Stark State College Rankings by Salary Score™

I never write reviews, however when someone pays tens of thousands of dollars to be completely mislead from the start on this LPN program I knew I had to write my opinion in hopes of helping others .First, I took all my prereqs at Stark State in Canton, the instructors that I had were really good and truly wanted the best for their students. I passed all my prereqs that consisited of algebra 1 and 2 along with BIO 101, my GPA was 3.75 . I then attendend the LPN program that fall of 2023. I went to the orientation... Read More with roughly around 80 people. This group of people consisted of morning, afternoon and weekend/night programs. This is where the misleading started to take place. We were told how proud the instructors are that they have a 100% NCLEX passing rate. I thouhgt that was so amazing looking around the room, not knowing that they only had 12 grads out of 80 the previous year. I then found out that 12 people is one of their higher grad rates. This is ridiculous!! I hope 12 people can pass their NCLEX the first time around. THIS IS NOTHING to be proud of by any means!!! Next, when classes started we were remindend over and over that most of us will fail out by Nursing 3 and that we all need to work harder. Only 2 instructors lectured in Pharmacology. As far as nursing 1 and 2, we were given outdated and poorly narrated slides that were made during COVID for our learning pleasure. Between all the ummmms and talking in circles, you may get some information that you need for nursing. The pharmacolgy video lectures were pretty good, however these were mostly self taught as well. We also received weekly emails stating that if we don't do what they want in a very short amount of time that we will be excused from the program. This mainly pertianed to ACEMAPP and clinicals. Also, rules are changed as to what mood the instructors are in on that particular day. This became to be part of our usual routine. Then, I started Nursing 3, which I was so excited because we were told that we actuall get weekly lectures. We got an option to sign up for mornings or afternoons. I started out in mornings and due to my childrens school/sport schedule I signed up for afternoons. For those who chose afternoons, we were told by that instructor that she will be starting her classes musch earlier because she likes to get in and get out due to traffic. If we really had no choice and the instructor got to completely dictate the Nursing 3 schedule, then why act like they are giving us a choice? Lab is one day per week, the instructors in lab are very nice, but the equipment is less than par for a decent learning environment. They really did do the best with what they had, which is not the fault of the lab instructors. Then, I had what I thought was a classroom time of lecturing of the current topic at hand. WRONG!! The instructor lectured maybe 45 minutes, gave us a quiz and for the rest of the class time gave us what she called "busy work" such as crosswords, more ATI videos and a scavenger hunt all the while she went to her office and graded papers. She actually used our classroom time and what we as students paid her for, for her grading. We would practice case studies that were no where near the same setup as to what she expected on her tests. She literally taught on an RN level which is ridiculous! Her tests were very confusing and focused on material that wasn't gone over thoroughly, as most material was not. I met with her to look over my test/quizzes and I got zero support. I was told that I most likely have testing anxiety and that I need to put more time in my study habits. I literally went to school, drove almost and hour there and back Monday-Wednesday and had clinicals Thursday and Friday from 7am-3:30 pm. I would go home and teach myself by watching 25 hours worth of videos and take lengthly notes from an RN standard. I also had assignments on ATI for hours, because you had to get a strong on the assignment to recieve NO GRADE and if you didn't do the assignment to her standards, you would not receive participation points for Lab ( Lab and clinicals are a pass/fail as all programs). I studied for up to 12 hours a day only to take a test and fail them. As to knowing the material, I did know the material. It was the way the instructor had the tests set up. She would literally focus on mainly one topic and test on that one thing along with a handful of other topics. I had up to 60 pages of notes that I took weekly and only to focus on a handful of topics is ridiculous.We then had to do a case study that we really didn't learn about other than what you teach yourself. We were expected to know all the labs, meds (and all the generic names), diseases, side effects, nursing implications of up to 50 diseases.Then we had the pleasure of looking at our previous weeks case study. It was mostly matter of her opinion on what she thought was appropriate for that specific case study. Most students failed these case studies. She said it was because we weren't studing enough when asked by a student in class if she would lecture on these. She said she would look into that and never did help us with them. I am convinced the tests and case studies were designed to fail students. I am by far not the only one that has stated this. I eventually withdrew on my own from the program because I truly got tired of failing, not receiving any help even when asked by me and by other students, teaching myself and paying a lot of money for horrible video lectures. In conclusion, if you are wanting to pay a lot of money, teach yourself, learn on less than adequate equipment for Lab, be told over and over to look around and that the person next to you will not pass the program, and never be taught how to do a case study properly then Stark State LPN program is for you!

