All you need to do is create a ScholarRescue account to enter! We’ll draw the winner when we have 500 “Likes”on FB.

OFFICIAL RULES

1. NO PURCHASE NECESSARY TO ENTER OR TO WIN. A PURCHASE WILL NOT INCREASE YOUR ODDS OF WINNING. ALL FEDERAL, STATE, LOCAL AND MUNICIPAL LAWS AND REGULATIONS APPLY. VOID WHERE PROHIBITED.

2. ELIGIBILITY. You must be aged 18 or older at the time of entry. Persons directly affiliated with ScholarRescue are not eligible to participate. Void where prohibited by law. Subject to all applicable federal, state, and local laws and regulations. Participation constitutes full and unconditional agreement to these rules. You must have an active ScholarRescue account to be eligible.

3. ENTRY. All eligible persons with an active ScholarRescue account will be entered in the sweepstakes whenever 500 people have “Liked” the ScholarRescue Facebook page (or at 12:00AM ET 6/1/2013, if 500 “Likes” have not been obtained). Only one account per person is allowed, therefore only one entry per person.

One winner will be randomly selected and notified that he/she has won. If the selected winner cannot be contacted, is ineligible for any reason, does not agree to the terms set out herein, or declines the offer of receiving a $500 travel voucher, then a new winner will be selected and notified.

ScholarRescue reserves the right to request from any entrant additional documentation it reasonably believes is necessary to validate any entry or award any prize. ScholarRescue will not be responsible for incomplete or erroneous account information that results in the inability to contact the winner.

While all ScholarRescue eligible members will be entered into the drawing, entry itself confers no rights on those members.  Winner waives all rights to hold ScholarRescue liable in any way.

4. PRIZES. One (1) winner to receive a $500 (value) gift certificate for travel/vacation booked through SunLover Travel (www.sunlovertravel.net).  The value of the certificate may be used to book any travel not exceeding $500 or be applied toward the booking of travel exceeding $500.

5. HOW TO ENTER/ODDS OF WINNING: Automatic entry for all eligible persons with ScholarRescue.com account (no purchase necessary) beginning 5/7/2013 and ending either when the ScholarRescue Facebook page has 500 “Likes” or at 12:00AM ET 6/1/2013 (whichever occurs first).

Odds of winning are dependent on the number of registered ScholarRescue members at time of sweepstake ending (but likely to be no more than 1:2,000 odds of winning).

6. GENERAL CONDITIONS. By accepting a prize, the winner grants ScholarRescue and/or their designees the right to use his/her name, biographical information, testimonial, photo and/or likeness and/or prize information or personal exposition (and/or any edited portion thereof) for advertising, publicity, promotional and other purposes in any and all media, now or hereafter devised, throughout the world in perpetuity, without additional compensation, notification or permission, except where prohibited by law. ScholarRescue is not responsible for lost, late, incomplete, illegible, inaccurate, undelivered or garbled entries as a result of any kind problem whether human or electronic, or the processing of entries.ScholarRescue is also not responsible for any incorrect or inaccurate information, whether caused by site users, tampering, hacking or by any equipment or programming associated with or utilized in the Sweepstakes. ScholarRescue is not responsible for injury or damage to participants’ or to any other person’s property. Persons who tamper with or abuse any aspect of the Sweepstakes or Website, who are in violation of these Official Rules or who act in an unsportsmanlike or disruptive manner as solely determined by ScholarRescuer, will be disqualified. Automated entries are prohibited, and will cause disqualification. Entrants may not register multiple times.

7. WINNER NOTIFICATIONS AND ACCEPTANCE. Potential winner will be notified by e-mail, phone at ScholarRescue’s discretion within twenty-four (24) hours of random drawing. If Sponsor cannot locate a winner within two (2) business days of date of attempted notification, the prize will be forfeited and a new winner will be randomly selected. ScholarRescue is not responsible for any change of email address, mailing address and/or telephone number of entrants.

8. LIMITATION OF LIABILITY. By entering the Sweepstakes, entrants agree that the ScholarRescue LLC, SunLover Travel, Facebook, Inc. and their respective officers, directors, employees and agents (collectively, “Released Parties”) (a) shall not be responsible or liable for, and are hereby released from, any and all costs, injuries, losses or damages of any kind, including, without limitation, death and bodily injury, due in whole or in part, directly or indirectly, to participation in the Sweepstakes or any Sweepstakes related activity, or from entrant’s acceptance, receipt, possession and/or use or misuse of a prize (including any travel or activity related thereto); (b) under no circumstances will entrant be permitted
to obtain awards for, and participant hereby waives all rights to claim, punitive, incidental, consequential or any other damages, other than for actual out-of-pocket expenses; (c) all causes of action arising out of or connected with this Sweepstakes, or any prize awarded, shall be resolved individually, without resort to any form of class action; and (d) any and all claims, judgments, and award shall be limited to actual out-of-pocket costs incurred, excluding attorneys’ fees and court costs.

