Hi Melissa Wilson... epic thread here:
www2.cipd.co.uk/.../60768

Hi Melissa,

I completed the level 5 totally online - partly because I was in another country, but also meant I could study in my own time and not have to worry about fitting in classes at set times/days. I completed the modules after returning home and found I was able to easily fit the study around family life/work.

To be as objective as possible, I'll do my pros and cons :-)

Pros:
- Flexibility = epic. Study as much as you want one week, do a bit less the next - as long as your assignment is received before deadline, you're good.
- Support - I went through Avado who put you in to groups. Although this bit didn't work on 'group assignments' (which in all honesty you don't NEED to complete to move on) it worked really well when it came to the assignments, and we helped each other more than the tutor did (see cons) with ideas, references, and process
- Content - pretty much lifted straight from the CIPD so excellent
- Variety of tasks & learning methods - despite being totally online, there were tasks set requiring work offline and plenty of research which kept it interesting
- Live classes are recorded - I attended one live class and got bored. Just used the recordings after that to skip irrelevant bits.
- Easily tracked. Being online meant I could see how much I've done and how much was to be done - allowed really easy time management.

Cons:
- Tutor - personally, I didn't find my tutor particularly helpful or easy to contact. Ended up going to the main course adminstrator more often
- At the particular time I did it (2016-2017) Avado bought out Home Learning College, this led to some hiccups with the tech that was quickly fixed after reporting, just annoying it wasn't tested ahead of launcing the module
- Certificates took forever to get to the CII - much longer than advised
- Delays in results - again, at the particular time I did it, Avado didn't have any contingency plan for when a moderator assessor couldn't complete the marking, so we just had to wait (very poor given how strict they are with deadlines for submissions)

As mentioned, I didn't have a choice with Avado as they took over my provider. I would assume they have refined their processes by now, so could be fine. The other one to look at online is ICS Learn. Others on this forum have used ICS Learn and spoke favourably.

Kind regards,
Laura