It is important to disclose that this review is regarding Online classes only, as my disability and commute distance make attending in person very difficult. To get started, the online courses I've taken for Stark State are conspicuously lacking in depth and actual instruction. Despite all the online technology that can be utilized these days, there are very few options within the classes other than going over PowerPoint slides or clicking on a link to a website. I personally have zero issues with PowerPoint... Read More slides, but when they are the core method to instruct students, it is not acceptable to have these slides lacking important medical definitions, slides with placeholder pictures, and slides that have a 50/50 chance of actually playing an embedded video. It’s like these slides were not completed for the class (or they are meant for an in-person class where the instructor can fill in the blanks). On top of that, the structure of Online Exams and instruction is terrible. Yes, it is absolutely important for the student to work hard to try and pass the class, but there were several instances of questions that were not covered in the material, yet were a question on the exam, or cases where questions on an exam were then covered in a future week of class! I even went back to review why I missed some questions, and they were simply not in the slides or the book. Also, unlike a paper exam where the material can be gone over and missed questions reviewed, there is no option to review online exam material. You have to hope you remember what questions were incorrect and go off memory, making any future attempt less likely to succeed. While I’d also agree that it is necessary to keep a check on online cheating, Stark State really seems to have cheaters living rent-free in its board members heads. From having to SMS Text every single time logging in to check out new material (checking your phone every log-in adds up to a lot of wasted time after a few months) to having Respondus Monitor (anti-cheat webcam software that gives rural internet users a headache...it doesn’t even have a dark mode for sensitive eyes...also, you'd better hope that the webcam you need to buy will be compatible), as well as changing what is and is not acceptable a few weeks into class, the inconsistency of these online classes are based on the whims of what the instructor deems appropriate, and that’s bad news if the instructor does not understand or doesn’t care that online teaching needs to hit different beats than an in-person class. For example, the instructor offered extra credit, but the students had to attend the campus to be able to qualify for that extra credit. In an ONLINE class. If you didn’t/couldn’t show up, then that was tough luck for you. That is not fair for the students, nor is it acceptable to not provide online alternatives. I suppose the motivation to write this review came from the fact that I frequently emailed the last instructor on my concerns regarding the online system. The responses were professional and friendly, which I appreciate, but my concerns were deflected and dismissed at every turn. Responses such as, “Well, everyone thinks online classes are going to be easy until they take them!” and “Well, you just need to find a way to get it done.” This tactic of the instructor arguing against straw-men (I never assumed the online class would be easy, I just wanted to understand why such needless roadblocks were necessary, especially for a student with a disability) leaves a sour taste. I expect better for as much as a college education costs, and if this is the result of genuine attempts to highlight problems from the student perspective, I don’t have any trust or loyalty for the college as a result. In conclusion, while there are positives to be found (the instructors seem like nice people, trapped in a lousy system themselves), and remember that attending in-person may be a totally different story than what I experienced, my current opinion is that this Stark State does not care enough about students but rather the money they can get out of them while doing as little work as possible. And hey, if the poor quality of teaching means the students fail, they can always pay for the class again, right? You will undoubtedly be forced to teach yourself, and genuine concerns for how the classes are taught are almost certainly going to be dismissed because, after all, that would require more effort on Stark State’s part. This college's online system makes it not worth attending unless you have no other options.