Should for-profit schools have more rigorous entry requirements?

Who are you addressing with this post?

 

Not everyone should go to college. I'm not saying people shouldn't go to trade school or learn a skill, but the idea that everyone has the right to a four year college degree is absurd. Some people have the ability to succeed in an academic environment, others don't. I see posts on these boards from time-to-time that make me wonder how the poster managed to get into a college/university. When someone has trouble constructing a coherent sentence, it makes me question the caliber of the school(s) they attended.

Publicly traded for-profits are doing what all publicly traded entities do, making money for their share holders. Don't fault them if uninformed students buy into what they are selling.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they

"On the one hand, it is unacceptable to a great many reasonable readers to use the generic masculine pronoun (he in reference to no one in particular). On the other hand, it is unacceptable to a great many readers either to resort to nontraditional gimmicks to avoid the generic masculine (by using he/she or s/he, for example) or to use they as a kind of singular pronoun. Either way, credibility is lost with some readers.[2]"

 

Please forgive me for not having read through this whole thread. Maybe someone already asked this question. It is simply this: What do regional accreditors require in the area of admissions? Is this something that's even addressed as a part of the RA process? I don't KNOW the answer and I don't think that anyone else does either. I've never been able to obtain a list of the criteria that the regional accreditors use in their determination. I have no real reason to doubt the RA process but in recent years we as a country have come to be a bit more suspicious of governmental/regulatory processes that are less than transparent.

 

Since I was the one that raised the question of admissions standards at for-profit schools in another thread, I guess I feel obliged to reply here.

Open admissions allows for credit college work to weed out those who belong in a college program from those who don’t. I do not believe that either high school grades or general admission testing are reliable predictors but the open enrollment selection process is 100% correct if messy. Open admissions place the responsibility for a student’s success or lack thereof squarely on the student and their abilities. The more selective methods instead try to predict a student’s success or may use any other number of arbitrarily applied standards by which to grant or deny admissions. I’ve attended the more selective Southwestern College (where I had to submit writings and do a phone interview to gain admission) and open enrollment colleges such as Ashford University (for profit) and Bellevue (non-profit) and in both cases I was successful. But that is my story, at Ashford I noted that towards the end of our MBA program only about ½ to 1/3 of the students that started with me, finished with me. I fully expect that to be the case at Bellevue as well as it would be in pretty much any open admissions school.

On principle the profit status of a school should not be used as a determining factor for open or selective enrollment, rather the school’s own mission should, e.g. who they serve, what service they provide and why. Not every for profit is open enrollment and not every open enrollment school is for profit. In fact some would argue that the Open University in the UK is quite an accomplished school and a pioneer in open enrollment education. I don’t know what their graduation rate is, probably low, but I do know the reputation of their school and it appears sound. I like the idea of individual accountability and equal opportunity for all that is inherent in all open enrollment schools.

To make a special class of rules that apply only to for profit schools is damaging to education as a whole, it allows non-profits to gain a strategic edge in the market share without the need for improved services, innovation, accessibility or other traditional market factors (that are commonly understood to be effective I might add). The fact of the matter is the profit motive has driven innovation in education (as most any industry) which has been taken advantage of by every single distance learning student out there, present company included. We can thank for profit educational institutions for much of the improvements made in service and accessibility as well. The providers that are commonly maligned have met all the standards, however ambiguous for regional accreditation and continue to maintain them. Forget the appearance of elitism; classifying the market and thereby setting special circumstance policy is simply a form of market manipulation that comes at the detriment to the customer (aka student) regardless of who they decide to earn their degree with. I believe it will stagnate or slow innovation, introduce market factors that are not to the benefit of the student (or the school for that matter) and allow foreign educational providers an ability to gain an edge on the U.S. market in the areas of innovation and accessibility if not reputation. In this regard we have and maintain the ability to become our own biggest threat to being the world leader in education.