A coalition of for-profit colleges that has been campaigning against stricter federal regulation of its members added a lawsuit to its lobbying and public-relations push today, accusing the Government Accountability Office of “professional malpractice” in its undercover investigation of colleges’ recruiting tactics last summer. In the lawsuit the Coalition for Educational Success says the investigation’s findings, some of which the GAO has since softened, cost for-profit colleges millions as they responded to accusations and saw their companies lose value in the stock market.
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4 Responses to For-Profit Colleges’ Lawsuit Accuses GAO of ‘Malpractice’
goxewu - February 2, 2011 at 2:31 pm
While it goes without saying that we at Murray’s Discount University (formerly The Flotilla Academy of Anti-Federal Litigation) unconditionally support the plaintiff’s position in this courageous and necessary lawsuit, we would like to point with pride to the very name of that plaintiff: the Coalition for Educational Success.
“Coalition” has a ring of might to it, in addition to denoting a doughty group of unfairly beleaguered institutions heroically arrayed against Big Government. (Hey, it worked in Iraq, didn’t it?) “Educational” is an always-good word, and besides, it’s the busi…field of endeavor we’re in. But “Success” is the master stroke. It’s supposed to convey the success that our students find in the world after studying with us, but it also conveys, ever so indirectly, the reason we’re in the education game–financial success for ourselves. What can be worse for a fancy-named school (check out CES’s member list) than to see “their companies lose value in the stock market”?
And if anybody tries to attached the label, “AstroTurf organization” to CES, we’ll just say right back, “That’s right–AstroTurf is nothing but for-profit grass.”
annon1234 - February 2, 2011 at 3:54 pm
Well at least they are honest about which stakeholder is the important one to them – the stockholders who are padding their pockets at tax payer expense.
They clearly don’t care about the faculty as they are underpaid and, to a large extent, adjunct.
They clearly don’t care about the students or they’d have admissions standards beyond if they can pay (and most of the time the money comes from subsidized student loans, VA benefits and on occasion unsubsidized ones) such that they might be successful. And they’d make sure they didn’t get overwhelmed by student debt load. They don’t care about the outcomes other than they want to keep the students enrolled as long as possible or they’d not panic about gainful employment and ability to pay back student loan stipulations because if they cared there would be quality education going on and so it would be more likely this would not be a worry.
They clearly don’t care about the staff, except perhaps the sales staff (opps admissions staff) since they are the ones who figure out how to get the students to sign on the student loan dotted line so that the shareholders can get their hands on it most of it.
Incidentally I do think that any college or university – for profit or not – should be held to a standard of giving students an education where they might have half a chance to get a job and pay back their loans.
archman - February 2, 2011 at 4:09 pm
I love goxewu’s posts. Satirical poetry at its finest.
willynilly - February 2, 2011 at 8:46 pm
Isn’t this lawsuit funny as hell? The world’s experts on guiltless malpractice actually accusing their oversight unit of malpractice.