New Law Bans Use of Federal Student Aid for Foreign Colleges' Online Programs

Student loans have to be paid back, where WIC checks do not. Since the student loans are repaid, the borrower ought to have full discretion in choosing what education to buy with his/her student loans. As for the participants in the WIC program, I'm not even sure why the government would give a single flying flock whether a WIC woman prefers Brand X juice or Brand Y juice.

 

You speak of the government as if it were some sort of separate and distinct autonomous entity. NONSENSE!!! WE ARE THE GOVERNMENT!!! We tell the government what to do, they don't tell us what to do! When the government ceases to represent us, we send the elected officials packing. And it ougfht to be made easier to get rid of bureaucrats as well. Almost everybody else can now be laid off, downsized, rightsized, or otherwise deprived of their livelihoods at the stroke of an executive pen these days, why should a bunch of useless lazy do-nothing government workers be immune?

 

We are the government through our representatives. If you don't like it, vote them out. That's how our form of government works.

Student loans do, in fact, have to be paid back...but the government often times pays the interest on them, and pays the lender in case of default. None of this would be possible without taxpayer funds.

Student lending, as well as post-secondary education in general, is not a RIGHT. It is a privilege. No one has a RIGHT to a college education. The government is completely within its bounds to regulate the fashion in which federal dollars are allocated for post-secondary education. If you think a college education is a right, go try to get the gov't to pay for it. Remember, they do have to get paid back. There is NO inherent RIGHT to educate oneself at a college level, no matter where one chooses to do it.

 

Well...

Cargo,

You seem to think the argument is about the government's authority to regulate the loan program. I already understand this argument, as I know the government is operating within its scope as it relates to this choice.

What I am arguing about is the choice under question. I think it is a bad choice - one made by poorly-informed legislators. Isn't it ironic that such a ruling is made dura an era of ever-increasing lobbying efforts by for-profit distance learning entities?

Distance learning is a huge business in this country, and the student costs are ridiculous when compared to how much it costs to actually deliver the degree program. This cash cow lines the pockets of for-profit distance learning providers. On the other hand, foreign schools with legitimate distance learning programs are a great alternative for students wanting more variety, course offerings, and intellectual flexibility at a lower price than what is currently being offered in American distance learning circles.

I've earned a bachelor and master's degrees from well-known distance ed providers (Excelsior and Capella). I think they are both great schools in their own right, but I have issues with how Capella's rigid, structured academic approach. I recently started a philosophy master's with a British university, and while it is not as structured as Capella's approach, it is more rigourous in that it requires me to take responsibility for what I have to learn.

My point? Not every American student's intrests fits in with the Capella and Phoenix wannabes in the educational world. In many case, the foreign distance education market has a lot to offer that we don't offer here stateside. And in the end, this policy change doesn’t help the student at all - which is what the purpose of the student loan program is in the first place. Instead, it makes, for all intents and purposes, American distance learning programs, for-profit and non-profit – the only games in town.

I also never said post-secondary ed was a right. I said we have the right to choose how we educate ourselves. (Although I do think it SHOULD be a universal right for American citizens, together with healthcare. But that's another story). And since we live in a presumably free society, I believe we should have the freedom to educate ourselves where we so choose.

 

And when someone votes YOU in as Czar of Rights and Priviliges Designations, what criteria are you going to use to say, "Well, this one's a right, that one's a privilige," etc.?

 

There are three rights that are so fundamental that any and every serious political philosopher of the modern world has referred to them as natural rights: the rights to life, liberty, and property. The most fundamental aspect of the natural right to liberty is economic liberty: the natural right to choose one's own method of earning an income. Inherent in this must be the right to go get yourself any amount of education you're smart enough to go get. The Republicans, who spout a lot of male bovine fecal material about free trade, are restraining free trade in education for a few rich buddies of theirs. With that, anyone interested in getting a liberal arts doctorate via distance learning is left with one option: Union Institute. And the reason their tuition is $18,000/year is twofold: (a) student loan limits are $18,000/year for doctoral students and (b) there is no-one else in the US offering liberal arts doctorates via distance learning, so they don't have any competition forcing them to bring prices down. So, if you want a doctorate via distance learning, you: (a) better like business, education, or psychology, because that's all the US-based for-profits and thinly-disguised so-called non-profits are going to give you; (b) better like having only one very expensive choice, if you want a liberal arts doctorate via distance learning; or (c) better come with cash on the barrell-head if Union no longer offers your liberal arts specialty at the doctoral level (or if you don't like getting soaked on tuition for lack of competition).

