Speeding to a degree: Does a college credential signify ... anything?
- Joanne Jacobs
- Apr 21
- 3 min read
"Speedrunning" college is a "no-brainer," says Christie Williams, who earned a bachelor's degree in three months and a master's in five weeks via University of Maine at Presque Isle's online YourPace program.
Adults looking for workforce credentials are moving quickly -- very quickly -- through web tutorials and online classes to complete a college degree, reports Todd Wallack in the Washington Post. Williams, an HR exec in North Carolina, "spent two months racking up credits through web tutorials after work in 2024, then raced through 11 online classes" offered by UM Presque Isle to complete a four-year degree, he writes. The master's degree was even faster. "The two degrees cost a total of just over $4,000."
Most YourPace students finished a four-year degree in less than a year in 2024, writes Wallack. More than one in four finished in a single eight-week session.
"Degree hacking," also known as "college speed runs or hyper-accelerated degrees," is affordable and convenient, writes Wallack. It appeals to working adults who have no time or money for frat parties, football games or frou-frou electives. They want a credential that will give them a raise, a promotion or a shot at a better job.
For example, YourPace's English BA promises to prepare students for communications and marketing jobs. (There's also a Cannabis Business Certificate.)
Traditional educators fear the bachelor's degree lose its value, going the way of the high school diploma. “We want diplomas that mean something,” said Marjorie Hass, president of the Council of Independent Colleges. AI cheating already is eroding confidence that college graduates learned something in the four or five costly years typically spent on campus.
Self-paced online programs are based on "competency," at least in theory. Students must complete assignments or pass a test to show they've mastered the material. For YourPace students, writes Wallack, there are no class meetings or group discussions. "Seat time" is irrelevant.
“The students demonstrate how much they can learn as quickly as they can,” Raymond Rice, president of Presque Isle, said. “They take as long or as short as they need to get there.”
Of course, many speedrunners (it's a video game term) have earned some college credits before they enroll, Wallack writes. More than 43 million Americans started college but never earned a degree.
In addition, he writes, "the online schools best known for accelerated degrees, such as Maine’s Presque Isle campus and Western Governors University, also let students transfer in as many as three-quarters of the credits from nontraditional sources," such as on-the-job learning, passing tests or completing online tutorials.
Western Governors, a nonprofit with more than 194,000 students across the country, was founded as an online program to help working adults access higher education. The average time to a four-year degree is 2.5 years, with many finishing faster.
Serenity James, who works full-time in Atlanta and is raising a six-year-old daughter, couldn't attend a traditional college in person, she told Wallack. "She completed 16 courses on an online learning platform in 22 days," then finished 13 classes in two months to earn a Western Governor's bachelor's degree. She spent 2½ months earning an MBA. The two "degrees cost less than $9,000, which was covered by a scholarship, her employer and a federal Pell Grant."
"She said she had little contact with her professors or fellow students but was in touch regularly with a mentor assigned to her by the college,' he writes. "After finishing the degrees, she earned a promotion to a new higher-paying job at her employer, a national health insurance company."
Colleges typically contract with a proctoring service to make sure students aren't cheating on online exams -- or bringing in a ringer to take the test. Determining whether students are using AI to complete assignments is a huge challenge in online courses, say professors, but it's also bad in traditional courses.
Accreditors should question whether speedrunning grads really have demonstrated competence. But they should wonder about the not-so-fast grads too. How competent are they?
As usual, it depends on the subject. You aren’t going to be able to get a chemistry degree in 3 months, sitting in front of a computer. On the other hand, some “studies” degrees might just be possible.
I did a Masters in 9 months through WGU while working full time and doing all the rest of the stuff that goes along with a busy life. I learned a lot, did the work at my own pace, which was very fast. The alternative would have been two years and having to quit my job in order to attend full time college.
I'd say that the ability to do a degree in a shorter time says less about the degree program and more about the regular program.
The magic parchment gets you past the HR lady. Even only being 1 credit short of a credential and college doesn't matter in the hiring process for most employers.
Now, what you learned in your classes may prove of use to you, but it means nothing in the HR game. There is the heralded calligraphy course Steve Jobs audited.
But the record is long that the degree simply shows you've attended and passed the tests, not real learning, skill or knowledge gained. In the past, residential college was an intensive intellectual "basic training" where students learned how to learn. And in earlier times exposed students to a wider world of knowledge unavailable to most. Now, college is more likely…