What to Look for in a Distance/Online MBA

When I first started looking at Online MBA programs, I identified a number of factors which are important to anyone considering this type of program. In this post, I identify the key factors to look for in an online or distance MBA:

1. I started off with schools that are AACSB accredited. Anything else is a waste of money. Why put in all that time, money and hard work for a degree that's not accredited by the AACSB? This is the initial filter which lets you sort out the weaker schools from the better ones. I have a link to the AACSB school profiles which only includes the accredited schools. Resources such as the Businesweek school profiles, although used heavily, include non-accredited programs.
2. The diploma has to say "Master of Business Administration" without saying "distance education", "online" or denoting how you got it. I was originally very interested in the online program at UMass and had heard good things about it from people in the program. It does meet the test of being AACSB accreditation, but the degree is "Professional Master of Business Administration" or PMBA rather than MBA.
3. Delivery method is important. Several schools I looked at were accredited MBA programs, but the delivery method of the courses was correspondence school style. Rather than having a facility for online instruction, these programs ship you out a DVD of the lectures the day after class (an example of this kind of program can be found here. Then you sit there and watch the lecture being delivered when you have time. This didn't seem too effective to me, although I suppose if you are in the military or in a position where you can't get to a computer you don't have too much of a choice. I preferred to find schools where there was some online instruction.
4. Residency requirement. I was originally thinking that I would like a program that was all online. Programs have varying residency requirements. Some, like UMass, have no residency requirements. You can complete the entire program without going on campus. I wasn't able to find any programs that met requirements #1 and 2 which didn't have some sort of residency requirement. This normally means being on-campus about one week each year of the program. Some programs, such as the University of Florida, require that you travel to campus several times a year. I wasn't really interested in that type of arrangement.