| It's important that the school you are looking at is accredited, and hopefully well respected in the field. Case in point: the above mentioned University of Phoenix. Not that I generally use Wikipedia as a source, but the section on Criticism and Controversy regarding UoP is pretty decent. I'll be frank -- if someone told me they had a degree from University of Phoenix, I wouldn't consider it a "quality" degree. And to be honest, if I had the choice between hiring two candidates that were equal in all respects, but one had a degree from a well-known university, and the other from University of Phoenix, I'd take the first candidate. Why? Because I wouldn't trust the quality of work done at University of Phoenix, and because I know it's an online degree mill. To be honest, looking at Walden University, it seems to be much in the same model as University of Phoenix. Is any degree better than none? Probably. Is a "for-profit" university the best place to get your education? Quite possibly not. Take a look at some more traditional universities. I bet you dollars to doughnuts that a) they offer long distance learning courses, and b) they're cheaper than the for-profit colleges. In fact, you can make your search really easy by going here. You can put in your desired degree, and even indicate that you don't want to have to visit campus. There are many well respected colleges that come up during a Master's search on Business Administration, as an example. Walden University is $4175 per quarter for tuition. So roughly $16700 a year. University of Colorado-Denver is $600 per online credit, and requires 48 credits to finish the degree. If you figure two years to complete the degree, that's 6 credits per quarter, which means $600 x 6 = $3600 per year (or $14400 a year). You get a cheaper college, that people have actually heard of, that's probably more well respected -- and you know what? Unlike University of Phoenix, which immediately people are going to associate with "Ugh, online degree, that's not worth the paper it's written on" -- all you need to put on your resume is "University of Colorado." Nobody needs to know it's an online degree. University of Phoenix and their ilk had a place...when the old-style universities were slow to catch on to distance learning. But they're all starting to catch on to the distance learning craze nowadays, and the reality is, you can get a quality degree without lowering your standards anymore, and without having to pay as much. | 
