Online Doctoral Degrees - all you need to know!

Why complete an online doctoral degree?

Typical online doctoral degrees take somewhere between three to ten years or more. By working online, you are able to control how long it takes and how much impact it has on your current job, family or private life.

Another advantage is cost - studying online does tend to be cheaper than having to attend courses on a daily basis on a campus. I took the campus option and it was long, hard and cost a great deal - even more as I use to commute once a week from the South of England where my cat lived to the North of England, where my supervisor (who oddly enough didn't want to adopt my cat) happened to work. By working online, you could save huge amounts in transportation costs.

Another disadvantage I had was I had to live in Sheffield in Northern England. It was cold, wet, grey and often damp. If I had been able to work online, I could have chosen a nice little, warm, sunny spot in the South of Europe and just chated and communicated via email and skype - phone.

The final advantage is in theory you can hold down a full time job and still have direct contact with your supervisors. This is a more dubious idea, as can promise you, a doctoral degree is and should be considered a full time job in its own right - if it is not, you are either not working hard enough or the quality of your degree must leave a lot to be desired!

Types of Doctoral Degrees Online

There are two different types of doctoral degrees you can apply for.

• Professional Doctorate Degrees: These are highly specialise professional development courses. These often have both a theoretical part, and a practical part. The number of courses are of course constantly growing.
• Research Doctorate Degrees: These are pursued by those who wish to achieve the highest level of education and become experts in their field. I did this - and became an expert in soil fungi. To be honest I was just curious to see how high up the academic ladder I could go - where did I end up? As a Year 3 Primary school teacher - with a secret - if the children knew I was a doctor, I would have more bleeding arms, legs and missing teeth than the school nurse! I did it at a university. There are some theoretical PhDs you can complete online - many however are best done in a lab.

I still want to do an online doctoral degree - what is the next step?

The first step is to find your local U.S. Department of Education office and ask them for a list of legitimate courses in your state. There are so many fly-by-night or Diploma mills online - all offering you great qualifications and no work. The next thing to do is to find a high quality university who is prepared to take you.

I have found a great site which lists places which offer Online Doctoral Degrees . They also have lots more practical advice and suggestion on how to find the correct online degree course for you and how to make sure it has been fully accredited.

This is harder than is sounds, as some of the fly by night places have names which are remarkably similar to the Ivy League Universities.

I would recommend you search on the internet - even using our own search system on this site, as who knows what universities I have listed across the site! Then go and have a physical meeting with your future supervisor and check out their credentials as they are the ones who will need to open the doors to your first post - doctoral jobs!

Funny Benefits of being a doctor

I hear you ask - why go through the pain and cost of being a doctor if you end up as a primary school teacher. It still is worth having - as then you can drop from a great height when you want something or wish to complain! It is an instant respect generator!

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