Louisiana Baptist/ Liberty Baptist

First, I would say you need to contact the registrars at LU. I am a graduate of Liberty and I can tell you that some classes I transferred in were not used towards my degree (they were from a SACS institution). LBU can’t vouch for Liberty, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they accepted some credit hours. If you are planning on attending grad school, LU has certain standards, but I do know they will accept unaccredited degrees under certain conditions. Something else to consider is that LU is lax when it comes to issues such as these, so they are probably not the norm. Although I love LU, they do not have extremely high academic standards when it comes to acceptance. That being said once you are in the program they are top notch. I wouldn’t recommend doing unaccredited work with the hope of getting into one or two institutions; if they don’t work out, you may be left out in the cold.

 

Generally schools can accept/deny credits from any school based on their own policies. Now clearly accreditation will make some demands (etc) but it is not unheard of that credits from non-accredited schools would be accepted by accredited schools. I think there are several issues that need to be looked at:

1. Are you talking about graduate or undergraduate work? Many accredited seminaries will accept students who have a undergraduate degree from an unaccredited school. Such students are usually required to hold a certain gpa (like a B) for a certain number of hours.

2. If it is graduate to graduate then clearly Liberty has determined that LBU's courses meet certain standards. I doubt Liberty would do anything to endanger their accreditation so whatever standards they are using are probably allowed by SACS and TRACS (Liberty does hold both).

3. Liberty and LBU seem to have a relationship. I know that Falwell has spoken at LBU, as has Paige Patterson (of SWBTS). This may mean that LBU, like BJU, has a reputation with other seminaries that allows those schools to honor credits from LBU (Btw...BJU is not TRACS accredited).

4. Talk to Liberty.

5. If you are looking at enrolling in a distance learning program and you are looking at LTS and LBU...go with LTS. I am not saying that simply because I am a graduate of LTS but because LTS is fully accredited. A graduate degree from LTS will enjoy wider acceptance than one from LBU.

Schools can be weird sometimes...thats about the best way I can put it. :thumbs:

 

Is LBU a good school in general? What can I learn about this school from this forum?

 

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It is hard to answer "in general."

LBU is not "good" enough to become accredited by a recognized accreditor.

My impression is that graduate programs at LBU in Bible/Theology are not very rigorous. I looked at the LBU web catalogue the day before yesterday. I was amazed when looking at the faculty list to NOT see the schools named from which the professors earned their advanced degrees! That , IMO, is a red flag.

IMO good distance education is much based on the quality and the quantity of interaction between the student and the DE prof. But the prof can only lead the student through a level of rigor that that he/she him/herself has experienced. So, other things being equal, if a prof has chosen the easier , unaccredited, route to become academically qualified to teach, then he/she is not ready to teach at the level of rigor that a prof with an accredited doc is ready to teach.

That is one reason why LBU cannot become accredited as the recommendation of an accreditor as TRACS is that the prof of grad courses has an ACCREDITED PhD/ThD in the area of instruction.

Personally, think courses in praxis might be taught by experienced people. 30 years of successful pastoring IMO helps to qualify one to teach pastoring, BUT it does not qualify one to teach grad level Theology, Bible, languages, or church history--IMO!

IMO LBU is a better choice than many other unaccredited schools as Covington, Andersonville, Bethany of Dothan, or Golden State.

Have you considered that (1) there are inexpensive (comparatively) schools in South Africa ,as The South African Theological Seminary, which offer the equivalent of regionally accredited theological programs completely by distance education at a cost very competitive with unaccredited USA schools as LBU, or, (2) that some USA TRACS accredited schools offer programs for as little as $150 per q. hour?

God's blessing on your search.

Bill