 

You and everyone else absolutely have that right. It's the right to have it paid for that does not exist. And that's ultimately what we're talking about, isn't it?

We have a consitution, bill of rights, and a very long book of laws and legal decisions that clearly define the rights given to us. Nowhere, in the 225+ years of US history, has their been a law, amendment, or legal decision that guaranteed anyone a post-secondary education. In a society where a court can draw a "right" to an abortion out of a "right to privacy", I'm certain that if a college education were an inherent right, there would be plenty of legal opinion to clearly define that.

Instead, what we have are laws and legal decisions guaranteeing equal access to colleges to all, regardless of race, religion, gender, etc. This is as it should be. However, what is lacking is a clearly defined basis for a right to a college education. On a matter as important as this, I think by now we'd see it clearly defined if it were indeed a right.

The difference is clearly seen in elementary and secondary education. Taxpayer money directly pays for every school age student's education, no tuition is charged. It's a right. College, on the other hand, is not.

 

Actually, you said that there is no right to an education itself. Now, we have established that the right to economic freedom means the right to choose one's own job, which includes the right to get any amount of education one is deemed smart enough to be qualified to be admitted to. The next question then becomes: does the right to an education (such as one is deemed smart enough for) necessarily include a right to have said education paid for? I'd say that access to third-party payers for one's education is a privilige and not a right, with certain obvious exceptions, such as, for example, parents being responsible for any required amounts of education for their children under eighteen, with one being pretty much on one's own after age eighteen to make the best deals possible with parents, employers, scholarship foundations, the government, etc., for any amounts above and beyond what one can put out in terms of personal cold hard cash on the barrell-head. But I still think it stinks that the free trade party would make an anti-competitive move to restrain free trade in education.

 

What believe was clear from my post that I said that access to the college education was a right.

I clarified myself regarding the payment for college education that acted as a differentitation of where the rights stopped and the privilege started.

And I think as far as the Congress goes on this, I don't think it's a free-trade issue, I think it's an issue of subsidizing foreign companies, which I don't believe anyone would openly be in favor of. That's all

 

Cargo,

You keep spending a lot of time defending the government's choice here. Here's what I would like to know: How do you think the students - the intended beneficiary of the student loan program - benefit from this new government position?

Personally, I don't see how students benefit from this at all, and Ted has given some great examples as to why (i.e. fewer educational options, forced to pay higher tuition, etc.).

There are several odd things about this (although I disagree with your use of the word subsidizing as it realtes to this matter).

1. This ruling comes during an era of increased lobbying from for-profit, distance-learning heavyweights.

2. The only subsisidizing which is stopped is that which impacts the for-profit distance-learning providers.

 

Still, we own their @$$e$, they don't own us. And maybe the pols need to be reminded of this more often.

 

No way Jose...the non-profit distance learning schools (as well as B&M schools with distance programs) benefit as well. Any student that may have been considering a foreign distance learning program will now have to consider a domestic one. Whether that school is for-profit or non-profit is irrelevant.

Maybe the legislation comes at a time when more and more US institutions (profit status irrelevant) have distance learning programs available to students.

 

I agree with you that this law does not benefit the students.


And as a grad from the University of South Florida, I'd like to say that I also agree with you that for-profits/tax-paying schools will benefit from this law, but so will every American tax-exempt school. In fact, I don't see the not-for-profits complaining about this law change. They will probably thank the for-profits for the higher number of DL students that they will be getting (assuming, of course, that that the for-profits are entirely responsible for this law change but this sounds more like hearsay than fact). That for-profits/tax-paying have something to do with this new law? ok, but that they are entirely to blame? I don't know. This nation is ruled by corporations who have a huge influence on the richest not-for-profit universities in the country.

My point is that the "profit" factor is a problem but it does not stop with the for-profit schools. Tax-exempt schools are very guilty of creating their for-profit arms and of hiding under the "not-for-profit" status. Don't get me wrong, some not-profits are wonderful but many others are nothing more than huge tax-exempt money sponges that promote, as another poster said, a "get a degree in 4 weeks" like Charter Oak and many others. In fact, no offense to people here, but many who blame the for-profits entirely for everything in this forum are often graduates from these not-profit open-admission schools who complain about for-profits being, well, open admissions!
I don't mind some snobbery, but if there is going to be some I'd like to hear it more from people that have impressive academic backgrounds in competitive disciplines from well known tier 1 or 2 universities for a change.

 

Ok Cargo.

