AIU Online
 Program CatalogTuition | Starting Dates Admissions & Application |
Highlights
- Online virtual campus of American InterContinental University, an international institution founded in 1970
- Approximately 50,000 online graduates throughout the world
- Offers access to course materials via mobile devices
- Accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and a member of the U.S. Distance Learning Association
About the School
AIU Online is the online, web-based campus for American InterContinental University, a higher education institution established in 1970 and with residential campuses in the United States and England. The University's online degree programs offer career-focused undergraduate and graduate degrees in business, criminal justice, education, healthcare, technology, and visual communication.
Overview of AIU's Virtual Campus
A Promotional Video from the School
Introduces how AIU's online classroom technologies work. Discusses several features of their systems, including multimedia, collaboration, and the ability to customize experiences. Produced by AIU.
Academic Programs
AIU Online offers its degree programs through several schools, including:
- School of Business - This school blends core business and general education courses with the goal of fostering critical analysis and communication capabilities. Degree areas include business, criminal justice administration, finance, human resources, information systems, medical billing, operations management, project management, and more.
- School of Education - Programs emphasize that students understand learning theories, design of courses, educational technology, and the use of research methods. Concentration options include curriculum and instruction, educational assessment, instructional technology, and leadership of educational organizations.
- School of Healthcare Management - This school offers Business Administration degrees that are focused on healthcare management. Topics covered include ethics, industry overview, legal, healthcare systems, management, office practices, and policy.
- School of Information Technology - The school is designed to teach state-of-the-art IT skills and to base its curriculum on input from the IT marketplace. Optional concentrations include Internet security and project management.
- School of Marketing - The school is aimed at preparing marketing professionals to be effective as they manage, plan, implement, and assess marketing and advertising programs.
- School of Organizational Psychology and Development - Structured to ready students for careers involving the resolution of individual, group, and organizational issues, such as careers in human resources, training, and customer service.
- School of Visual Communication - Designed to prepare students with the graphic design skills needed to pursue careers in areas such as advertising, computer animation, and marketing. Concentrations include visual communication, digital design, and Web design.
As part of the school's commitment to quality education, AIU Online regularly reviews its programs, policies, and activities to help ensure that they are up-to-date with the latest business conditions.
AIU Students Discuss Their Experiences at Graduation
A Promotional Video from the School
Filmed during Spring 2011 commencement. Graduates are interviewed and discuss their experiences at AIU. Created by AIU.
Learning Options
AIU Online's “virtual campus” environment gives students the flexibility of anytime/anywhere studies. Delivered via the Internet, AIU Online's courses apply an “Asynchronous Learning Model” that utilizes a combination of face-to-face classroom time and web-based education components. AIU Online organizes students in teams and strives to keep class sizes small.
AIU Online offers students the choice in speeding up the completion of their degrees for some programs, such as for an Associate's degree. The University has a flexible scheduling approach for which students can take two courses in parallel or alternatively take a concentrated course in a five week session.
Features of AIU's online classroom environment include:
- Interactive communication – message boards, instant messages, and email
- Contents – multimedia lectures and presentations, printable presentations, frequently asked questions, multimedia workbook exercises, quizzes, online course reference resources, online library of journals, newspapers, and articles, and online help
Another online mode of study that AIU makes available is mobile learning, in which many course lectures and multimedia materials can be viewed from mobile devices such as cellular phones or PDAs.
Faculty
AIU Online appoints faculty with professional experience in their respective fields with the goal that they each will have directly related relevance to their courses. The instructors all have advanced degrees.
Student Life
AIU Online faculty has created AIU Community websites to facilitate interactions between students, alumni, and others on common areas of interest and study. For example the Educator 2 Educator site caters to exchanges between teaching professionals, administrators, and others. The Marketing Scene site brings together professionals and consumers to discuss marketing, advertising trends, specific ads, and more.
AIU Online's online Learning Center is another aspect of student life. The Center provides support services including:
- Online Learning Labs – Provides study sessions at no additional cost that augment subject areas such as English, math, art, design, spreadsheet software, and presentation software.
- One-to-One Tutoring – Students can receive live, real-time tutoring sessions from AIU Online faculty.
AIU Career Services gets involved with students from the time of enrollment and works with students after graduation. Career staff is available to help with career roadmaps, resumes, cover letters, interviews, uncovering career opportunities, and making contacts in a student's field of interest.