9. GOVERNING LAW/JURISDICTION. Sweepstakes shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the internal laws of the State of Texas, without giving effect to any choice of law or conflict of law rules or provisions that would cause the application of any other state laws. By entering, entrants consent to the jurisdiction and venue of the federal, state and local courts located in Tarrant County, TX.

10. SPONSOR. Sweepstakes is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook.

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We’ve all heard about the for-profit university industry problems: graduation rates; the ”helping” of students with financial aid; poor instruction; accreditation; transferability of credits etc…  All in all, some online universities are better than others.  When you are pot-committed, the unversity makes more money from you if you fail a class and then have to retake it. Do some online universities want you to fail? Do some online unversities deliberately design courses that “help” you fail?

With that being said, we thought we’d put together some useful tips on how to choose an online university:

Before paying a penny, read the policies carefully:

1. Is the university accredited?
2. Do credits tranfer to other institutions?
3. If you are completing a vocational degree, will the industry accept your degree?(i.e., you can take an online law degree but will you be able to get your license to practice?)
4. What are the refund policies? Know what the last day to drop your course for a full refund is? Do not enroll unless you are certain you can get your money back.
5. What are the guidelines for grade disputes? It is our belief that some online universities deliberately make dispute resolution almost impossible – so that they do not have to refund you.

After paying for a class:

1. Immediately go to the course pages and look around. Is it easy to navigate?
2. Read the syllabus and again navigate the course pages to see if materials, discussion forums, assignments, and exams are easy to find.
3. Is the structure and content user-friendly?  Is it absolutely clear when assignment 3 or exam 2 is due? How/where do you submit completed work?
4. Read your professor’s/instructor’s bio.  Where is that person from? Where did he/she receive his/her education? Does he/she have a terminal degree? What about work experience?
5. Send the instructor an email and ask a question!  If you don’t receive a timely response that answers your question, then chances are the instructor will not be helpful should a problem arise during the course.

Consider dropping the course and choosing another online unversity if you are not confident after having followed these tips!

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Some students post assignments looking for help with a class for the entire semester.  This kind of tutoring assignment works well when both parties keep in touch and expectations are managed properly. Occasionally an arbitration does occur but as much as possible, let’s all be proactive in preventing problems from arising! Here’s how:

As a student, you need to be certain that the help you requested is being provided!  Requesting arbitration “after the fact” does not help the your class (although your money is always safe with us).  So pay close attention to your progress throughout the semester!

As a scholar, you need to be sure that you are being reliable and responsive to the student … simply put give the class help that you promised! If it takes you 3 days to respond to a question that your client may have, then don’t be surprised to learn that the assignment has been arbitrated, that the student’s money has been refunded, and that you’ve received a poor rating!

Also, please remember to keep communication on our system … the comment thread helps us understand what is going on when an arbitration does happen to arise.

Finally, always remember that this is a community.  Treat people fairly and treat people respectfully … we do and we expect you to do the same!

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So it’s official – the cost of college is ridiculous (as we all know) but they estimate that by 2030 Private Schools might cost up $130,000 a year and Public Schools might set you back $57,000 a year.

And you thought it was bad now!

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I thought I’d address a few of things about ScholarRescue:

1) Does ScholarRescue write my essay or complete my assignment? – We don’t employ anyone, rather, we are a platform or network for you to meet other students who can help you. This is an online COMMUNITY of college students and grads.

2) How do I know this is REAL? – The easiest way to find out is simply to sign up, look around, see what other people are doing. This costs you nothing.  We’ve built a pretty neat website with lots of features and functionality – post an assignment, which again costs nothing.  Wait for responses, look at scholars’ previous ratings and reviews, test out our message system.  Hopefully this should be enough to CONVINCE you.

3) How do I know that I won’t be ripped off … don’t I have to pay before I receive the work? – You will NOT be ripped off … that is our GUARANTEE.  You do pay in advance, but you are in control of releasing payment to the scholar (the person you select to receive help from).  You get 48 hours to review the work – if you are not happy, you can ask the scholar to fix the problem or ask us to arbitrate which allows us to step in and refund you.  Our goal to provide the utmost satisfaction and value to ALL of our members – remember, we don’t employ writers so we can objectively protect everyone.

Mark

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I know it’s a little bit silly but ….

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkKyXVhsg6I

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Online class is hard … it’s no wonder you see and hear people saying ”who can I pay to take my online class?”

