Louisiana State University - Shreveport Reviews

"I am new to the online MBA program and seriously regret my decision to enroll here. They use ProctorU for exams which is rife with problems. Had I realized just what a nightmare it would be each week dealing with this company for my exams, I would have never enrolled at LSUS. Some stranger gets access and control over my computer, mouse, camera, and microphone. The wait times for a proctor are long. I've waited over an hour to be connected in order to take my exam. There is no consistency with the proctor requirements. I take my exams in the exact same place, with the same setup, yet each time there is some new issue. The military ID that I use for each exam is suddenly not clear enough one day, even though it was fine every other time. You can't have your phone with you, so I leave my phone in another room. Yet, they still insist on seeing the phone, so I had to walk through my house with the laptop to show my phone was located in the kitchen. I have a mirror in front of the desk so they can see the whole computer when requested, yet will still insist I take a picture with my phone (which is in another room). Then they want 360 degree view of the room, the desk, under the desk, the area on the floor around, etc. It's ridiculous jumping through all these hoops before you are taking an exam. I got flagged for possible cheating because I was startled by a loud noise outside and looked to the side for one second (normal human behavior). Another time my camera stopped working, unbeknownst to me, and instead of telling me through the speaker or sending a message on the chat box they just put that I left the exam. If you want to be treated like garbage, then this is the place is for you."

"The LSUS MBA program is conducted entirely online and can be completed within 2 years. Terms are extremely fast paced and only last 7 weeks; however the workload per class is roughy equivalent to a 14 week course. Overall, the quality of instruction is good and I am satisfied with my experience. It is also one of the most affordable AASCB accredited MBA programs in the US, which is a major advantage."

"I have two doctoral degrees but decided to advance my education with an MBA with a Marketing specialization from LSU-Shreveport. I had a tremendous experience for the following reasons: 1) The total tuition cost was just over $12,000 for the entire program. It was a GREAT VALUE! 2) The online courses were easy to navigate and possessed the requisite rigor. 3) The classes were designed with real-world applications in mind. 4) The professors are well-qualified and knowledgable in their classroom areas. 5) The program was flexible, and I completed it on my schedule. 6) The graduation ceremony was top-notch! I HIGHLY recommend LSU-Shreveport as a quality institution from which to earn your degree! From enrollment through graduation, their team was highly-responsive and engaging."

"Only good things to say about the online MBA program at LSUS. It's flexible for someone already in a career and is looking for a solid business foundation to help accelerate their career path. There are student study groups that are formed in each class and this helps create an environment that makes it feel almost like an in person program. Highly recommended!!!"

"I found the online MBA program to be challenging and stimulating. It met most if not all expectations regarding the curriculum, online professors, and the testing platform. **Note** I will say one proctor was overzealous and required me to remove family photos hung on the wall before launching the test. That said, completing my MBA was a personal goal of mine for many years. After putting two kids through college, three cancers, and a thirty-eight year career, I decided it was time. I remain thankful to LSUS for the encouragement staff displayed in my first inquiry of the program. I found the professors accessible as needed for email replies to questions regarding class materials and required tasks. I would simply offer this. Understand why you are seeking the advanced degree and then be intentional in making it a priority in your life. You will have to make sacrifices which can be difficult. At 60 years of age, I changed companies, had 12 hour work days, endured the Covid virus, and lost my father, and best friend during my time. Do your best and utilize the resources afforded in the program and those of your own experience and you can finish successfully. My GPA was 4.0 and my diploma hangs proudly in my office."

"I really enjoyed my experience at LSUS. With that being said, this is not the place for someone looking for a "traditional" college experience. While there are many opportunities to meet people and become involved with the LSUS community, the focus of the university is mainly academic. I found my classes were a good size (20-30 students) and had reasonable expectations. I am very happy with my experience and am currently working on my MBA through LSUS's online program."

