Online Degree

ADN: an associate degree with a nursing concentration. Also called ASN (associate of science) or AAN (associate of arts), these are granted by community or junior colleges. A full-time credit load takes about two years to complete. This degree prepares you to take the RN licensure exam and work as an RN.

BSN: a bachelor of science with a nursing concentration. This undergraduate degree can be obtained from a college or university with a nursing program. A full-time class load takes about four years. A BSN prepares you to take the RN licensure exam, enables you to work in many professional roles and settings, and acts as a springboard to a graduate education.

BAN: a bachelor of arts with a nursing concentration. Less commonly offered in colleges and universities, a BAN curriculum focuses more on liberal arts or humanities. You typically take the same nursing courses as BSN candidates, but your electives may be in subjects such as history and literature. With regard to advancing your education or profession, there is essentially no difference between BSN and BAN (see HERE).

MSN: a master of science with a nursing focus. This graduate degree prepares you for a specific career path in nursing, such as a nurse practitioner, anesthetist, clinical specialist, educator, or researcher. You can complete a master’s program in about two years with a full-time credit load.

MAN: a master of arts with a nursing focus. Less common than the MSN in the academic and professional world, the MAN typically prepares you for a career in education or administrative leadership.

DNP: doctor of nursing practice. This is a relatively new graduate degree available to nurses who want to be at the highest level of their specialty. The DNP may eventually be the required degree for nurses who want to enter advanced practice specialties. A DNP focuses on clinical nursing practice and although it requires no dissertation, it does require a the completion of a scholarly project, and can take two or three years to complete.

PhD: doctor of philosophy. This degree prepares nurses to conduct research, become professors in universities, or be high-level administrators or policy developers. In place of PhDs, some schools offer DNS or DNSc (doctor of nursing science) degrees, which have a similar research-focused program. All of these require a dissertation, and take about two or three years to complete (see HERE).

EdD:  doctor of education.  With a focus in nursing, this degree prepares nurses to conduct research and become professors in universities.  Program requirements and duration are typically similar to a PhD program.

Licensure, certifications, and scope of practice
Depending upon your license or certification, your scope of practice will differ.

CNA: certified nursing assistant. Also called nursing aides, you can prepare for this role at some high schools, vocational schools, and community or junior colleges. The work involves patient care under the supervision of nurses or doctors. To be certified or not depends on where you want to work—most nursing care facilities, for instance, require that you be certified to work there. Achieving certification usually involves at least 75 hours of training and successful completion of a competency exam. Some states have additional requirements.

LPN/LVN: licensed practical nurse/licensed vocational nurse. The terminology is determined by the licensing state—Texas and California, for instance, use LVN whereas most other states use LPN. To prepare for your licensing exam you need to receive a diploma from a training program (usually one year in duration) from a vocational/technical school or community or junior college. The work involves caring for patients in settings such as hospitals, nursing care facilities, doctor’s offices, home health care, or in a private-duty capacity—all under supervision of a doctor or nurse. In some states, LPNs can administer prescription medications, start IVs, and care for ventilator-dependent patients.

RN: registered nurse. Along with basic patient care duties, RNs have an expanded scope of practice that includes complex patient treatment and decision making, as well as patient and family education, advocacy, and emotional support. Most RNs work in healthcare facilities, but they can also apply their professional skills in home care settings, doctor’s offices, schools, private businesses, or government services. Having your RN license makes you a versatile professional and enables you to advance your education or practice in many specialties.

What does a “C” mean?
RN acronyms with a “C” such as CCRN (critical care RN), CRNA (certified registered nurse anesthetist), CRNP (certified registered nurse practitioner) or RN-C indicate certification in a particular specialty. To become certified you need additional experience, training, and successful completion of a certification exam.

“I have a buddy who got a four-year bachelor’s degree in accounting who’s making $10 an hour,” Omer says. “I’m making two and a half times more than he is.”

Omer, who is 24, is one of many newly minted graduates of community colleges defying history and stereotype by proving that a bachelor’s degree is not, as seems widely believed, the only ticket to a middle-class income.

Significant numbers of community-college grads are getting better jobs, and earning more at the start of their careers than people with bachelor’s degrees, a trend that surprises even the researchers who have noticed it in wage data that has started to become more available in the last year.

