Kaplan Higher Education Will Lay Off 770 People

As I have written several times previously, the Kaplan gig is up, for good. Run for cover, protect yourself, and for heaven’s sake, if you own stock in this loser, sell it today.

Well, the for-profits had a good run, with their well-orchestrated campaigns for papering over the shoddy practices characterizing both their recruiting tactics and the “education” being delivered. They have provided a particularly nice means for a chosen few to rake in the big bucks, never mind the bait and switch basis characterizing so many of them. I doubt for-profit education will go quietly, and they have proven quite able to persuade malleable politicians (by doling out money) to defend their interests, but at least for now the stench has become so overpowering that even the most venal are beginning to look at them askance.

I would be the first to admit that there are serious problems with many for-profit schools. However, to lump them all together and call them “fake schools’ illustrates only the writer’s own ignorance. There are some (many?) good programs within some of those colleges that genuinley serve the students they enroll with rigor!), allowing them to achieve things that would not have been available to them without the opportunity provided by the for-profit school. Many students choose the for-profits over public schools for legitimate reasons.

Indeed, “a very broad view of the world” often includes moral relativism, but sadly omits intellectual honesty.

Dr. Thomas posts: “I would highly encourage those who speak without experience to conduct research by teaching at some of those ‘fake’ schools.”

Like Dr. Thomas, I too have worked for both profit and non-profit schools, and while I do not know where Dr. Thomas taught, I am highly dubious, both of the poster and the poster’s claims.

My proprietary school experience was an absolute fiasco for all the typically cited reasons, not the least of which was the drubbing the actual education took to meet the bottom line. Yes we took attendance every day, but it was entirely a facade–as long as the students were paying, they were passing. No library. No faculty development (“faculty meetings” were entirely devoted to numbers of enrollment). And, worst of all, few to no advanced degrees and often little to no teaching experience. I suspect our good Dr. Thomas works for Kaplan or one of the the other 4-profits, and I am sorry, Dr. Thomas, but it was a “fake” school.

Worse still, my current position includes helping university staff members with their “doctoral” dissertations (a Kaplan “doctoral candidate” included)…I will leave the readers to fill in the quality issues involved…

I have the privilege of representing Ben Wilcox and Carlos Diaz as whistleblowers against Kaplan University for violations of the False Claims Act.
I admire them both for having the courage to come forward. and expose the fraudulent acts. They will earn a reward for coming forward assuming they win the case, but that was not their original motivation for exposing the fraud.
I have to admit that I have been absolutely shocked at what I found out about Kaplan.
I personally believe these types of schools should be called predatory for-profit proprietary education corporations.
I hear the heartache from the former recruiters who could no longer stomach what they they were required to do.
I receive e-mails from instructors and/or professors who are so relieved that they no longer have to inflate grades.
I receive the phone calls and e-mails from the former students who indicate they were preyed upon.
I hear the tears when they find out that their credits are nontransferable. They are stuck with a large student loan which is not dischargeable in bankruptcy.

We must stop this $28 billion a year ripoff of the federal government, taxpayers such as you and me, and the students.
You can help by exposing fraud .
John W. Andrews ESQ
jwa@andrewslawgroup.com
813 8771867

Actually, Dr. Thomas, I did not work for Kaplan. And, intellectual laziness or not, I am painting proprietary education with a broad stroke.

The very nature of education (that teachers be able to hold students to certain standards and be able to conduct research with academic freedom) is contradictory to the nature of a business venture which must respond to customers and the bottom line.

I might suggest that your efforts to defend for-profit education will not be terribly convincing here, nor should they be.

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I think people who equate all for profit universities as diploma mills are guilty of excess generalizing and lazy thinking. Many public and private universities have faculty and staff entrenched in the security of their jobs who just go through the motions of doing their jobs. The completion rates at community colleges are dismally low. The colleges and universities with the highest completion rates are those schools where where admission is competitive and the bulk of the student population are traditional students. These students do not make up the bulk of students attending the for profit schools.

I have experience working with both profits and non profits and I think the current situation we are in is due to the fact that public and traditional private schools due a very poor job of servicing the non traditional student who requires flexibility that the for profits offer. I think the for profits grew very quickly because they filled a huge need.

They grew without oversight. They grew without anyone trying to sort out the very fundamental conflict of interest inherent in the idea of a non profit university held by a publicly traded university. They grew without any agreement regarding best practices among these universities.

I work for one of them who thankfully has been out of the spotlight but there is a LOT of pressure to enroll and the school is basically an open enrollment school. The people I speak to and do enroll are people who want to continue their education or begin their education but for whom traditional options are not possible. They are single mothers, people who work third shift, people who travel, people in the military. They are also people who have tried the community college route and have scheduling issues, can’t get into required classes because they are filled, don’t feel comfortable sitting in classes with people half their ages, etc. etc. The community college which should be the greatest educational bargain around does not do that great a job in serving non traditional students.

Manufacturing and trade jobs have been disappearing and people need an education; however, it is amazing how many applications I read from people who spell “college” “coledge”. High schools graduate many people who do not have the skills they need for college. I read a lot of commentary about instructors at for profits being pressured to give passing grades and I know it happens; however, what I see more often than not at the school where I work are students flunking out. They flunk out because they don’t have the skills necessary to pass classes as they become progessively more difficult. They flunk out because they don’t read the rules and regulations of the university (which are posted in many places and reiterated constantly) about deadlines, contacting instructors when they can’t finish an assignment on time, and because as adults they still have not overcome the issues that made them poor students or poor candidates for college education when they were 18.