"This is a fantastic choice for grad school. I researched for a long time for a good ACCSB accredited schools for my MBA, and finally took a chance and joined the LSUS accelerated MBA program. It is challenging, and you have to commit and plan a good portion of your time of the week for the course work. If you plan out well, it is indeed doable. I enrolled two classes each session, and graduated in about ten months. I did it with a full time job and a kid. I used rate my professor.com to chose my teachers, and they all turned out to be great and fair. I got all As and graduated with a 4.0 GPA. Their platforms, customer service, and proctor services were great, I truly enjoyed my learning here. To all the people who are willing to be organized and plan you week, and wants to graduate fast with a worthy MBA, this is a great school pick. I would recommend it in a heart beat. Tuition costs are not astronomical, and my experience from day one was nothing short of wonderful!"

"I am currently enrolled in the LSUS MBA-Data Analytics Specialization. The LSUS MBA program has been an extremely positive experience; the professors are brilliant and extremely specialized, with extensive experience in business industries such as data analytics, marketing, IT, accounting, organizational change management, and so on. The program has received a highly esteemed AACSB Global Business School Accreditation and is ranked as one of the best business schools in the country in terms of value for money and education. The LSUS MBA hammers core business principles and coursework challenges and shifts your thinking to a bigger perspective. Textbooks and readings are offered at no cost and are among the most current and intriguing literature and business publications accessible today. The courses are strategically structured to give you a wide array of experiences and ultimately provides value to your professional portfolio. The courses are designed to equip you with a diverse set of experiences that will add value to your professional portfolio. All exams are live proctored to ensure program integrity. The upper-level marketing courses are highly intriguing, and the hands-on tasks really compel you to learn in a positive way. I would recommend this MBA program to anyone who is: 1) currently employed and searching for a competitive advantage in the workplace or looking to branch out. 2) does not want to carry substantial debt student loan liabilities 3) Those seeking a well-rounded, AACSB-accredited business education with the option of specializing in a particular subject."

"I'm currently enrolled at LSUS, but am over halfway done. So far, I have 4 "A"s and 2 "B"s. Is this a tough school, yes. Can it be done while working full-time, yes. I'm really taken aback by the reviews on here and it's why I felt compelled to write a review. Getting your MBA should be hard, or else it would take away from everyone being able to actually obtain one, right? LSUS is the best value AACSB accredited MBA, and I searched for 3 months prior to enrolling. I work full-time between 50-60 hours/week, I'm head of household with small children and I also take care of my elderly mother. Listen, if I can do this (taking one class at a time), then I feel like it's not impossible to do. Slow and steady and recognizing that although I'd love to double or triple up to finish, my life does not support that. I'll graduate over a total of 18 months and I'm ok with that. Typically reviews are only written by someone who is disgruntled, so here is my honest positive review of someone currently enrolled."

"Do yourself a favor, and spend the extra money and go to a school like SNHU. Overall MUCH better experience. From the student services, advising, professors, etc., there is no question. LSUS uses a third party testing company, ProctorU, in it's testing environment. This is a serious BREACH of personal data from your own computer. They do not allow you to fully test this system before classes start, only to get the GREEN CHECKMARK that your systems are good to go to handle the online environment. By the time you get to the testing environment with ProctorU, your option to drop courses for a refund is past. The professors are AWFUL. I had one professor who had 3 degrees, served in the army, and he could not find a way to return my emails or help me with the issues I was having with my firewall not allowing the testing content due to security reasons. (Customer support at ProctorU advised me to remove my firewall! Do your research on ProctorU incidents - it's a real issue across several colleges - some of which have chosen to ban it due to data breaches as well as the level of disrespect and stress it adds to students' experiences). Furthermore, LSUS does not have a contingency plan in place for students who do not want to use ProctorU. I did get my money back after DILIGENT days and weeks of calls and emails and ultimately directly contacting the Dean. I am not exaggerating when I say I spent hours on the phone with support and trying to contact student services. A complete nightmare. Know what you are signing up for when you are dealing with admissions before you even attend. Don't save $5K dollars on degree to stress yourself out and be treated like a teenager in detention. Respect yourself more than that and attend a school that treats you like a CUSTOMER who is paying for your education! TRUST me on this. This school is a scam. You deserve BETTER."

