thinkPhD

By far MGT5012 took more time than any other course to date. There were 12 assignments including papers and analyses. Today (Saturday) is the last day for this course and I did not finish up the assignments until Wednesday. Besides requiring a good bit of time, the next to last assignment referred to a chapter that was not in the 12e which was required for the course. Luckily, I also have the 11e and was able to complete the assignment. I told my academic advisor and the dean has been contacted.

Others have posted on the learner discussion board that the work load was manageable. I work a demanding job, plus I teach business courses and am a wife and mother. My time is very precious and this course sucked up just about all of my free time. It seemed like I was always working on a paper…either reading the text, researching, writing or reviewing my papers. I talked to one student who dropped the course after seeing the assignments!

My next course is MGT5002 Marketing Management. There are THREE assignments in this course. Of course, the assignments have high points potential!

I received my graded Assignment 3 back this week and was pleasantly surprised – I received an excellent grade. Comments indicated that I was on the right path all along. That assignment had wording that really needs to be improved. So, how did I celebrate? Why, I continued working on Assignment 4, of course!

Today I am about half way through the essay and bumping up against the word count. I will table this for a few days and come back to it with fresh eyes.

I turned in MGT5012 Assignment 3: Cost Analysis and CVP yesterday. That assignment was an Excel spreadsheet identifying the break-even point. The instructions were detailed but vague. The assignment had a write up and an example submission, but it really did not match my interpretation of the assignment. I created a scenario about a business assembling garage doors and a decision that the owner would have to make about adding to the product line or keeping only one model. We will see later this week if I was on track or not.

Last night I began reading chapters 7 and 8 in prep for Assignment 4: Decision Making and Costing. This assignment is an essay comparing variable and activity based costing and will include examples and applications.  Essays are to be 1000 words only and broken up into these headings:

Question /Prompt

Review of Subject

Discussions – max 600 words

Conclusions

References

I do not like these “canned” assignments and word count maximums. It seems so…high schoolish. I typically run more than the word count but I am not embellishing. I add a lot of references and try to be very clear. The point of the research and study is to LEARN. Word counts are just plain nuts at this level.

I hope to start on the writing portion of the assignment today. I wish I had more time to work on assignments because I would like to complete a course in fewer weeks. This course ends on 05/24 and has 12 assignments. I know some who are able to take two courses at a time or finish early to start on the next one earlier than 12 weeks (the course length). My PhD looks very far off in the distance – maybe 2011. I will be 52 then. Ugh.

I got Assignment 2 back and have been working on Assignment 3 in MGT5012, Managerial Accounting for Decision Makers. This one is a “Tutorial Model” related to Break-Even Analysis. I am not sure if I am on the right track or not on this assignment. It looked pretty straightforward but once I got into it, the Excel spreadsheet has unexpected errors in it. I am changing them to what I think is correct. This weekend I hope to work on it for an extended time and turn it in. I have not been able to devote as much time this week to my studies. I know I will PAY for it!

I completed and turned in Assignment 1 yesterday…it took me ALL DAY to read, research and write that paper! This course comes with a “Learner Plan” file, which states:

Chapter Readings– 1 hour for overview and initial understanding of text. 2 hours for detail review and comprehension

Essays – 1 hour to create, write and edit to the essay format. Half hour for research, APA inclusions, and final edit

What? Only 4 1/2 hours? It took me probably 8 hours! Geez – am I that S-L-O-W? The toughest part was cramming it all into a few pages. The syllabus states 3-4 pages but there was no way with the “Essay Format” the course requires. The assignment could not have been covered in 3-4 pages – no way. I wrote 5 pages, 7 initiatially, and had to trim it down. I am not in college -this is grad school – and complete coverage of the topic should be the requirement – not a certain number of words or pages.

For Assignment 2, I have to use the “Case Format” which has certain numbers of words for each section!!!!

This is driving me CRAZY. Am I the only person that hates being bound by WORDS or PAGE count?

OK – I think I am all set for MGT5012. Everything is printed out and organized into a three-ring binder, tabbed and sorted. I have my texts and the HBS (Harvard Business School) cases. I am reading the text in prep for the first assignment. Cleared and ready for takeoff…

The text has an website with slide presentations, quizzes, templates, flashcards, check figures, etc.  A number of McGraw-Hill Higher Education texts have an online support component. When writing papers, I use some of the charts or figures from the book which are also available in the presentations. Websites like these are really great resources for the student. MHHE has my vote!

I received my grade for the final project in MGT5001 Economics and the Modern Manager. My 4.0 is hanging in there! Today starts MGT5012 Managerial Accounting for Decision Making. There are 12 activities in this course; some are papers, case studies and problems. The first assignment is a paper on GAAP, JIT and TOC worth 10 points.

The course has apparently undergone some changes as the syllabus differs from one that I had seen previously. The assignments are pulled from the textbook as well as the HBR Coursepak. The Coursepak includes case studies and is downloaded from the Harvard Business School XanEdu website for a fee, of course.

The regular textbook is Managerial Accounting 12th edition (2008) by Garrison, Noreen and Brewer. I was able to find someone selling her text. This book will be the most expensive used book that I have purchased so far here at NCU. This book with shipping was $93.95 plus the HBR Coursepak cost $47.50. The textbook is the newest edition so the resale value is high. The fellow student who is selling her MA textbook is also including a copy of the 11th edition which she said she had also purchased. I have not yet purchased the HBR Coursepak yet, but I will this week.