List of Accredited Online Colleges and Universities

The best way to get a feel for the education you would receive at CSU is to read our student reviews. The school currently has a 100% approval rate among current and former students, though that is statistically likely to change as more reviews come in. CSU lacks regional accreditation, which will be a problem if you want to transfer credits to another school or if you want your degree to count toward a more advanced degree. However, it is nationally accredited by the Distance Education and Training Council (DETC) which is one of the U.S. Department of Education's approved national accrediting agencies. National accreditation is designed for vocational programs that will allow you to enter the work force, so if this is what you are looking for, CSU may be a good choice.

We had not heard of InterCoast before your question. The school is clearly not a diploma mill scam, since it has physical campus locations and has been approved to operate by the state of California. The national organization that accredits it, ACCET, appears on the U.S. Department of Education's list of approved national accrediting bodies. However, InterCoast lacks regional accreditation, which means that your credits are unlikely to transfer to other schools, and your degree is unlikely to be accepted by other schools as a credential that would allow you to go on to further study. If you are looking for a vocational certificate, which gives you an extra credential for a job that does not traditionally require a degree (such as wedding planning or auto repair) InterCoast may be a good choice, because those are the kinds of programs that national accreditation is designed for. However, if you are looking to study in a traditional academic discipline, we do not recommend that you attend a school without regional accreditation.

Riverbanks University is a completely unaccredited scam. The organization that supposedly accredits it, the Universal Council for "Inrernational" Schools (UCAIS), is also fake. (And shouldn't it be "UCFIS"?) The best way to tell a school is a diploma mill is that they give no address on their Contact Us page, because they are operating illegally. Amusingly, Riverbanks has random pins on a world map, with one in Alaska and one in Greenland, to indicate its location. It is probably just a P.O. box somewhere outside the U.S., from which fake degrees are mailed.

Ashford, which is regionally accredited by the Higher Learning Commission and North Central Association, has gotten mixed reviews from the current and former students who have checked in with us. Hundreds have responded, and while over half feel positively about the school, more than one-third feel negatively. Criticisms have included costs that were higher than what the school reported, and professors who do not respond promptly. Praise has included convenience and up-to-date technology. You should look over the reviews in that link and decide for yourself.