"I enrolled in LSUS because it was the best value AACSB accredited MBA I could find, without a surcharge for being out of state. Intelligent.com also rated it as having the best data analytics focus for 2022. The LSUS MBA has been a very rigorous academic undertaking but unfortunately the MBA schedule is totally inflexible. Although the courses can be done in any order, each course is lockstep with one proctored exam every week. Each course week begins on Monday. You can take the weekly exam starting on Thursday night through and latest Sunday night each week. You canNOT take the exam ahead of time or fall behind. Even if you explain your day job work schedule is very hectic on a particular week and want to work ahead you will get NO hind nor quarter. I took one course at a time. If you try to take 2 courses at a time, ensure you have a lot of flexibility at your day job, and that you don't have to work more than 4-5 hours M-F at your day job. In between each course you get one week off to try and make amends to your family. IMHO the LSUS AACSB MBA courses are very good value for the money, but better suited for independent learners who have completed at least 2 years of university successfully. Class sizes are about 150 people. Some classes have Zoom tutorials which I have not attended. All exams can be done at home. Each exam starts with ProctorU examining your ID, and then taking over your computer and checking that you have no outside connections. The entire exam is video and sound recorded and later reviewed. Get a wide field camera for your computer so that during the exam video recording your entire face is visible onscreen. If part of your face inadvertently drifts off their video screen, you are accused of cheating, even though all you are doing is doing is a math calculation on scratch paper to the side of the laptop. Unfortunately, because the students are not treated the best at LSUS, the program will not attain top rankings. In summary, the LSUS MBA is a rigorous academic program and compared to other MBAs a very good value for the $; I can definitely see why the LSUS MBA is AACSB accredited. However, if you cannot put up with taking tests every week, this is NOT the MBA for you. If you are looking for an MBA with spoonfeeding lectures, and where the instructor will adjust the course timing for your day job schedule though, this is NOT the MBA for you."

"Don't do it!!, there are better schools. I have nothing positive to say about this school at all. if you want to be stressed, given busy work and graded too harshly then yes attend. The classes fill up fast, there is always technical issues and the class schedule is just horrid. there's not really much guidance from the professors and I found that really frustrating and the dean and graduate studies make little effort to help when things go south. last semester most people could not get into their classes which resulted in graduation delays for a lot of people due to their registration cite crashing, honestly this school is one of the cheapest for a reason. go somewhere else!!"

"I see several reviews that are bashing the rigor of the LSUS MBA curriculum, which is concerning when considering the fact that this is a graduate level business program. It should be rigorous. It should be difficult. It should be something that not everyone can comfortably do, because if they could, it would no longer hold prestige to possess an MBA. I think that a lot of people look at online programs and expect them to be easy just because they don't have to sit in a lecture hall to achieve it. On the contrary, I absolutely believe that online programs provide the learner with the benefit value equal to the effort that they put into it. I would definitely call this program rigorous, but I am also glad that it is. I would strongly prefer to go through a program that challenges me every step of the way and finish with a fraction of the cohort that I started with, rather than walk across the finish line with every one of them because the program was easy. Another complaint that I see a lot in these reviews is that the workload is overwhelming. Again, I'm surprised and concerned to see that given the nature of the program. While I wouldn't call the workload "easy" to manage, it is certainly doable. Personally, I have a full-time and a part-time job, I run other businesses on the side, I am simultaneously pursuing a separate graduate program at another university, and am the primary caretaker of my household. This is not intended to be contentious, but simply to illustrate that it is absolutely possible to maintain the LSUS MBA workload while still maintaining other responsibilities. Overall, I would absolutely recommend LSUS and specifically the Accelerated MBA program to individuals seeking to further their career. The caveat I would place on it is that if you already feel like you are overwhelmed with your current schedule and/or if you are not willing to carve out appropriate time to devote to a graduate-level program, do yourself a favor and look elsewhere. There are easier MBA programs out there, just as there are certainly harder ones. And there are both more and less prestigious ones. There are cheaper (maybe?) and more expensive (definitely) ones as well. LSUS happens to hit a lot of great points - they are a great school with sufficient academic respect, they have a rigorous program that lends prestige over many other university options, and a learner would be hard-pressed to find a less expensive alternative. I have enjoyed my courses at LSUS and given the chance, I would choose this program all over again."

