For-Profits Give Thousands to Politicians Who Oppose ‘Gainful Employment’ Rule

The states and their state boards of higher education should be against this rule also. Let the Feds make rules about paying back loans, but don’t let them decide what constitutes higher education.

Write to all the Senators on Harkin’s HELP committee and tell them to pass into law “gainful employment rules” and to stop the for-profits from feeding at the trough of the taxpayers and on unknowing students. You can search HELP committe and their names and emails will come up.

haohtt, you need to get a life. All graduates holding an MD granting school or college (e.g., medical school) accredited by the Graduate Education in Medicine qualify for tuition reimbursement if they agree to work in a hospital, or private medical practice in a Federally identified underserved area of the country, i.e., Appalachia (which runs from Maine to northern Alabama). Moreover, after Residency, in just one year of practice most MDs will earn far more than all four years of medical education cost at a public university, i.e., NC’s Chapel Hill. Beyond that, many of the for-profit colleges prey on potential students who for one reason don’t want to do what it takes to attend a non-profit public or private university, i.e., vetrans, or inlisted persons who want the government to pay for a degree, but don’t want the bother of moving to a new location. The bottom line about the Education Department’s proposed ruling is about students who take a degree that has little, if any value toward getting gainful employment in the field of study, beyond minimum wage. Try paying $100K in loans back while getting married, having a baby, supporting two vehicles, and buying or renting a home, furnishing a home,when only one of the parents works, and even then brings in only $30K a year. Yes, the loan will get paid back eventually; however, in the meantime Uncle Sam, meaning you and me will be picking up the tab for the interest on the loan, which is somewhere between $1k, and $2,5K, depending on the type of loan(s), and interest rate.

bearjimmy, A small fraction of medical school graduates go on to work “in a Federally identified underserved area of the country.” The “gainful employment rule” bans federal funding for programs who graduate payback rates fall below 35%, so Harvard’s and Tulane’s med school 24% payback rates would qualify for the ban. You are correct in your assessment of the payback opportuntities for medical students, which is why the arbitrary “gainful employment” rules are so silly (and why they should apply equally to non-profits). Your opinions about military students and the value or lack thereof of degrees from for-profit universities have no basis in reality and run counter to the latest research data. I have a wonderful and full life, thank you, Perhaps, my friend, you should do a little homework.

Another very lame and feeble effort on the part of the “For-Profits” to try to buy some respectability. At the end of the day it won’t work.

How about the lobbying from the non-profit universities, whose pressure to eliminate the competition from the for-profits led to these investigations in the first place (coupled with the fact that many officials in the Obama Administration came directly from working for these institutions into the Administration)?

Bravo, simonj55. My sentiments exactly. My experience with for-profits is that they are simply selling degrees, and that their primary structure is about keeping students and not failing them, no matter what. I have very little respect for for-profit schools.