Rutherford University

Last updated
Rutherford University
MottoLongevity, Advancement, Wisdom
Type unaccredited private university identified as a degree mill [1]
Active1993–2009 (2009)
Chancellor Abdul Hassam
President William Weston
Dean Abdul Hassam
VP/RegistrarNasrat/Nusri Hassam/Kassam
Address
28-29 Dzeliwe Street
,
Mbabane
,
Eswatini; British Columbia, Canada; Hong Kong, China; Mexico; South Africa; Evanston, Wyoming
Website rutherford.edu

Rutherford University, previously doing business as Senior University International and Stratford International University, [2] was an unaccredited [3] private institution that offered degrees online. It operated from 1993 through 2009 and offered the following degrees: Bachelor of Arts, Bachelor of Science, Master of Arts, Master of Science, Master of Business Administration, Doctor of Philosophy, Doctor of Business Administration. [4]

Contents

The Oregon Office of Degree Authorization had labeled Rutherford University a degree mill. [1]

Recognition

On its website Rutherford claimed to be accredited by the International States Parliament, [5] [6] an organization based in Palermo, Sicily. [7] Rutherford also claimed to be recognized by the government of the African nation of Swaziland, but this was denied by the nation's minister of education and other education officials in early 2008. [8] Subsequently, the claim of recognition by Swaziland was removed from the university website [8] and returned. [9]

The Oregon Office of Degree Authorization stated that Rutherford University had "no authority to issue degrees." [1] The British Columbia government believed that the school was operating unlawfully from British Columbia. [2]

History

Rutherford was established in 1993 as Senior University International in Evanston, Wyoming. Its owner or co-owner was Lester Carr, who was also a co-owner of Columbia Pacific University and had served as president of Columbia Commonwealth University [10] in Rock Springs, Wyoming. Senior University International was not allowed to continue its operations from Wyoming after it did not meet the requirements of the Wyoming government. [11] [12]

Subsequently, the school officially operated from British Columbia. According to Hoovers it had annual sales of 600,000 dollars with seven employees in Vancouver, but other reports stated that it operated from Richmond. Richmond was the place of residence of Rutherford senior Abdul Sultan Hassam, [13] Vancouver was the residence of Leslie Carr. [2] In March 2006 Rutherford was instructed to stop enrolling students from British Columbia. [5] [12]

In 2003, a "Rutherford University" was identified as planning to develop a new campus in New South Wales, Australia. [14]

In 2005 the Dutch foundation "Counselling Netherlands" in Heteren started a Bachelor of Arts in Multidisciplinary Counselling program for 10.000 euro over four years through Rutherford University. However, in 2008 it was discovered that the school was not accredited as Counselling Netherlands had claimed. [3] [15] [16]

In 2007 the university claimed to have its headquarters in Mbabane, Swaziland, [17] However, its corporate headquarters remained in Evanston, Wyoming. [18] As of mid-2008, only an address in Swaziland was provided by the institution. [5] A telephone number in Swaziland was removed from the website after the operator had stated not to know Rutherford University. [8] The Oregon Office of Degree Authorization reports listed Wyoming, British Columbia, Swaziland, South Africa, and China as geographic locations with which Rutherford University has been associated. [1]

In June 2009, all the information on the sub-pages was no longer available from the organization's website. The website of "Rutherford University Mexico" was accessible after being temporarily unavailable, but by September 2009 the domain was no longer connected.

See also

Related Research Articles

Bronte International University is an unaccredited post-secondary educational institution formerly in South Dakota. It is widely considered to be a diploma mill, operated from an unknown location. Its website offers "fast" degrees for "life experience."

Saint Regis University sometimes styled as St. Regis University was a diploma mill operation that was one of about 120 connected institutions operated by an American fraud ring from about 1999 until 2005, when it was shut down by U.S. government authorities. The operation was known as "Operation Gold Seal".

A diploma mill is a business that sells unaccredited diplomas or academic degrees. The term is also used pejoratively to describe any educational institution with low academic admission standards, low job placement rate, or low average starting salaries of its graduates.

Hamilton University was an unaccredited institution based in Evanston, Wyoming. According to the Oregon Office of Degree Authorization, it was first established in Hawaii as American State University. It has since been closed by court order in Wyoming and has relocated to the Bahamas under the name Richardson University.

