diploma mill

American  

noun

1. an organization claiming to be an institution of higher learning but existing for profit only and granting degrees without demanding proper qualifications of the recipients.

2. a college or university having such a large number of students that none receives individual attention from the teachers.

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Etymology

Origin of diploma mill

First recorded in 1925–30

Example Sentences

Cuffari’s resume says he has a Ph.D. in management from California Coast University, a college that the government in 2004 flagged as a “diploma mill.”

From Washington Post

In a memoir, he recalled the character: “He was a plump, bald, ebullient southerner who had once served five years in a prison on a charge of exposing himself before a group of children and was now the head of a religious diploma mill in Florida and of a seedy flat-roofed stucco church called the Church of Holy Love, Incorporated. He wore a hat that looked too small for him. He had a trick eyelid that every once in awhile fluttered shut on him. His name was Leo Bebb.”

From New York Times

Even by those standards, John Brinkley — who was awarded his medical degree by a disreputable diploma mill — was one of a kind.

From Salon

Lawyers could draw from a dossier that Goldman had put together, presenting Mr. Leissner as a master con artist who had a doctorate from a mail-order diploma mill and had affairs with powerful women in Asia, including a client of the firm’s.

From New York Times

“If we don’t do anything about it, we will turn every accredited university into a diploma mill.”

From New York Times