For-profit schools under fire. Again.

Here's another news highlighting how for-profit universities are misleading students and misusing the federal student loan program to make huge profits. Click on this link to view: For-Profit Universities Scam Students

 

The latest stories about Kaplan University are particularly disturbing. It is alleged that "academic advisors" secretly read student emails, so that they could harvest students' user names and passwords, use this info to enroll them for more courses without their knowledge, and claim more federal financial aid reimbursements. This procedure was known as "guerrilla registration".

I thought the University of Phoenix had hit the bottom when they started actively recruiting drug-addicted high-school dropouts at homeless shelters, in order to register them and claim their federal aid. But at least UoP was signing up willing volunteers. Kaplan was (allegedly) signing people up without their knowledge or consent.

 

This is chilling. What a terrible black eye for online education. Unfortunately, when news like this becomes public, many assume that these same dishonest practices are present in online schools in general. One school is dishonest so all online schools are dishonest. So something like this hurts us all, at least indirectly.

 

Sadly, many assume that the problem is online education. But, if you look at the names in the article you'll see that the schools have more traditional programs as well. You can't shoot undercover video when the person is applying to an online school. The "students" who were signing up for these schools where attempting to go to school in person.

 

By and large, the horror stories have the words "for-profit" in the headline -- not the word "online". For example, the headline in the Original Post above was "For-Profit Universities Scam Students." It didn't say anything about "online".

It's certainly true that in some cases, these stories involve for-profit programs offered by DL -- for example, the woman described in Post #2 above was studying with Kaplan online. But anyone who has been following the horror stories will quickly realize that same sorts of abuses are also reported in for-profit programs that are B&M.

The reality is that news like this tarnishes Kaplan's reputation, in terms of both distance and B&M programs.

 

There is a problem with online for profit schools. Degreeinfoers need to lead the fight. From the news stories over the years, a reasonable person will come to the conclusion that for profits are preying on vulnerable students. A PHD/DBA for more than $40,000 is cash grab. For the higher prices at for profits online, students receive a risky product along with crippling debt. A bad investment. In the dotcom era the business model was upside down; the same is happening with for profit online education. Students are paying big $$ for junk bond/subprime equivalent education. We need to applaud and promote the few for profits who care about their students financial welfare while at the same time offering a decent product.

 

I agree 100% with your position regarding expensive online doctoral programs being "a bad investment" for those who pay to attend. What amazes me is how they all charge about the same. Why can't one online school realize that charging a reasonable amount for their PhD degree, irrespective of what the rest are charging, may actually guarantee long-term success and superior reputation. If the school is rigorous and the students are happy with tuition rates, public perception and student enrollment is likely to go up.

Instead, they all act as though online education will go away soon, so they have to make their millions before it all collapses soon. Until there is a convincing reason why a PhD from an online-only school cost $50k, $60k, or $70k (aside from the regular "it's what the market can bear, or its regionally accredited" excuses), in addition to not falling victim of the scam, I will make sure no one that I know falls for it.

 

That is a sad thing indeed. I am glad that as of yet my school does not have any of these huge red flags associated with it. Though I have heard some rumblings regarding "possible" financial aid fraud with AMU/APU as of yet it is still nothing proven. I do fear that before I can confer my bachelors and move on to a graduate program that something will transpire to ruin the validity of my degree

 

Kahn Swick & Foti, a large law firm in Lousiana, seems very interested in hearing from current or former students of AMU/APU. See info here and here.

 

Um thanks for the links but that is not something I would be interested in being involved in. As a member of the military I would never become involved with any class action suit that may discredit my association with the military. Also, I have neither spoken with anyone nor been party to any financial missleadings or fraud with this school. I was just speaking to the scuttlebutt I have intercepted. I personally find my school to be a great way to earn my degree while on active duty.