Breyer State University, also called Breyer State University-Alabama, is an unaccredited distance education, for profit, private university that formerly operated in the U.S. states of Idaho and Alabama and now reports a location in Panama. It has been described by The New Republic magazine as a diploma mill that "claimed official-sounding accreditation to attract hundreds of people to obtain degrees". Breyer State University disputes this categorization.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rochville University</span>

Rochville University was an online diploma mill offering a "Life Experience Degree, and Certificate Program" without coursework or prior transcript evaluation. The State of Texas classified it as an "illegal supplier of educational credentials" whose degrees may not be used in Texas. The Oregon Office of Degree Authorization lists it as "fake". Its operation is believed to be centered in Pakistan, and its diplomas and degree certificates have been mailed from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Along with many similar enterprises, it is owned by the Karachi based company, Axact, whose main business, according to a New York Times investigation, is "to take the centuries-old scam of selling fake academic degrees and turn it into an Internet-era scheme on a global scale".

American Central University (ACU) was an unaccredited distance learning private, for-profit university licensed by the state of Wyoming in 2004. The Oregon Office of Degree Authorization stated that the institution may be run from Malaysia.

Rushmore University is an unaccredited institution of higher learning offering online degrees in a variety of business-related fields, exclusively via distance learning. It has been described as a diploma mill, providing illegitimate academic degrees and diplomas for a fee.

The Oregon Office of Degree Authorization (ODA) is a unit of the Office of Student Access and Completion, with responsibilities related to maintaining high standards in private higher education institutions in Oregon. ODA administers laws and provides oversight of private colleges and universities offering degree programs in the state, validates individual claims of degrees, enforces the closure of substandard or fraudulent higher education programs in the state, and enforces policy for publicly funded postsecondary programs and locations. It was formerly a unit of the Oregon Student Access Commission (OSAC), which became Oregon Student Assistance Commission prior to January 1, 2012. Its functions moved to the Oregon Higher Education Coordinating Commission as part of the Office of Student Access and Completion in July 2012.

University Degree Program (UDP) is or was an unaccredited consortium of diploma mills run by Americans Jason and Caroline Abraham beginning in the 1990s. In 2004, The Chronicle of Higher Education called UDP the "granddaddy" of diploma mill operations.

Unaccredited institutions of higher education are colleges, trade schools, seminaries, and universities which do not have formal educational accreditation.

Preston University is a private for-profit unaccredited institution that offers a variety of academic degree programs by distance learning. Preston was originally based in Wyoming and in 2007 was based in Alabama. As of 2012, Preston identified Los Angeles, California as its base of operations.

The Isles International University/Université (IIU), formerly known as Irish International University and European Business School, is an unaccredited university operating currently in Ireland.

Washington International University is an online unaccredited institution of higher education founded in 1994 and currently incorporated in the British Virgin Islands. It describes itself as a "cyberspace university" and a "university without borders", serving clients from around the world online. The university website states that WIU's graduates have come from 112 countries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Diploma mills in the United States</span>

Diploma mills in the United States are organizations that award academic degrees and diplomas with substandard or no academic study and without academic approval by officially recognized educational accrediting bodies or qualified government agencies. The purchaser can then claim to hold an academic degree, and the organization is motivated by making a profit. These degrees are often awarded based on vaguely construed life experience. Some organizations claim accreditation by non-recognized/unapproved accrediting bodies set up for the purposes of providing a veneer of authenticity.

American City University (ACU) is a private unaccredited distance education university headquartered in Pasadena, California. The school currently offers an online MBA program.

Warren National University, previously known as Kennedy-Western University, was an unaccredited private distance learning university that claimed to offer undergraduate and graduate degrees in the United States from 1984 to 2009. It has been described by federal investigators and news sources as a diploma mill, a designation it has disputed. Its administrative offices were located in Agoura Hills, California.

