Masters in Education - Training and Performance Improvement

by Jessica Jordan
(Cincinnati, OH)

Capella University has made it very easy for me to begin my pursuit of a Master's degree in Education Training and Performance Improvement. I found out about Capella through an Education Fair held by my employer.

The Enrollment Counselor was friendly, knowledgeable, and very willing to answer all of my questions. My current adviser calls and emails on a regular basis, and is quick to step in if I am having a problem enrolling in a course, accessing the website or receiving my grades.

While the vast majority of my experience with Capella has been more than positive, I have had two negative experiences. The first negative was when I had to renew my financial aid. For some reason, Capella had two accounts set up for me, one of them with the wrong social security number. When my renewal aid was offered it went to the wrong account. I was within a week of my class starting before it was all figured out. It did take several phone calls, and a bit of pushing on my part to get the financial aid office to figure out and correct the problem, but finally, someone did help and I am still enrolled and still correctly receiving my aid.

The second problem is that the majority of my program required courses are taught by one particular instructor. I don't seem to click with this instructor, and have been a bit frustrated in the courses with trying to figure out what I need to do to satisfy his requirements. He often seems to be preoccupied with other activities.

I will say, though, that what has kept me successful is the layout of the course room, and the discussion threads. Staying on top of the threads week to week has provided me with a wealth of knowledge and other perspectives that I have been able to incorporate into my own learning.

The best thing about the classes at Capella is that I am able to use my own work experiences to complete my course projects. Typically, as I am working on a project for work, I can use that for my course project, and in essence "kill two birds with one stone". The ability to do this has kept my stress at a minimum because the projects seem to complete themselves.

Overall, I am satisfied with my experience at Capella University, and would recommend it to anyone. My only caution is that you must be able to work independently and stay focused otherwise any sort of distance learning may not be for you.

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