Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eCampus News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

ED rulemaking includes input on controversial ‘gainful employment’ rules

The Obama administration has seen legal setbacks in its push for gainful employment rules.

The U.S. Department of Education (ED) will kick off a new round of public hearings on the oft-discussed “gainful employment” regulations, which the for-profit college industry has successfully fought in ongoing legal battles.

ED announced April 15 that it would launch a series of rulemaking proceedings covering a number of higher education issues, including the rules pushed by the Obama administration that would have prevented career-training programs, mainly at for-profit colleges – many with expansive online programs — from leaving students with unaffordable debt and limited employment options.

The rules were first proposed by the administration in 2009 after growing evidence and congressional inquiries showed that as the for-profit college sector grew – bolstered by the easy access of web-based courses – completion rates remained dismally low at some schools and students proved unprepared for the workforce.…Read More

Republicans pounce after Obama targets diploma mills catering to military

A Florida Republican has called for a hearing on the president's April 27 executive order.

Congressional Republicans and officials from the for-profit college industry have excoriated President Obama’s executive order meant to provide more college information to military veterans with ample federal education benefits, with one influential House Republican calling for a hearing on the order.

Obama on April 27 signed the order at the Fort Stewart Army post in Georgia, after years of complaints about for-profit colleges catering to military service members who have GI Bill benefits. For-profit schools receive about 90 percent of their funding from federally-backed student loans.

The executive order, lauded by many in higher education who have raised questions about the quality of for-profit college courses and the sector’s skyrocketing dropout rate, could allow military veterans to more easily calculate loan repayments on money needed outside of GI Bill benefits, along with a school’s policy on course credit transfers.…Read More

Federal report slams online for-profit colleges

Harkin requested the GAO report released Nov. 22.

Undercover investigators from the federal Government Accountability Office (GAO) earned course credit while skipping classes and submitting substandard work in online for-profit college programs – findings the for-profit industry has labeled politicized and unreliable.

“For-Profit Schools: Experiences of Undercover Students Enrolled in Online Classes at Selected Colleges,” a GAO report released Nov. 22, is the second government examination of for-profit colleges’ practices, which have been called into question by many in higher education and lawmakers in Congress.

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), head of the Senate’s education committee, ordered the yearlong investigation in which GAO agents pretended to be online students at 15 for-profit colleges.…Read More

For-profit colleges slow in response to prospective students

Some schools respond to prospective student eMails in minutes.

For an industry known for its aggressive student recruitment techniques, many private, for-profit colleges take as long as 12 hours to return a prospective student’s phone call—and two days to respond to eMail inquiries from potential students.

Four in 10 for-profit schools don’t respond to student phone calls within a day, and seven in 10 schools have a same-day eMail response, according to a white paper released this week by Leads360, a California-based company that sells enrollment management technology.

In the survey of 28 for-profit colleges—including well-known schools like Grand Canyon University (GCU) and American Public University (APU)—“none showed consistent across-the-board success that would maximize their chances of enrolling the highest number of qualified prospects,” the white paper says.…Read More

Are for-profit colleges hurting online education’s reputation?

For-profit colleges account for about half of student loan defaults.

Congressional hearings and a barrage of criticism have put for-profit colleges on the defensive, and with many of the sector’s largest schools touting vast web-based course options, those who track the industry say for-profit programs could damage the public perception of online education.

Lawmakers from both major parties have defended the for-profit industry’s business practices, but Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) has remained one of the most vocal—and active—critics of for-profit colleges’ recruitment and student loan practices.

Read more about for-profit colleges in higher education……Read More

Liberal activists: For-profit colleges ‘ripping off’ students, taxpayers

About 1,000 young people attended the annual Campus Progress conference.

In a speech at the Campus Progress National Conference July 6, an official from a left-leaning think tank condemned for-profit colleges—many of which are the nation’s largest online education providers—as ineffective and financially crippling for students.

Campus Progress, the youth branch of the Center for American Progress, a progressive think tank based in Washington, D.C., held its annual conference last week.

Read more about for-profit regulations in higher education……Read More

Opinion: New ‘gainful employment’ regulation is weak medicine for a strong ailment

Jose Cruz of The Education Trust says for-profit colleges still will face scrutiny from states attorneys.

The gainful employment regulation recently announced by the U.S. Department of Education is painfully weak, especially when compared with the colossal and well-documented abuses committed by for-profit career colleges.

Under the new regulation, a career education program will need to fail all three of the following very forgiving standards for three out of four years before it can be declared ineligible for federal subsidies.

Read more about for-profit regulations in higher education……Read More

Are new ED rules an ‘unconditional surrender’ to for-profit colleges?

Duncan has helped shape for-profit regulations since 2009.

Some of the country’s largest online education programs will have to comply with federal regulations far less stringent than once thought after the U.S. Education Department (ED) unveiled its new rules for for-profit institutions that have come under fire for unscrupulous business practices.

The long-awaited rules aimed at for-profit schools such as the University of Phoenix and Kaplan University—first discussed in 2009—were released June 1. The regulations are meant to ensure that students aren’t graduating from for-profit colleges unqualified for the professional world and burdened with excessive student loan debt.

One-fourth of for-profit students default on their loans after three years, for-profit students account for almost half of all federal loan defaults, and graduation rates at those schools hover around 50 percent, according to national education statistics.…Read More

For-profit colleges concede defeat on new rules, vow to fight on

Miller lauded bipartisan support for a provision that would defund for-profit rules.

Efforts by lobbyists from for-profit colleges – including some of the largest online education programs – fell short last week when Congress passed a compromise budget bill that would allow the Education Department (ED) to move ahead with its long-awaited “gainful employment” regulations.

In an April 11 statement, Harris Miller, president of the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities (APSCU), said the group’s last-ditch try to get the House and Senate to include a provision that would de-fund ED’s for-profit rulemaking was not included in the final budget that will fund the federal government through September.

APSCU asked its members to call their Congressional representatives as the final budget was being finalized, not conceding defeat on the for-profit regulations – known as “gainful employment” rules — until the bill became law.…Read More

Experts: Accusations could make students wary of for-profit colleges

Students claim they were misled by Kaplan University advisors.

Members of Congress likely won’t be swayed by the latest round of damaging personal accounts from former Kaplan University students released last week, but prospective students might exercise a bit more caution while researching online college offerings, industry experts said.

Change.org, a nonprofit organization specializing in web-based petitions, is publishing a series of personal stories from former students at Kaplan – one of the nation’s largest online institutions – who claim they were misled by the university and saddled with thousands in student loan debt.

The Change.org accounts are the latest in a string of charges claiming the fast-growing for-profit college industry has used unseemly recruiting practices and student loan tactics that lead students to a job that doesn’t pay enough to afford massive loan repayments.…Read More