interesting story on for profit colleges-

NetworkingStudent

I found an interesting story on for profit colleges. This story definitely makes a few good points explaining why students should attending WGU, and other regionally accredited colleges. Additionally, there are several reasons in this story mentioning why IT students should skip ITT Tech, University of Phoenix ,ect. …..Devry


Investigation reveals claims of unmanageable debt by 'for-profit' college students - Rock Center with Brian Williams

NotHackingYou

The answer really has to be somewhere in the middle. It is the student who is responsible for the amount of money they decide to borrow. The colleges shouldn't be lying to anyone but this trend of denying personal responsibility is worse than heavy debt.

Iristheangel

A lot of these places has deceptive practices promising their students great job titles, salaries, and opportunities when they get out of the school but often are disappointed. Some people are able to succeed but it's usually the exception to the rule when you look at the loan repayment rates. I'm not going to say everyone fails. There are some prime examples on this forum that went to for-profit colleges and still succeeded but it's a greater struggle for most when saddled with all those debts and a lot of those colleges aren't regionally accredited so you can't the credits anywhere

jm0202

Yeah.. I am so happy I decided to start my MSISA at WGU soon.
The sad part about the student loan debt is that effective July 1, 2012 the government has decided that any loan available for masters degree is only unsub. That's why WGU's Financial aid told me and my State University confirmed to me.
I guess i will have to pay the interest while studying...

YFZblu

I agree for the most part - For-profits simply cost too much to justify the degree at that type of institution; most of them, anyway. That said, I roll my eyes when one of these articles makes its rounds. At this point they never provide any new information or anything insightful. Instead they simply babble on and on about how much debt the country has tied up in federal student aid. Make no mistake, it is a bubble.

Why isn't anyone pointing fingers at the government? After all, the government makes this money nearly as easy to obtain as going to an ATM. There is a fine line between making education available for all and giving money to any independent with a pulse.

Iristheangel

I agree, YFZBlu. I don't think the government should be dispensing money unless it's going towards a fully accredited college. A lot of these institutions aren't regionally accredited. The government was trying to pass a bill that would give these for-profit colleges a "3-strikes and you're out" restriction on their federal loan eligibility. The original bill was something like "if the college fails to meet an X loan repayment rate, they become ineligible for federal loans. Unfortunately, paid off politicians crying foul got us a bill that was watered down. Now it's pathetic: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/10/us/politics/for-profit-college-rules-scaled-back-after-lobbying.html?pagewanted=all


I'm a strong believer in giving kids an opportunity to get an education but I also believe that financial aid shouldn't be granted to any institution that hangs the word "college" at the door

YFZblu

I agree Iris, but let's take a look at perception for a moment. The article was really centered around that school in Las Vegas. But nobody cares about a for-profit in Vegas that nobody has ever heard about, so they toss in names of the big fish like the University of Phoenix; which is now a buzzword as much as it is the name of an educational institution. Really all that article had to say is "Hey look, the University of Phoenix got sued thee years ago". The University of Phoenix is regionally accredited, and is also credited with being one of the biggest offenders as far as irresponsible borrowing is concerned.

So who should be on trial? The state colleges and universities who aren't doing a good enough job of meeting the needs of the population, causing them to turn to more expensive methods? The Universities that charge too much but who also make it possible for a mother of three with two jobs to attend college? The people themselves, who accept massive debts just to fulfill a skewed view of worth that our society deems important? The government, who gives tens of thousands of dollars away to anyone who can complete the FAFSA?

I like to think everyone is to blame to some degree. This issue will certainly have its day on trial, I just really hope it doesn't come too late.

Iristheangel

Yes, UoP is regionally accredited but if the original law I mentioned had gone into place, they would have lost their federal loan eligibility based on their student loan repayment rate. I like to blame local and state colleges but I watch their budgets get cut time and time again by the government so their ability to provide diverse class options and extended hours are cut as well. The prices of these universities have raised but it's statistically tied to the rate of financial support they are losing from the government. It's a crappy thing when these third party options become the only options for some people. If they are to be a viable and realistic option, they need to balance their expectations and price or stop being eligible to be supported by government loans. I don't have a problem with people filling out a FAFSA and going to a public university. Some will default. Compared to 1990 where the student loan default rate was about 23%, we're still doing better at 8.8% currently. What's scary is the statistics for a lot of this for-profit colleges which experience anywhere from 15-25% default rate depending on the college. For-profit colleges only account for about 12-13% of all federal student loans, but they account for about 44% of all federal loan defaults. Scary numbers if you think about how many of their students had to default to create 44% of our overall federal loan defaults.

YFZblu

Colleges don't default on loans, Students do. Low income Students do it more, of which for-profits have a high volume of. Graduation rate of low-income Students is also lower. We can't say "don't enroll low-income Students", so we blame the colleges. We say they "target" low-income Students.

I think the requirements should be more stringent for everyone, especially the Students who 'promise' to pay the money back with nothing more than an electronic signature. But this needs to be a group effort - We shouldn't just say it's OK for state and local colleges to be a flawed option just because the funding isn't there. With that type of position nothing would ever get fixed.

I've heard of some employers not hiring people or even refusing to promote them if they have Student loans in default. Not a terrible idea.

SteveO86

I don't know, people shouldn't be so gullible either I mean when anyone says you take these classes get a degree and make 80k+ a year after you graduate shouldn't that make you think? If it was that easy why isn't everyone else doing it?

Now I'm not going to defend the college at all, I mean it is just wrong they are going after either young kids out of high school and paint this beautiful picture in their head or someone older who needs to do something to better his quality of life, but bottom line is it's nothing more then a sales gimmick they are no better department store or car sales they are always going to say how good it is and never tell you the full story of what others have had to deal with. That's why people should really do research on any major investment they make, using the girl in that article as an example it doesn't sound like they really thought it out themselves they just kind of jumped in. We can't forget about personal responsibility either.

I ended up going to one of those for profit colleges, graduated back in '05 and I'm still paying it off but that's my fault. I've been paying the minimum for years I could pay extra but I don't.

kgb

I agree that colleges shouldn't lie. But, I also believe it's totally on the person to not be lazy and do some research on their own. In today's world, there's NO reason for someone to be ill-informed. It just takes some motivation to go look for the information.

I'll use myself as an example. Like 6 years ago, I wanted to make a career switch. Looked into the Bio Medical Technician field (work with computers, fix medical equipment). Sounded like a good thing. Ask the people there at the school, what kind of starting salary am I looking at? I needed to maintain my same salary. They respond, oh ya, no worries. What do I do? I went and researched it, and nope. They were like 20k off... Whose fault would've that been? All mine.

I've been in the artistic field for the last 10 years. It still amazes me how many people are getting into crazy debt for an art degree...It's clever marketing and the government's giving away $ that is feeding those schools. There was a recent article on Art Institute, people are paying 40-80k for a web design degree...Then you read about those students who cry about having to pay that size loan off and they were ripped off. Nope, pay it bud. You could spend less than 5mins on google and find out that getting into crazy debt for something like that is a bad idea.