"When I first began LSUS, I had a woman from the accounting department tell me that I should feel lucky for having both tribal scholarship and GI Bill paying for my education, which for several reason offended me. I gave up five years of my life for one of those scholarship and worked very hard to maintain the other. Luck had nothing to do with the sacrifices I made too one day be able to pursue a higher education. On top of that, the school posted that summer 2016 and spring 2016 were paid in full when in actuality the checks were sent but never cashed. 2020 comes around and the LSUS is saying I owe over 4-thousand-dollar in tuition. Since it has been longer than 2 semester the scholarships I had will not pay for those semesters. Now during a pandemic where I am finically struggling and trying to get back in to school, LSUS is holding my transcript until I pay the tuition that should have already been paid. Now I am sitting here with over a 4-thousand-dollar tuition dept due to LSUS mishandling of finances."

"The work load is overwhelming and reading the entire text isn't helpful when it comes to the quiz. Teachers and coaches need to communicate better. Especially when a person is on financial-aid and you have to keep a B. Not that easy, work & school!!!"

"I enrolled in this university to improve my chances of advancing in my career but so far it is actually having a negative impact on it. I am enrolled in the Online MBA program and I just wish I did not. The workload in some classes is absolutely unbearable and it has had a very negative impact on my job and physical and mental health as well. Simply put, some classes require that you spend more than 40+ hours a week working on them. For example, some classes require that you present a 2,000+ words paper with very specific requirements every single week for 7 weeks straight, on top of reading a couple of chapters (almost 200 pages) and preparing for weekly exams that focus on minor details of the text. Basically, you have to have a photographic memory to absorb the content of the text to be able to get a good grade. My family has seen me study and work to the point of exhaustion for this MBA and many have expressed concerns about it. In terms of instruction, you are paying to get materials and access to online lessons that you must teach yourself. The amount of teacher-student interaction is nonexistent or minimal. For those who are considering the online MBA, please, see other options."

"LSU-Shreveport is a small school, but a good one. Classes are usually small, which allows for better interaction with the professors. Degree programs are a little limited. They do not offer degrees such as archaeology, for example. That is due to the administration of the entire LSU system, however, not LSU-Shreveport specifically. LSUS is a good school for degrees such as history, business, and education. The teachers I had were good. They were knowledgeable and good about working and interacting with students. The school also offers a lot of student activities. Overall, I was pleased with the school."

"I took the online MBA program and found it significantly lacking. The professors refuse to give individual feedback on the questions / concepts missed on quizzes, providing only aggregated answers from the class, which are useless for individual knowledge. Some professors communicate primarily in all capital letters, which is strictly prohibited by program standards. The curriculum is from 2014, and does not include examples which are relevant to actual situations. One professor refused to perform any instruction; the class was almost entirely YouTube videos from another professor and textbook readings; the two information streams were not complementary in knowledge or terminology. Correspondence with the MBA Director, Dr. Knotts, proved unsatisfying; she made it perfectly clear that she is not interested in student progression. The lack of professionalism and poor professional communication caused me to leave the school in search of an institution which demonstrates an actual interest in teaching and learning rather than simply being a monetary collection company."

"I can’t think of how the program could be worse. There were maybe two professors in the science department who were decent. Between having a professor say he was handing out McDonald’s applications because we weren’t going anywhere to a newly appointed dean of the department who found this behavior acceptable. No one cares and most openly tell you how much they hate their jobs. It’s an extremely hard program with a terrible education. I’d recommend anywhere else over this disaster of a place I spent four years going through."

"I would certainly recommend LSUS. I retained an immense amount of knowledge through the MBA program and enjoyed interacting with very intelligent professors and classmates. While it can be rigorous taking multiple classes at a time, I like the ability to work every day and complete the program in one year at an affordable price. I wouldn't want to take two years to learn material that I can learn in one year. You also get a 1-week break in between classes, which allows you to rejuvenate before beginning your next course."