Does anyone have any opinions this school/program?
Is it good or bad, does it actually prepare you well enough to work in the field when finished, is it looked down upon by employers?
I recommend the program. I am currently enrolled in the program. I am also a law enforcement officer and have been doing forensics since Jan 2006. They offer both a Bachelors and Masters program.
Even though this post has been inactive for a while I thought I would throw my 2 cents in about the Champlain College CDF program. I transferred into the program from a networking AS mixed with a few criminal justice and law classes. This program was amazing and I received a ton of experience during my time there. They offer a variety of classes so that you can specialize into a specific field of forensics and are constantly upgrading their curriculum.
They also have a great community of students at the school. For the most part they are all willing to help each other out and I have made some friends that I will have for the rest of my life. The campus is amazing and has a lot to offer even if it doesn't seem like it at the time.
They also have the LCDI which is a state sponsored lab that they offer students to work/volunteer at. I remember being able to work on a variety of research topics, data recovery jobs (that they offer free to the students/faculty of the school), and working with the state of Vermont Human Resource Investigation team to work on actual cases.
The job placement for the school in genera is amazingly high within the first year of graduation and the CDF major is even higher. I know of only 2 people from the year ahead of me that do not have jobs in the field and a number of the students this year already have jobs lined up and ready to go after graduation. I graduated in December and was already working by the start of February.
Marc Zammuto is the career adviser for the technology department and he is a wizard at his job. He pulls together an impressive amount of opportunities including internships, part-time work, and full-time employment. He is very easy to work will help anyone who wants to do well.
If anyone has any questions about going through the undergrad program at Champlain College just message me and I can fill you in.
Thank you for your insight.
I know several people who are working on their Forensics Masters and Baccalaureate at Champlain.
I am working on my Bachelors degree through them.
I haven't taken any Digital Forensics classes yet, so I can't speak to those.
However, I do like the classes, and the other students (DF seems to be quite popular, as all my classes have had a large number of DF students).
My one gripe is this. They don't offer a lot of online classes that are a whole semester long. What they do is offer accelerated classes that are like 7 weeks long, but contain a whole semester's material. Taking one class at a time like that is more brutal than taking a full class load. For Criminal Procedure I was reading around 100 pages of material a week, plus doing assignments.
My one gripe is this. They don't offer a lot of online classes that are a whole semester long. What they do is offer accelerated classes that are like 7 weeks long, but contain a whole semester's material. Taking one class at a time like that is more brutal than taking a full class load. For Criminal Procedure I was reading around 100 pages of material a week, plus doing assignments.
I can agree with you that there is not a lot of online classes but for anything that is not major specific I found that I was able to take them at a community college that was in my home town and as long as I showed that the curriculum was similar they were more than happy to transfer the credit. This made it 1000% easier because not only were the classes longer but in my opinion they were easier and more relevant to the real world.
After saying that I do have to question what teacher you had for the online course. I took a couple online through Champlain and I found the course work to be easier than in the classroom.
One thing I do have to say about the program is that it is geared towards law enforcement and academia and does not touch really on the e-discovery side. I felt I was doing well in the program and as soon as I got into the e-discovery job I have, I felt like I had to go back to freshman year. They should really have a few classes on the consulting and e-discovery side of the field as that is where a majority of the friends I know are getting jobs.
I guess then you would not want to take some of the
They are Friday 630pm to 9pm, Saturday & Sunday 900am to 500pm, for two weekends with about a month gab between them.
You can take four courses in one semester, but the amount of reading and writing is the same as for a full semester.
Love it - gets all the core stuff out of the way.
I am taking the Bachelor's program online - and I love it so far. I like that I can take one class at a time so that my focus is not divided. Although the the classes are accelerated it balances out to 2 classes a semester - a true 1/2 time student schedule.
The online program is demanding because of the accelerated nature but so far my experience with professors has been very good. They respond quickly to questions and some provide lots of material to learn from. Many of my classmates too have been helpful as discussions at this school seem to be very active and everyone is willing to work together and help each other out.
I am looking forward to the rest when I get there. I haven't had the opportunity to even start thinking about working with the career placement folks yet but I will be getting there.