 

This "new" article seems to be merely the same old article that has been reported for the past several months,but with some new window dressing. In discussions about the high tuition charged by for-profit colleges, the comparisons tend to pit the private for-profits against the public colleges and state universities, which derive the majority (often 70-80%) of their operating funds from taxpayer allotments. Comparisons are rarely made between the private non-profits and private for-profits. The College Board recently published a list of the over 100 colleges and universities that charge over $50K--not for the total cost of the degree, but for each YEAR of tuition, fees and room. How many for-profits made that list? None.

Now, having said that, I agree fully that each person needs to find the degree that will meet his or her needs best. Our small Ph.D. program consists mainly of students who are already in their careers and will be promoted as a result of receiving their degree. Some wish to enhance their career either via consulting or adjunct teaching. We have counseled students who have applied with the goal of seeking a full-time tenure-track position at a traditional university to seek an AACSB accredited institution.

It is frustrating when all private proprietary institutions are lumped together, when some of us are not part of some large publicly traded corporation, have brick and mortar campuses with full-time faculty and staff (that receive salary and health/vision/dental/life benefits) and pay income taxes (without receiving any of the state and local taxes given to our sister public institutions). When our admissions officers are asked about the salary potential of graduates, they provide the URL for the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A comparison of our undergraduate tuition rates with those of our neighboring institutions found us to be $15 per semester hour more expensive than our local state university and $219/$324 per semester hour less than our two non-profit private schools.

One of the factors that influences our online tuition is that, unlike many other schools (in which the online program is more or less an add-on to the traditional programs and are handled by the traditional program staff), my institution maintains a fully staffed campus of professionals dedicated primarily to providing services for our fully online students. Also, since our face-to-face courses do not yet use our learning management system, the online program bares the total costs for the LMS (hopefully that will change in the near future). Given that our retention rate for our online students each quarter is 90-92%, we must be doing something right.

 

I agree with Dr. Pina's assessment 100%. Schools such as Aspen, Sullivan and many others do have a moral compass, and are looking for the well-being of their students. Furthermore, these schools view themselves as a benefactor to their students, and they carry themselves with high degree of integrity.

I hate to bring Aspen again to the conversation -as many people think that here at DegreeInfo we talk about Aspen all the time- however, here we have a fine example of a school that is doing the right thing. Aspen is providing quality affordable education to students who otherwise could not afford such education. Aspen and other schools like it should be given praise.

I truly believe that the Kaplans of the world, with their deceptive, and unethical business practices, are giving for-profit a bad name. Therefore, leaving students and the general public with a poor perception of for-profit schools. Michael Oliver, in another thread, brought up an interesting point, are RA for-profit degrees worthless? My answer to that is hell no, these degrees hold the highest level of accreditation in the U.S. However, there is a perception out in the general public that view these degrees as "worthless" in the sense that they come from sleazy schools with dubious practices such as Kaplan. (I'm not bashing on Kaplan, is just the perception out there).

It is ultimately up to the student to diligently research all of his or her options. With the wealth of information available to prospective students, there is really no excuse to jump into a world of debt.

 

I don't think you were seriously suggesting it, but perhaps there is truth to what you suggested, Steve. Perhaps this is just another example of how government education assistance in its current form is producing substantial harm.

I've always said it inflates prices and produces artificial supply of funding. It seems to me that perhaps simplification is in order.

 

The government has its hands deep into higher education, either by covering the bulk of the costs of operations of public colleges with gifts of taxpayer funds, or by providing substantial funding to private for-profit and non-profit colleges through student loans. If that were to disappear, then state universities would cost the same as private universities.

 

If you look at the tuition charged by most of the FPs, it is exactly the same as the military reimburses via TA. If the military slashed the TA rate, schools would follow suit and lower their tuition accordingly (at least for military folks, probably at the expense of everyone else).

Agreed on the Antioch rate. With a PhD from University of Penn. you could teach anywhere in academia you wanted to, so if that was a goal I think it would be worth it.