certificates and degrees through online and/or in-person learning. It is headquartered in Phoenix, AZ, but it maintains campuses through the United States. UoP has open enrollment, requiring students to have a high school diploma or GED to be admitted. 

The school offers single-courses and certificates in multiple disciplines. It also offers associate’s, bachelor’s, master’s, and and doctoral degrees. See the entire program list here (click on Degrees and Programs). 

The school is currently owned by private equity firm Apollo Global Management.  

Is the University of Phoenix accredited?

Yes, the University of Phoenix is accredited through the Higher Learning Commission. This is the same accrediting body that oversees brick-and-mortar schools within a 19-state region.

The current accreditation is good through the 2021-2022 academic year.  

Why is university of phoenix a joke

1. They enroll anyone and everyone meaning if you can’t get accepted at any 2-year or 4-year college, they will accept you, even if you failed your S.A.T. exam.
2. You don’t have to take any SAT or other scholastic achievement college entrance examinations to enroll.
3. You don’t have to take the GRE (Graduate Record Examination) to enroll in graduate-level study.
4. The majority of colleges and universities in the U.S.A. state that if you have been out of college for 10 years, all of your college credits that you have earned become expired, meaning, you have to start all over again, as a freshman with 0 college credits. University of Phoenix Online will still accept your college credits even if you’ve been out of school for 20 years.
5. They will take life experiences as college credit.
6. They enroll people with extremely bad English grammar and writing skills.
7. They say that they’ll train you and teach you job skills like how professionals do it in the real world and they don’t.
8. Classes are an easy 5 weeks of typing papers and relying on the person with the most knowledge to pass the learning team.
9. Classes are taught by facilitators, not instructors or teachers.
10. You will get some nasty instructors that won’t answer any of your telephone calls or emails until the class is over. I can prove it with my Windows Networking instructor, Mr. Paul Rouk because he finally contacted me 2 weeks after the class was over! As a teacher, shouldn’t you be passionate about helping your students succeed and become over-achievers? I would help my students succeed in every possible way, not ignore their telephone calls or email messages, wait 2 weeks until the class is finished, and then offer the student help. What if the student failed the class and had to repeat it again? What if the student had to repeat the same class with the same instructor?
11. The academic and financial aid counselors will be there for you saying even though you’re not learning anything, once you get your bachelor’s degree, you’ll be able to get a better job in your field of study. They’re telling you this and being nice to you so they can get paid but what they should be telling you is that once you graduate, you’ll have a “worthless” degree in your hands. Once you graduate, you’ll be unemployed and wish you attended your local state university. I graduated a year ago in July 2008 and I’m still unemployed. I’ve read complaints about former students who graduated 3 years ago and are still not working in their field because they were improperly and inadequately trained.
12. Many employers don’t acknowledge resumes with the University of Phoenix credential.
13. They only care about your money, not the education you receive.
14. Cheating and plagiarism are widepread at the University of Phoenix Online. Online students constantly cheat on their individual and learning team assignments, as well as, plagiarize on their writing assignments. The University of Phoenix deletes all of its online classroom correspondence so that this information cannot be investigated by the United States Department of Education.
15. No information about faculty. You cannot call up a faculty member and inquire about the program of study you’re interested in, what students really learn, and what companies former students are currently working for. Their faculty hold college degrees if not from diploma mill, University of Phoenix, then from other diploma mills.
16. No information about its graduates. Only 2% of students complete their programs of study. Eventually, this statistic adds to the student loan default rate because graduates cannot get hired in their field of study with their University of Phoenix degree.

Why does University of Phoenix have a bad reputation?

Chief among the reasons University of Phoenix has such a bad reputation is the fact that it is a for-profit institution. In fact, it is the largest for-profit university in the United States.

As such, it is majorly concerned with maximizing profit. This is reflected in its liberal admission process that allows 100 percent acceptance rate for online programs.

Consequently, people perceive the university as a cash-grabbing institution that cares nothing about its students.

The fact that University of Phoenix accepts everyone who applies for its online programs is also a red flag. That means, no competitiveness in its admission process. It accepts all and sundry.

While universities like Harvard, Princeton and University of Chicago have an acceptance rate of 5%, 6% and 6% respectively, the University of Phoenix has an acceptance rate of 100 percent.

This coupled with the fact that the university has a 17 percent graduation rate gives it a terrible reputation.

Another reason for the bad reputation of University of Phoenix is the adoption of deceptive marketing tactics in its advertisement campaigns.

The university has been caught making false claims in its advertisements in order to attract more students. The most recent of such cases took place in 2019 when the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sued UoPX for its deceptive marketing campaign.

Specifically its “Let’s get to work” campaign featuring companies like Twitter, Yahoo!, Adobe and Microsoft. The campaign gave the impression that University of Phoenix was working together with these high profile employers to create jobs specifically for students of the university.

This was false and the campaign was deemed misleading. Consequently, the University of Phoenix was fined to the tune of $191M.

Along with its uncompetitive admission process and deceptive marketing tactics, the University of Phoenix also has one of the highest student loan default rate in the US. This also contributes to the bad reputation of the university.

is university of phoenix legit

The University of Phoenix has been regionally accredited since 1978 by The Higher Learning Commission (HLC). In February 2013, a peer review group recommended to the HLC that the university be put on probation because the University of Phoenix “has insufficient autonomy relative to its parent corporation.” On May 9, 2013, the Apollo Group filed a report with the Securities and Exchange Commission which stated that the HLC Institutional Actions Council First Committee (“IACFC”) had recommended to the HLC that the university retain its regional accreditation, but that the university be placed on “notice” for two years. Their concerns centered on the university’s governance, student assessment, and faculty scholarship in relation to Ph.D. programs. In July 2015, the Higher Learning Commission removed University of Phoenix from Notice Status.

Some individual colleges within the University of Phoenix hold specialty accreditation or are pre-accredited by accrediting agencies that are recognized by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation.

School of Business – accreditation through the Accreditation Council for Business Schools and Programs (ACBSP).Because Phoenix’s business programs are not accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB), some companies will not provide tuition reimbursement for employees attending Phoenix.
College of Education – Master of Education is accredited by the Teacher Education Accreditation Council (TEAC)
College of Nursing – B.S. and M.S. degree programs are accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education (CCNE),
College of Social Sciences – The Master of Science in Counseling program in Community Counseling (Phoenix and Tucson campuses only), the Master of Science in Counseling program in Mental Health Counseling (Utah campuses only), and the Master of Science in Counseling program in Clinical Mental Health Counseling (Phoenix and Tucson campuses only) are accredited by the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP).

What did the University of Phoenix do wrong?

Some people find the idea of a for-profit university repulsive. To them, UoPX did wrong for simply existing. However, more cogent reasons for the criticisms received by the university include the fact that UoPX has an uncompetitive admission process.

Accepting everyone into its online programs makes it seem like the university is more concerned with money than students. This is further compounded by the atrociously low graduation rate of the university.

Deceptive marketing practices that hurt its reputation is also another thing the University of Phoenix did wrong. This has resulted in bad press that does not seem to be going away anytime soon.