To help students navigate the technical aspects of their online experience, AIU Online has a 24/7 technical support team to assist with computing and software issues.
Admissions and Financial Aid
AIU Online admission requirements depend on the program. Every applicant must at least complete a telephone interview with an Admission Advisor and provide documentation of high school graduation or equivalent. Students whose first language is not English need to submit proof of English language proficiency. The admission process can be completed as quickly as four to seven business days.
For financial aid AIU Online can help students work through a number of alternatives. The University participates in several federal and private aid programs. University grants and scholarships are available. A student may have aid choices available from his/her employer including tuition reimbursement. Military tuition benefits may also be an option for veterans and active military personnel. Find disclosures on graduation rates, student financial obligations and more at www.aiuniv.edu/disclosures
Note: This school offers rapid response to online requests:
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Student/Alumni Reviews of This School
Sort Reviews By:AIU Online • Online
Studying Associates - Computer Applications (completion in: 2011)
• 12/3/2011
"I wasn't satisfied enough with the cost or reputation. I plan to work in the civilian sector, and plan to keep the costs low which is why I decided to switch to the community college."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | maybe | I would if they wanted a degree that was offered online at AMU and they couldn't find that degree online at a local college. I would also recommend it to those in the military or government sectors who can't take classes in any other form. Other than that, no. |
| Satisfaction With Major | 4 | I decided to switch to a local college. I was unhappy with how much more expensive they were than my local college and with the financial aid department. I also had a lot of issues with my adviser who kept losing my documents and filling incorrect information into the system (which also delayed financial aid). |
| Instruction | 5 | Since these were online classes there really wasn't very much instruction. This is why I say the instruction was average. This would really be the case with most online classes - the instructor assigns the readings and homework, and you are on your own to learn and complete it. |
| Cost | 1 | AMU is very expensive for an associates degree. It would have cost me around $16,000 where as I found a community college degree I can do mostly online, and it will only cost around $5,000. I do think their Master's degree cost is a little more reasonable, but not the Associates. |
| Schedule Flexibility | 10 | This is probably what makes AMU so popular. Your schedule is totally flexible, and teachers will grant extensions on occasions. |
| Academic Facilities | 7 | AMU did well in providing the necessary tools to learn the material, and they did offer a lot of support. The professors tried hard to make themselves available for questions and the library was easily accessible online. |
| Social Life | 3 | Being an online school there wasn't much interaction, which can be expected. However you do get to interact through discussion boards within the class, and there is also a bit of interaction on the face book page for the college. |
| Placement Services | 5 | The career services was a joke. I would check the job board once in a while, but I rarely saw very much. Instead they encouraged you to network a lot, and most students told me they had to find work on their own (including finding their own internships). |
| Alumni Network | I am not really familiar with the alumni network and support. I decided to switch colleges before completion. |
AIU Online • Online
Studying Accounting (completion in: 1993)
• 12/4/2011
"I was pretty satisfied with this school. It could have been better, but it was a great school overall."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | Yes! This is a great school if you don't have much free time, and you can just work online! |
| Satisfaction With Major | 5 | My school experience was average. It could have been better at times but it also could have been worse. |
| Instruction | 5 | The quality of instruction is average. It could have been better but it was online, so it was pretty good for an online college. |
| Cost | 10 | The cost is great! It's cheap and you can live at home! |
| Schedule Flexibility | 10 | This is very flexible. It's online so you can do it whenever you want! |
| Academic Facilities | 3 | There were no "classrooms" or libraries or anything since it is online. But the online stuff was pretty good. |
| Social Life | 1 | There was no social events. It was just taking classes online. |
| Placement Services | 1 | It was online so there was no career service that I knew of. |
AIU Online • Online
Studying Business Administration (completion in: 2012)
• 12/2/2011
"They are always there to help when you need it. I get at least 1 call a week just checking up to see if I need anything."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | Yes I would, and I already have. My school has been so helpful with me that I feel it's the best I have ever seen. |
| Satisfaction With Major | 10 | Class are easy to follow and you know what to expect. I also enjoy how your books are online at your finger tips and the teachers are easy to get a hold of. |
| Instruction | 9 | The teachers will respond back to you promptly. If you get behind on work due to problems not under your control teachers will work with you. |
| Cost | 10 | I thought the cost was fair when I started. Then they made it better by lowering the cost overall. You do not need to pay extra for books used online, and most are online. This made it nice to not have this extra cost. |