Lest we get off track here, please note that I am NOT excluding the tax-exempt schools from this educational debacle. I understand they, too, benefit from this new ruling. My reason for focusing on the DL heavyweights (who are for-profit, in most cases) is to highlight their exponentially increased lobbying efforts as of late. You don’t have to be an industry heavyweight to benefit form a heavyweight’s lobbying efforts.

Notwithstanding any of this, you have still not answered my question: How does this new law benefit American students – the group I believe should be the true beneficiary of the student loan program? Is being forced to choose from a diet of American distance-learning programs - programs which are for the most part overpriced, rigidly structured, and narrowly scoped - truly in the best interest of the American student? If you think so, then I implore you to please explain how.

Many American DL schools are wonderful, but so are many foreign programs as well. Moreover, the benefit of foreign programs is that there are more program options available, greater flexibility of study (research or course-based programs), increased opportunity for scholarship (e.g. a MPhil research project), and tuition rates which often turn out to be lower or equal to American programs. For example, there TONS of Human Services, Business, Education, and Psychology graduate programs available for study here in the US. On the other hand, there are few domestic options for those of us wanting a more liberal-arts based program that is not DETC or unaccredited. For students like these, foreign schools are the only option in many cases.

 

I don't blame the for-profits for everything, and I don't see them as the enemy. In fact, I have a bachelor and Master's from two for-profit DL heavyweights. I would also use them for other degrees as well, but at the moment, they don’t offer programming which meet my interests.

However, I am fairly certain that for-profit DL lobbying efforts have something to do with this new ruling. I'm also sure there are some non-profit DL providers who have also engaged in their fair share of lobbying as well, but generally speaking, non-profit DL providers see DL as a side-sort of thing. It is not their bread and butter, which happens to be the 18-20-something, on-campus student. As such, they may or may not benefit from this new ruling, but their core focus remains relatively unaffected.

I'm not sure what you mean by snobbery here or who you are addressing with this statement. As you can see, I have nothing against for-profit schools per se, as their very existence proves they meet a valuable niche - and one that proves to be lucrative for them. At the same time, I am cautious to fully embrace the for-profit approach, because its very existence lends itself to a situation where the only programs offered are the ones which will generate the most profit for a school. Meeting a demand and generating profit is acceptable within our economic system. But that doesn’t mean that other, less high-demand, educational programs – ones that may or may not generate as much profit - are less important than business, psychology, education, or human services.

Moreover, I think that current tuition levels for for-profit DL providers are substantially inflated, as they structure their fees in order to capitalize upon as much as the Stafford Loan Levels permit. The for-profit DL providers are not the only ones guilty of this, mind you, but it is most noticeable in their fee structures.

 

Let me start out by saying that in no way am I trying to start some kind of heated debate, merely engage in a good-natured discussion

It's probable that the American student was not intended to be the beneficiary of this law. Most likely the law was to benefit the US educational institution. I see no problems with law designed to give US education/business a leg up on their foreign counterparts. We do it all the time with import duties, tariffs, and quotas and other countries do it to us.

IMO federal student aid should not go to unaccredited institutions, domestic or foreign. That's not to devalue the work that the students of these institutions have done, merely to state that one has to draw a line somewhere, and this is where I believe the line should be drawn.

 

All the same, the Republicans are still a bunch of f***ing hypocrites for mouthing a bunch of pious BS about the value of free trade and then passing this anti-competitive bill. If you're going to talk a lot of talk about free trade, then don't turn around and pass any laws that are anti-free trade ... EVER!!! On the other hand, if you're going to pass laws restraining free trade (in any measure whatsoever, no matter how small), then g..d...it, have enough gazongas to admit that you don't really believe in free trade (at least not when enough big American corporations buy your worthless @$$).

 

If it's a political thing, I think that Republicans tend to favor a policy that favors US interests. Speaking of free trade, wasn't it Mr. Clinton that made China the "most favored" nation for the "free trade"? That seemed much more a move to facilitate free trade than anything I've seen in a while.

 

That is true of pretty much all private universities, isn't it? For instance, I'm pretty sure Capella tuition is actually lower than any accredited private university in Los Angeles.

Regards
GE

 

Still, when it comes to what the respective parties actually say, it is the Republicans who yell and scream about free trade (except Pat Buchanan, of course, who got run out of the party on that issue), while it is usually the Democrats (except, apparently, Clinton, who followed the turncoat Dick Morris' advice to try to out-Republican the Republicans) who speak about using tariffs and other forms of protectionism to save American jobs. You should either do what you say, or else you're a fricking hypocrite!