“There is that perception that the bachelor’s degree is the default, and, quite frankly, before we started this work showing the value of a technical associate’s degree, I would have said that too,” says Mark Schneider, vice president of the American Institutes for Research, which helped collect the numbers for some of the states that report them.

Omer’s friends with bachelor’s degrees “aren’t learning skills,” he says. “They’re just learning all this theory. I’ve got an applied degree. And I’m out there making a good amount of change.”

Nearly 30 percent of Americans with associate’s degrees now make more than those with bachelor’s degrees, according to Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce. In fact, new research into earnings shows that, on average, community-college graduates right out of school, as a group, make more than graduates of four-year universities.

The average wage for recent graduates of community colleges in Tennessee , for instance, is $38,948—more than $1,300 higher than the average wage for recent graduates from the state’s four-year institutions.

In Virginia, recent graduates of community-college occupational (see more here) and technical degree programs make an average of $40,000. That’s almost $2,500 more than recent bachelor’s degree recipients.

And while by mid-career many bachelor’s degree recipients have caught up in earnings to community-college grads, “the other factor that has to be taken into account is that getting a four-year degree can be much more expensive than getting a two-year degree,” Schneider says.

A two-year community-college degree, at present full rates, costs about $6,262, based on research by the College Board. A bachelor’s degree from a four-year, private residential university goes for $158,072.

More coverage
 •As grads seek jobs, universities cut career services
 •New pressure on colleges to disclose grads’ earnings
 •Pressed to bridge the skills gap, colleges and corporations try to get along
 •Impatient employers step in to educate prospective workers

What’s driving up the wages of community-college grads is that, in spite of persistent high unemployment, there is high demand for people with so-called “middle-skills” that often require no more than an associate’s degree, such as lab technicians, teachers in early-childhood programs, computer engineers, draftsmen, radiation therapists, paralegals, and machinists.

“A good technical-oriented associate’s degree program at a good community college is actually turning out graduates whose skills meet the needs of the regional labor market,” says Schneider, a former U.S. commissioner of education statistics.

With a two-year community-college degree, air-traffic controllers can make $113,547, radiation therapists $76,627, dental hygienists $70,408, nuclear medicine technologists $69,638, nuclear technicians $68,037, registered nurses $65,853, and fashion designers $63,170, the online website CareerBuilder.com reported in January.

“You come out with skills that people want immediately and not just theory,” Omer says.

The Georgetown center estimates that 29 million jobs paying middle-class wages today require an associate’s, but not a bachelor’s, degree.

“I would not suggest anyone look down their nose at the associate’s degree,” says Jeff Strohl, director of research at the Georgetown center.

“Sub-baccalaureate education suffers the stigma of the vocational-technical high school,” Strohl says. “That’s where other people’s kids went. People see those programs as tracking into something that’s dead end.”

In fact, he says, “It’s very clear that that perception does not hold up.”

The bad news is that not enough associate’s degree holders are being produced, even as many graduates with bachelor’s degrees appear to be ending up underemployed.

The United States ranks second among industrialized nations, after Norway, in the number of workers over 25 with a bachelor’s degree or better, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. But it’s a distant 16th in the proportion of people with associate’s degrees and certificates.

Only 10 percent of American workers have the sub-baccalaureate degrees increasingly needed for middle-skills jobs, compared with 24 percent of Canadians and 19 percent of Japanese, the OECD reports.

Over the last 20 years, the number of graduates with associate’s degrees in the United States has increased barely three percent.  And while the Obama administration has pushed community colleges to increase their numbers of graduates (see here), enrollment at these schools fell 3.1 percent this year, the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reports. Graduation rates also remain abysmally low.

Meanwhile, many people with bachelor’s degrees are working in fields other than the ones in which they majored, according to a new report by the Center for College Affordability and Productivity.

“We have a lot of bartenders and taxi drivers with bachelor’s degrees,” says Christopher Denhart, one of the report’s coauthors.

Still, the salary advantage for associate’s degree holders narrows over time, as bachelor’s degree recipients catch up, says Schneider.

“It’s still true, on average, that the bachelor’s degree pays off more than the associate’s degree,” he says.

Although these figures vary widely by profession, associate’s degree recipients, on average, end up making about $500,000 more over their careers than people with only high-school diplomas (see this post), but $500,000 less than people with bachelor’s degrees, the Georgetown center calculates.

As for Omer, he’s already working toward a bachelor’s degree.

