I know it's been done, but...

[amastrike]

I was looking at the website for "Breyer State University" and was torn between laughing at the idiocy of the thing and horrified that people are actually stupid enough to pay for it. How does anyone think an equine degree can be earned online? And it doesn't even pretend to be an equine science degree, it's an equine studies degree! It's "accredited," but not by any valid accreditation program. People are really willing to pay $275 per course for something that is so clearly BS? And so fitting, as the "university"'s initials are BSU.. it certainly is a BS university. Which leads me to wonder... was the creator of this someone with quite a sense of humor, trying to see if people would fall for something that's so obviously a scam?

Looking at the courses outlined, it's like a ten year old's school assignment on how to create outlines. A stupid ten year old, at that.

Some of my favorite bits...

From "The Business of Making Money with Horses":
II. Potential is what sells horses.
A. Learning what the market demands
B. How to find ‘potential’ in a horse
C. Developing a catalog sales sheet

Really? Potential sells horses? So something like training is irrelevant?

VI. Broodmares are risky business.
A. Avoid the conventional approach
B. Breed for profits, not genetics
Breeding for profits over genetics has been so useful... look at all those fabulous HYPP and HERDA horses out there! Any breeder who actually follows that guideline should be shot.

Coat Color Genetics:
II. Black, Bay and Chestnuts
A. How to breed for color
B. Genetic test for red gene
C. What bay foals look like
I guess they just skip over the part where bay is not a color on its own? They have a sample lesson on color genetics.. totally misleading. They don't explain black/red and the effect of the agouti gene. Bit of an oversight there...

III. Palominos, Cremellos, Buckskins and Perlinos
A. Incomplete dominance
B. Cremello gene on black
Cremello is not a gene, it's a color caused by two copies of the cream gene on a red (chestnut) coat.

V. Sprinkling on the White
A. The roan horse
B. The gray horse
C. The white horse
They actually think there's a true white horse? Seriously? No no no, a thousand times no. And they don't even mention the extremely common sabino gene!

Dressage: Foundation for All Riding Disciplines:
VIII. Lateral work
A. Simple Leg Yield
B. Counter Bend on Circle
C. Half-Pass
D. Questions
E. Tasks
Going from leg yield and counter bending to the half-pass is a bit of a jump... what about shoulder fore and shoulder in and haunches in and haunches out? Is the next logical step the piaffe?

Nutrition for Maximum Performance:
IX. Feeding the “Special Needs” Horse
A. HYPP
B. EPM
C. Laminitis Prone
I had no idea a protozoal disease required special feeding! Do the protozoa get mad and wreak havoc on the horse's nervous system if they don't get what they want to eat? Or.. hm... just a thought, but maybe they should be talking about EPSM?

I'm just... argh. I could do a better of job of making up a bogus equine degree! Heck, my cat could do a better job, and he can't even type!

/vent

[nightsong]

I thought, upon reading the beginning of the thread, that it was a 'school' for people who had the toy horses. Kind of like story books to go with dolls. Far wrong?

[ddashaq]

I was thinking along the same lines as Nightsong. I mean, the plastic horse people charge either other stud fees and such, so I did not find a university devoted to plastic horses completely out of the question.:D

[pj]

I was thinking along the same lines as Nightsong. I mean, the plastic horse people charge either other stud fees and such, so I did not find a university devoted to plastic horses completely out of the question.:D

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Do they REALLY?

[ddashaq]

Yup. Stumbled upon a web site devoted to Breyer breeding last winter when I was researching some UL dressage horses for work. I was laughing so hard, I nearly cried.:lol:

They also have a racing association. Personally, I am very interested to see one of these plastic horse races. If you ever get the chance, Breyerfest is an interesting experience, too. (But no plastic horse races damn it!)

[CosMonster]

Well, to be fair, if the course is just about making money with horses breeding for profit over genetics is the way to go...I didn't see a section on ethics in there, after all. ;)

[ZiggyStardust]

Yup. Stumbled upon a web site devoted to Breyer breeding last winter when I was researching some UL dressage horses for work. I was laughing so hard, I nearly cried.:lol:

They also have a racing association. Personally, I am very interested to see one of these plastic horse races. If you ever get the chance, Breyerfest is an interesting experience, too. (But no plastic horse races damn it!)

In defense of Breyer people, this may be the closest they are able to get to horses, especially some of the kids, so kudos to them if they make it so industrious.

When I was a desperately horse crazy kid with parents who refused to support me taking riding lessons again (because English riding makes little girls snobby apparently ?), my next best thing was Breyers, and if I had the means, I'm sure I would have been that into it, too.