| Schedule Flexibility | 8 | For full time student you have 2 classes a month. Each week you have 4 assignments due by that Sunday. |
| Academic Facilities | 10 | They have a great tutoring program for my course. They also have a great online library that will only give you information that can be considered college level. |
| Social Life | 10 | There is a lot of groups you can join that make it nice. They try to have social events all around so everyone can join in on them. |
| Placement Services | 7 | They help you build a great resume. They do help try to find jobs, but most of them are ones you could find by going to Monster and searching. |
| Alumni Network | 10 | There are programs online that give you a chance to talk to alumni. The school has many different meetings in real life through which you could meet people as well. |
AIU Online • Online
Studying Bachelors In Information Technology (completion in: 2007)
• 12/26/2011
"I am completely satisfied with my experiences at American InterContinental University Online! Like I mentioned earlier, I am in the process of obtaining my Masters Degree there and I have already obtained my Associates and my Bachelors."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | I would completely recommend American InterContinental University Online to others. It offers a very flexible schedule to accommodate any busy person. I am a father and husband and currently am working to start my own business, and I was able to obtain a quality education with an authentic college experience. |
| Satisfaction With Major | 10 | American InterContinental University Online introduced me to a wide array of things within the IT field. I have obtained my associates and bachelors from the school and I am currently in the process of getting my masters. |
| Instruction | 9 | The curriculum that was used helped us obtain a level of education limited by the amount of work one wanted to do. If you did not want to do the work, then you would not pass, or even learn anything. |
| Cost | 6 | It was a little expensive to attend American InterContinental University Online, but so is any other college. I do not understand why it cost so much for it to be online, but nonetheless, it was a college experience at an accredited school, and the outcome is a college degree in one of the many fields they offer. |
| Schedule Flexibility | 10 | You would attend class any time during the week if you wanted to. There were a couple of live chat sessions with the instructors that were a set times, but they not mandatory. Although if you needed assistance, it was a good idea to attend the session. |
| Academic Facilities | 10 | The school provided a virtual library with many resources located across the world wide web. They also issued actual textbooks to the students and would provide any means necessary to help with a topic. |
| Social Life | 1 | Because American InterContinental University is primarily an online school, there were not many instances to show school spirit. There are actual campuses located across the USA and in other countries, like in England. |
| Placement Services | 5 | The school provided a system to help teach you interview skills or to get your resume in order. They do not offer services to help find you a job, though. |
| Alumni Network | 8 | I continue to keep in touch with students that I graduated with or even pass by in a class. I plan to one day in the near future visit someone that I met that is from Florida and I hope to become a good friend with him in real life. |
AIU Online • Online
Studying Criminal Justice (completion in: 2009)
• 12/27/2011
"Very satisfied and glad I went to this school."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | Anyone who is seeking a degree in criminal justice should attend this school. |
| Satisfaction With Major | 10 | Excellent school and one of the best in the US. Professors are all from different backgrounds related to the field of study. |
| Instruction | 10 | Relevance to field is extremely high because program prepares and gives you general knowledge about criminal justice. |
| Cost | 9 | Being an out of state student I wish the cost was less. Education cost is extremely high today. |
| Schedule Flexibility | 9 | The class schedule is very flexible. I was able to schedule all of my classes in one full day. |
| Academic Facilities | 9 | Up to date facilities and technologically advanced classrooms. |
| Social Life | 9 | very outgoing and active social life. Many clubs to join. |
| Placement Services | 9 | The job placement service is extremely helpful because the school offers job fairs. |
AIU Online • Online
Studying Associate's In Business Administration (completion in: 2012)
• 1/10/2012
"Overall I was pleased. It was a supportive atmosphere. My favorite aspect was that it was a very fast program."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | Probably. It is a good way to get back into school. |
| Satisfaction With Major | 6 | I thought that it was somewhat easy. It was not that challenging. I really liked the professors and all of the staff associated with the college. |
| Instruction | 7 | I thought that the teachers could have taught more in their lessons. Sometimes they would ask us very in depth questions on the homework that they had covered very quickly. |
| Cost | 5 | I thought that it was about the right price. For what I got I was happy with what I paid. |
| Schedule Flexibility | 8 | I always had an easy time with my professors asking for extensions when I really needed them. The teachers were always accommodating when I had issues turning in work on time. |
| Academic Facilities | 7 | AIU has pretty good resources. The library has a ton of great information that makes research much easier. |
