Online Degree Programs - Compare Distance Degrees

When Maurice Rico, a senior process engineer in El Paso, TX, enrolled in Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business online degree program, a top ranked distance learning MBA, he wasn’t sure he had picked the best online school—until he participated in a mandatory, one-week online residency before classes began.

Rico, 40, flew from Texas to Indiana for the one-week online residency, paying airfare out of his own pocket (the school paid for housing and meals for the campus residency). The “very intense” week of coursework, case studies, and networking allowed him to meet his teachers and fellow online students.

Rico now says the online campus residency requirement confirmed that the Kelley Direct distance degree program was the right online MBA program for him. “It made me feel a lot better about how well-structured and solid it was,” Rico says.

Graduate schools often require students to take one of several standardized admission tests. The GRE (Graduate Record Exam) is the most commonly required test. The MAT (Miller's Analogy Test) is another. Preparing for these tests can be time consuming—and expensive.

Fortunately, many accredited online masters degree programs do not require the GRE, GMAT or MAT. 

In fact, Get Educated's national surveys of more than 1,200 online masters have revealed that the majority of online masters degree programs do not require a traditional admission test.

Non-traditional adult students who want to avoid the GRE/MAT should compare online master degree programs carefully. It is possible to find a high quality distance masters program that does not require the GRE or a related admission test.

Cecilia Parmar, 43, of central New Jersey, chose two online master’s degree programs partly because neither one required her to take the Graduate Record Exam, or GRE (the most common admission test for graduate school).

“As a working mother, my time is valuable, and having to prepare and take the GRE—which was a requirement of some of the other programs I considered—would just have been another obstacle in my pursuit of a graduate degree,” she says.

When time is of the essence an accelerated online degree may be a great option. Accelerated programs consist of short online classes that compress the typical 16-week college semester into five to 10 week sessions. 

You literally earn your degree faster by studying faster.

Jennifer Menges of Philadelphia is studying undergraduate psychology at Columbia College of Missouri online.  She says eight-week online courses are “just right” for her.