FollowAs the unemployed struggle to find jobs in a difficult economy, they might look for ways to improve their chances of landing that elusive job offer.
“It’s easy to see that people are looking for ways to make themselves more marketable, given the state of the economy,” said Sandra Chalmers, state Division of Trade and Consumer Protection administrator. “One way of doing that is going back to school.”
Those people can be vulnerable to scams, Chalmers said. Diploma mills offer degrees without requiring the time or effort of the student. The offers, usually coming from pop-up windows on the Internet or unwanted emails, sound too good to be true. As with most scams, that’s a warning that it probably isn’t true, Chalmers said.
Statewide, there were 78 complaints of diploma scams in 2008 and 83 in 2009, the most recent year in which statistics are available, Chalmers said. While the number of complaints has remained fairly steady, there has been an increase in the number of diploma mills nationally and internationally, she said.
A lot of people are buying degrees without doing the work, said Dan Kellogg, University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point registrar. The diploma mills provide fake transcripts, along with the degrees.
“It’s just like counterfeit money,” Kellogg said.
Official records from known schools have watermarks and other security protection to keep them from being copied, Kellogg said. Employers need to be careful to check out applicants’ degrees and ask specific questions about school start and graduation dates.
There are numerous legitimate schools that offer good online programs, Kellogg said. However, it should take four or more years to get a bachelor’s degree, even if the degree is through an online program.
Potential students looking for an online program from a known college should call the school to verify the website, Kellogg said.
Wood County Investigator-Sgt. Dean Berres said he hasn’t had any complaints from diploma mill victims. However, he cautions people against clicking on the pop-up ads that advertise schools.
“In most cases, those pop-ups will also contain either spyware or malware,” Berres said. “You click on them and it’s going to install software monitoring activity (programs). Anything like that could do some bad stuff.”
People can take steps to determine whether a school is legitimate, Chalmers said.
The Wisconsin Educational Approval Board regulates post-secondary schools, and people can find information at www.eab.state.wi.us. The U.S. Department of Education also has a database of accredited schools at www.ope.ed.gov/accreditation. While not all legitimate schools get accreditation, it’s a good place to start, Chalmers said.
People should remember that trying to take a shortcut to getting a diploma or degree to get a job can have bad results, she said. If an employer learns a degree isn’t legitimate, the employee could be fired and find it difficult to get hired again.
Source: wisconsinrapidstribune