| Social Life | 3 | Really non-existent. There is a social networking feature but it really is not that great. |
| Placement Services | 8 | I think that this is one of the strongest parts of the college. Career Services is a great part of the university. They are really helpful. |
| Alumni Network | I really have not utilized the alumni network. I just never had a use for it. |
AIU Online • Online
Studying Business Administration - Marketing (completion in: 2009)
• 1/21/2012
"I was very satisfied because of the academic knowledge that I acquired, which I used to further my career in business administration."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | I chose "yes" because American InterContinental University would give any student an excellent education. The student would learn how to apply that education in a real working environment. |
| Satisfaction With Major | 10 | Business Administration at American InterContinental University afforded me a well-rounded, comprehensive course of study that prepared me for the field of business administration/marketing, finance, and research, to name a few. The knowledge I gained prepared me to work in a position in the field of business administration because I was able to apply what I learned in the position that I currently work in. Should I decide to look for another position, I would be confident in knowing that I would be the best choice for that position. |
| Instruction | 10 | The professors gave me a quality education because I was able to take the knowledge they gave me to the workplace. As far as career preparation goes, American InterContinental University provided direction in locating a position in my field. The curriculum was extensive, comprehensive, and challenging. |
| Cost | 7 | The cost of attending was very expensive, in excess of 40K. However, it was well worth the cost considering the academic knowledge that I acquired that I could use in real time. I appreciated the fact that I was able to acquire scholarships because of my high academic achievements, which made it well worth the cost. |
| Schedule Flexibility | 10 | I attended American InterContinental University online. This afforded me the flexibility to attend classes 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The schedule was completely flexible. I just was required to complete the coursework in the timeframe allowed for a project/assignment. |
| Academic Facilities | 10 | American InterContinental University's academic facilities and resources were excellent. They were excellent because the libraries, media, academic advisors, tutors, study groups, and professors were always available. Academic advisors and professors could be e-mailed with questions and they would reply to the e-mails promptly without delay (within 24 hours). Because I attended online classes exclusively, there was never a time when I was not able to conduct research. I used my own computer, which the school assisted me in acquiring using my scholarship funds. |
| Social Life | 8 | Because I attended online, there were no face-to-face parties, athletic events, or organized social events, except during graduation. If face-to-face events were to occur, the students would have to arrange them individually. School spirit was also not something that was expressed by American InterContinental University. They just required that we comply with the rules and respect our professors. However, they did offer various memorabilia that we could purchase. |
| Placement Services | 5 | 1. American InterContinental University's job placement and career services were "average." Average is the rating I chose because they lack good placement of their students in jobs after graduation. As far as career services assistance, American InterContinental University provided good direction in the form of advice on resume creation and websites to locate jobs. |
| Alumni Network | 10 | The alumni network support is excellent. American Intercontinental University sends me information that has been valuable, and they keep me abreast of the latest information relevant to my career. |
AIU Online • Online
Studying I Am Currently Enrolled In The Bachelor Degree Program For Criminal Justice (Forensic Science). (completion in: 2013)
• 1/23/2012
"I am very satisfied with AIU's online program. I have the flexible schedule I need to keep up with my course load and my family. I have great instructors to assist me with my work."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | The program is very flexible and the instructors are amazing. The course load is not too heavy but one can still learn a lot. |
| Satisfaction With Major | 10 | My instructors have made my course load as understandable as possible. The assignments are very detailed and are easy to complete. |
| Instruction | 10 | I am currently getting career services assistance and this help makes finding a career easier. The curriculum goes along with the career path. |
| Cost | 2 | The institution is very costly. I need to go to school online because although it is costly, it works with my schedule, and that is more important than the cost. |
| Schedule Flexibility | 10 | I can log on and do my assignments on my time, as long as I follow the deadlines set by the institution. This makes it very easy to get my assignments completed. |
| Academic Facilities | 9 | AIU's online facilities assist students in all courses. The staff and online library make attending AIU possible. |
| Social Life | I do not participate in any school functions. I am enrolled in the online program and therefore do not visit the campus. | |
| Placement Services | 9 | I am getting career services assistance and it has been very helpful. |
| Alumni Network | I am not currently involved in any alumni network or support groups. I do plan on becoming involved in networking with other AIU alumni. |