“Down the road a little further, I may want to become a director or a manager, and there’s still that stereotype” about associate’s degrees, he says.

“A bachelor’s degree will get me to that point.”

Just like with a brick and mortar school, accredited online schools accept financial assistance from qualified students. This is a relief to students who need help paying for their education. If you are interested in studying online, you can also look for a school that provides counseling and job placement after graduation. Choosing this as an alternative to get fake diploma online programs also lets students work at their own pace. For many motivated students, this means taking accelerated courses so they can earn their degree in a shorter period of time, which provides an even grater advantage.

There are no limits to the field of study for students enrolled in online degree programs. Among the many careers that individuals can choose from include, law, IT, the travel industry, education and business. Depending on the chosen career, the student can complete a quality online bachelor degree, or any other undergraduate or graduate degree. It is this variety that keeps online schools filled every year. If you are interested in attending school online, do some research on a number of schools before making a school choice. The good news is that you need not be concerned about where the school is located because you will be studying online. Every school will have different tuition costs, offer various programs and have other unique features that can influence your decision. Make sure the school you choose offers the option of financial aid in the event the need arises.

On the other hand, a lot of people today would rather order fake certificate documents rather than attend school. The reasons for their preference in obtaining online fake college degrees vary depending on the person and the circumstances. Some people simply find it more convenient to do so, while others do not want to invest the time or money going to online classes. Each individual should weigh their options and decide whether an online degree or fake diplomas will provide them with an improved quality of life in the long run.

What Next After Earning Master's Degree In Psychology? - One day : I am a recent graduate from the University of Phoenix. I have recently started looking for work as of March 2013. My degree title is Master of Science in Psychology. 

The question is: What can I do with a master's degree in psychology?
I am utterly perplexed on where to start looking for employment. I am considering going back to school to earn my doctorate, but I would like to find employment at least partly to pay for college. Can you understand my dilemma in this economic downturn?"

While it may seem that all master's degree are fairly equivalent, there is actually a surprising amount of variability in degree options.

Common Master's Degree Options

Job Options With a Master's Degree in Psychology

Jobs at Colleges and Universities

Jobs in Local, State and Federal Government

Jobs in Health Care and Mental Health Services

Jobs in Business, Sales, Marketing and Advertising

The Job Outlook Like With a Master's Degree in Psychology

After years of standing by while the online wave gathered momentum at lower-tier institutions, MIT and Harvard last year gave online education a $60-million bear hug by collaborating to found edX, a nonprofit MOOC provider that could also serve as a laboratory for studying the dynamics of virtual classrooms.
The universities made it clear then that they intended to use their MOOCs to improve, not supplant, traditional courses.

Getting Their Money's Worth

Step 3: Do nothing to stem the behavior of bad actors and those who encourage them. Allow colleges and universities to raise prices and engage in rankings wars based on flawed metrics that distort the market.  Fail to require states to maintain their effort to ensuring affordability.  Allow, even encourage, private business to step into the gaps.

All necessary clinical experience is coordinated with a local hospital or facility affiliated with the school.
Besides the convenience and flexibility, another major advantage of distance learning is to have access to and be able to interact with instructors and advisors by e-mail, message boards, live chat rooms virtual classrooms, and phone calls. These technologies provide students with online support unlimited and unparalleled teachers and school counselors.
Most nursing students will also have an online school counselor who will work with them online on a one on one basis. As opposed to traditional classroom learning, the curriculum of the student can be customized and planned according to the specific needs of the student and objectives. Online students will be assisted in the application process, scholarships, study plans, and even career planning.
Besides the fact that an online degree is more affordable than going to a traditional school, everything you need to complete most of your course is just at your fingertips, a computer and an Internet connection. Most online universities provide an overview of additional requirements such as books and laboratory equipment. Normally, your program online will cost 30-50% less than a traditional curriculum. Of course, the cost can vary from one school to another with most prestigious schools charge less known. However, going to a well-known school is much safer and reliable. You always want to get your degree from a reputable school wear over your name.
Different schools offer different specializations and advanced degrees, but most online schools offer RN, MSN, and training programs for nurse practitioners. Some masters of nursing programs offered online offer a specialization in science education or combine management or administration of health care. Depending on what you want in the end, you can choose a school that offers the program you want to take. Make sure the school is accredited and certified online by a nationally recognized nursing license and official.