The Management Institute of Canada or Institut Canadien de Management (MIC) is a Canadian professional school based in Montreal, authorized by the government of Quebec. MIC is an unaccredited non-degree business school in Quebec, offering online programs in business administration.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Unaccredited colleges Archived 2007-03-19 at the Wayback Machine , Oregon Office of Degree Authorization, Oregon
  2. 1 2 3 "Who is operating unlawfully in BC?". bcdegrees.ca. 2006-10-22. Archived from the original on October 20, 2007. Retrieved 2008-04-12.
  3. 1 2 Van Der Mee, Tonny; Wessels, Kees (2008-04-10). "Een diploma van niks voor 10.000 euro" [A degree worth zilch for 10,000 euro]. Algemeen Dagblad (in Dutch). Retrieved 2010-10-21.
  4. ↑ Rutherford University :: Programs. Accessed 2008-04-10. Archived April 4, 2008, at the Wayback Machine
  5. 1 2 3 "The Diploma Mafias - with a list of diploma factories worldwide". New Sabah. No. 1069. Iraq. Archived from the original on July 19, 2010. Retrieved 2015-07-03. Rutherford University, a diploma factory first based in Canada, escaped to the American state of Wyoming two years ago, after the Canadian government had taken action against companies selling fake university diplomas. But after Wyoming invoked its higher education laws, the university decided it was better to leave America altogether and it is now selling its diplomas from Swaziland. Its website says the university is "fully accredited" by something called the "International States Parliament" which is also a joke. Other institutes which look like daughters of Rutherford University even claim to be accredited by the "Supreme Council of the Presidency of the International States Parliament" which is three times nothing.
  6. ↑ Rutherford University :: About. Accessed 2008-04-10. Archived April 4, 2008, at the Wayback Machine
  7. ↑ Ezell, Allen; Bear, John (2005). "Appendix E: Accreditation". Degree Mills: The Billion-dollar Industry That Has Sold Over A Million Fake Diplomas . Prometheus Books. ISBN   978-1-59102-238-1. Here is a list of more than two hundred accrediting agencies that, as of late 2004, are not recognized by either CHEA or the US Department of Education. Inclusion on this list does not mean the accreditor is good or bad, real or fake, but only that it [is] not recognized by either of these two agencies. [...] Parlamento Mondiale per la Sicurezza e la Pace. Accreditor claimed by Senior University, Wyoming. It awards titles of nobility from an address in Palermo, Italy.
  8. 1 2 3 "Zelfs de minister van Onderwijs van Swaziland weet van niets (Dutch: Even the Minister of Education of Swaziland is not in the picture)". Algemeen Dagblad . 2008-04-10. Retrieved 2010-10-21.
  9. ↑ Rutherford University :: Recognition and Accreditation. Accessed 2009-03-27 [ dead link ]
  10. ↑ Bear J and Bear MP: Bears' Guide to Earning Degrees by Distance. Ten Speed Press, 2003, page 215. ISBN   1-58008-431-1
  11. ↑ Barron, Joan (2006-06-16). "Online school departs". Star-Tribune . Retrieved 2018-02-13.
  12. 1 2 Millar R: "B.C. government to review private school regulation." Archived 2012-04-03 at the Wayback Machine Macleans.ca 2007-06-26. Accessed 2008-04-10.
  13. ↑ Steffenhagen, Janet: B.C. Blacklists Private University Archived 2012-06-12 at the Wayback Machine . Vancouver Sun 2008-06-11. Accessed 2009-03-28.
  14. ↑ "University-in-the-park scheme fails to add up". Sydney Morning Herald . Sydney. June 7, 2003. Retrieved March 29, 2009.
  15. ↑ "Cookies op AD.nl | AD.nl". www.ad.nl (in Dutch). Retrieved 2017-08-17.
  16. ↑ Van Der Mee, T; Wessels, K (10 April 2008). "Studenten misleid met neptitels"" [Students misled with phony titles]. Algemeen Dagblad (in Dutch). Retrieved 21 October 2010.
  17. ↑ "Preston University moves to Alabama, spins off new school". Daily Times-Call . 2007-03-15. Preston University has moved to Alabama — where there's less oversight of post-secondary education — now that Wyoming requires private universities to be accredited. Preston is now based in Montgomery, Ala., and joins at least one other online school, Rutherford University, that has left Wyoming in response to the law. [...] Also within the past several months, Rutherford University has moved from Rock Springs to Mbabane, Swaziland, according to the school's Web site.
  18. ↑ Rutherford University :: Contact info. Accessed 2008-04-10. Archived April 4, 2008, at the Wayback Machine
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.