Two of the institutions he has already taken on are the National College of Kentucky,Inc., for allegedly falsifying job placement numbers and Educational Management Corporation (EDMC), which owns Argosy University and Brown Mackie Colleges. EDMC is charged with violating federal law by paying admissions officers a commission based salaried for the number of students recruited.
Conway’s
investigations into the for-profit sector started when his office began
receiving complaints of students being exploited financially by seven of the
more than 100 for-profit institutions in Kentucky.
Conway is
not the only attorney general seeking action against these institutions. He is
joined by 22 other states investigating these institutions. And Conway has
gained significant support from the media and other political figures, such as
the director of the C.I.A. and his wife, Hollister K. Petraeus.
Actually,
Petraeus had an interesting letter to the editor on the topic in the New York
Times back in September. In this
letter, Petraeus condemns for-profit colleges for maliciously misleading
veteran students by enrolling them and then offering no academic, financial or
counseling support. She states for-profit schools use military students for
their G.I. Bill monies, which in turn maintain the institution’s ability to
receive other federal student aid.
Another editorial in the New York Times in Octoberexpands on this issue. For-profit
schools have collected 37 percent of dispersed G.I. monies but enrollment
numbers show only 25% of veterans have been trained. The first-year attrition
rate is astounding, noted at 409,437 students. This group is lead by the Apollo
Group, the umbrella corporation for the University of Phoenix. This was also noted in a Chronicle of Higher Ed article in September.
Not all for-profit schools are using immoral
practices and it is important to
acknowledge the work being done by The Foundation for Educational Success, an
independent organization focused on enforcing standards for the for-profit
colleges. Unfortunately, only
approximately 17% of the nation’s for-profit schools have endorsed these
standards.
The work of Conway and others in making these institutions
more accountable is impressive and imperative. I am pleasantly surprised to see the standards and
ethically driven improvements of those institutions involved with the
Foundation for Educational Success. When I review the advertisements and job
descriptions of for-profit schools, I am now inclined to check the Foundation’s
website and see if the institutions has accepted and is working towards the
standards.
We expect public higher education institutions to be accredited or to
maintain self-assessments using the Council for Educational Standards
measurements, I’m just glad to see those expectations being applied to other
educational outlets as well.
I think it is important for there to be a fight against non-profit institutions that are misrepresenting themselves. I can't argue that Ann calls the non-profit system the "cash-cow" of this decade. It is unethical and unfair and down-right sad that students choosing these for-profit institutions don't always know what they're getting themselves into.
ReplyDeleteThe unfortunate part is what a big battle I see this becoming. Some for-profit institutions are regionally accredited so that at least students wanting to move forward in their education and/or careers aren't being held back in that way. But what about the ones who are not accredited? What about the students who are coming out of these schools with thousands and thousands of dollars of debt that may have nothing to show for it in the end?
I believe where the hard battle lies is within what these institutions offer. They're offering everything students want, at a price. There are incentives for enrolling, they have night and weekend classes, online degrees, shortened degree times, and many of them do have great student support (aka customer service) that make students believe they're getting the best of both worlds.
I'm eager to see what sort of regulation ends up coming from conversations like these because I believe there is a long battle ahead. Like it or not, these institutions are supplying what today's student is demanding.
Janella - your post was fair and balanced in your acknowledgement of some for-profit institutions trying to do the right thing for students as well as they ways in which they are taking advantage of the system.
ReplyDeleteI was glad to see an organization committed to helping these schools be more accountable and disheartened to hear that only 17% participate.
I deal with for-profit institutions regularly in my job as they come to our community college to recruit students. They are incredibly aggressive and manyd of them incredibly professional. They have an immense amount of resources available to them. While I have relaxed a little about many of these schools I still have to say that I get skeptical when I hear "for-profit". My biggest issue is the predatory nature of many of these institutions - you pointed out whats happening with our veterans. It's also happening to our low income students and our students of color in disproportionate numbers.
I don't see these institutions going away and am hopeful that more will be done to help educate our public about their options when it comes to higher education. Our public institutions have something here to learn though as well - these institutions are incredibly responsive to the needs of adult learners a population with often few places to turn based on their scheduling needs.