In a brick-and-mortar university, you get up and go to class, you listen to and interact with your professor and your peers.  You are motivated because you want to do well, you know you can get “called on,” and there’s a certain level of social pressure that drives you on … even when you hate the class.  Online however, it is different: you log in and listen … you are in your PJ’s, there are all the distractions and comforts of your home around you.  Nobody’s looking at you, questions aren’t being directed toward you, classmates aren’t next to you … the intensity is missing!

Clearly, online unversity courses are improving … universities are trying to create virtual classroom experiences that emulate the “real” thing with online meet-and-greets, forums, group projects, q&a sessions, virtual instructor ”office hours” etc…  But is it enough?  The answer seems to be no … online class dropout rates are higher than regular dropout rates and apparantly some of the major reasons for this are: time constraints and time management, lack of motivation and lack of support. (Ask me for references if you are interested).

Imagine having a partner … someone to help you, someone to work with you, someone to check on you and your progress, someone to tutor you when you are lost, someone to brainstorm with, someone who can ensure you’re work is being done. This is what ScholarRescue is about … you find a scholar (other students and grads) that you are comfortable working with, you set the parameters of the working relationship, you stay in touch as much or as little as you need, you get the help that you actually want and need.  The loneliness and solitude of being an online student and all the problems that go along with it are gone! Class completed!

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A great website called CollegeCures.com posted a review about us.  You can read it here:

http://www.collegecures.com/2012/homework-headache-no-problems-college-cures-reviews-scholarrescue-com/

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OK – so you’re in college and you’re broke!  Now you are looking for a way to make some cash.  You’ve heard about this site called ScholarRescue.com and you’re morality hazard warning light are on … “isn’t this wrong and doesn’t this devalue that piece of paper I’m paying thousands of dollars for?”

You might want to consider this: higher education enrollment is at an all-time high.  It has increased from approximately 15 million in 2000 to more than 20 million students today … that’s 33% growth¹.  In that same period, the US population has grown by less than 10%². In other words, universities are admitting a greater percentage of people than ever before. In and of itself, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing; but why the growth and where are these students coming from?

Higher education is, whether we like it or not, an industry just like any other, where universities, just like companies, are in a constant struggle for survival.  Survival, for most is simply based on enrollment. The more students enrolled, the greater the revenue and economies of scale.  This allows for greater investment in facilities and faculty which, in turn makes it more easy to recruit more students (… who wants to go to a school with a 40 year old rec center and student union?).

The name-brand universities will always attract the brightest applicants and never have a problem filling every seat that they create.  The other schools are competing for everyone else. Yet the industry is growing – since 1990 we’ve seen the number of higher education institutions increase by more than 25%³ (from approximately 3,500 to 4,500) and most, if not all, are trying to grow which means that competition for every student has intensified tremendously.  So if you aren’t a name-brand university or if you don’t have some sort of competitive advantage, then where would you find your customers? Presumably, the only way to fill those seats is by accepting less-qualified students. High school grade inflation⁴ and standardized test score re-centering⁵ exacerbate the problem and the result is a massive decline in college admittance standards.

Just look around you the next time you are in class … who shouldn’t be there?  Ask yourself “why does my school have a writing center?” Schools have writing centers and on-staff tutors to cover their tracks … they’ve admitted poor quality students and now need to keep those students at all costs in order to pay the bills!  How is it that even with lower standards, year on year we see average GPA’s on the rise⁶? 43% of all letter grades are now an A⁷.

Remember you’re morality hazard warning light? The light that made you say … “isn’t this wrong and doesn’t this devalue that piece of paper I’m paying thousands of dollars for?” Well … who is really doing the devaluing – you for writing the paper for a student or the university for admitting students who really have no place being there?

Today, many employers say that colleges and universities are not adequately preparing students for jobs⁸. So while the average cost of university and the average college debt level (approximately $25,000 on graduation⁹) are both steadily rising, the median starting salary has shrunk to $27,000¹⁰ and graduates are less well prepared for their futures.

So all in all, if you decide to help someone out, what you are really doing is helping yourself to: pay your bills, lower your debt, improve your skills and knowledge, and give yourself an edge to get a good job upon graduation!  You are also doing your university a favor … but they will never admit it!

1 http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0278.pdf

2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States

3 http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0278.pdf

4 http://www.act.org/research/policymakers/pdf/issues.pdf

5 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAT

6 and 7 http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/14/the-history-of-college-grade-inflation/

8 http://chronicle.com/article/Employers-Say-College/130013/

9 http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/03/pf/student_loan_debt/index.htm

10 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/19/business/economy/19grads.html Continue reading →

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