There are of course many students who thrive at the for profit universities and get a good education. These are usually the students who always had the skills for college but “life got in the way” or they were “late bloomers”. There is a niche among students who positively thrive at the profits but there are a lot of students who either don’t belong in college or need a year or two of remedial work.

Take for example, someone typical of the person I talk to and do not enroll. The person is 30 something, unemployed or underemployed, who has had years of experience working in an industry that was slammed by the recession. The person has little or no college background and never liked school in the first place but knows he or she has to have retraining and usually has no idea what he or she wants to do. I can call this person months later and that person will be in the same place but even poorer and more desperate. What do we have to offer this person in terms of retraining, remedial education, vocational counseling? Does anyone think the overburdened unemployment offices and community colleges do a good job?

So where do you teach Dr. Thomas? Perhaps your institution breaks the norm and should be congratulated–but it is pretty easy to come here and make the sorts of claims that you do without the burden of evidence (you might just as easily be a Kaplan attorney or PR writer for all we know). You could clear this up by posting the name of the for-profit which does such an excellent job.

And, for whatever it is worth, the retention game may erode the quality of the non-profit sector as well, no argument there…

Sure Moongate, I’ll tell you my first for-profit and we can go from there. Please reciprocate by listing your first higher ed teaching position.

The very first location I taught was one of the Remington Colleges. At the time there were 17 campuses around the country. Many of the administrators came from ITT Tech to start this school.
All of the requirements I listed earlier applied to Remington. We taught with tough love for students who might never have had a guiding hand in their life. When I arrived, the Associates program was in place and Bachelor classes were just beginning to form. Because we used BBAY funding, large stipends were not allowed, which means larger loans were not needed.

We integrated theory with hands-on application (one of the foundational theories of successful andragogy), and grew the campus. We required our Career Services to place 85% of our graduates in their career field within 90 days. How many state schools do the same?

If you Google “Remington”, you’ll find good and bad reviews from former students. As in all parts of Life, those who tried, succeeded; those who didn’t, blogged. It’s a lot like “Rate My Professor”. Even the highest rated professors have a few students who intensely dislike them.

Regarding accreditation, I became a West Coast SME for my field on behalf of ACICS. I traveled to western states and inspected other campuses of other schools. ACICS standards when compared to HLC are much more exact. In many areas HLC tends to allow colleges to set their own benchmarks and then checks to ensure they are following your own goals. ACICS has more defined goals. Unlike the 18-year faculty above, when I traveled to other colleges, I enforced those standards strictly. It also helped me to bring back beanchmarks on how to improve our campus.

At Remington we told students up front that credits from nationally accredited schools may not transfer to regionally accredited schools. However, I actually met with local colleges to outline our curriculum and to show how our students were actually receiving more content than students in a 3 s.h. course.
Several colleges and universities (of the 42 local campuses) with open minds accepted our students and credits. Those who clung to the territorial pissing of regional accreditation would require our students to pay them more money to take the same courses over again. Courses my best students could have taught.
That is the real maltreatment of students as defended by Senator Harkin.

My current univeristy has already been invited to testify before the Senate. We outlined how our retention rates are higher and our loan defaults are the same or lower than the state universities. We also demonstrated how the cost of our education is lower than the state schools when you consider the amount of tax subsidies per student we pay in taxation for one state college student.

You seem to have ingrained in your mind that all for-profits are the same. Is that really the way you intended to represent your thoughts?

The Admissions Advisor:
It begins in Kool Aid Club training, when questions about stigma and accreditation are dodged. They’d prefer you didn’t think too much on the sales floor, either; there’s virtually no discussion or training on program content or quality. Your job is simple: sell the American dream that higher ed equals car, house, stability, etc. There’s a quota each day, and sales managers roam the aisles of our cube heaven. Cube Heaven comes complete with for profit vending machines that distribute smaller portions of Doritos and candy for about $.20 more than machines everywhere else. What will they think of next?

You’re taught and encouraged to temper (and avoid in the initial interview) any “process” based questions…the realities of debt, how financial aid works, the work required, etc. You’re regularly and strongly encouraged to enroll same day, and management makes it clear that doing so helps to avoid losing students to other universities. They’ll fluff that with a seemingly bullet proof rationale that students have been putting this off forever, or are frightened, and that they need your help. Never mind that 95% of prospective students we’ve targeted are in poor financial situations, or the fact that they’re jobless, with the rent due, and in emotional, irrational states. Omit, enhance, and manipulate. You’re helping, so do whatever it takes. Get the enrollment. Toss a homeless person a smallpox infected blanket instead. At least they can declare bankruptcy after going to the ER. Yeah, they weren’t looking for THIS change in their lives: Not only will they be saddled with debt they can’t shake even in bankruptcy, but they’ll also have spent their Financial Aid card, effectively disqualifying themselves from school aid in the future.

Back to the sales floor and earning your check. It’s time to start “overcoming objections.” This is what you’ll spend the majority of job doing – convincing students that their intuition about a quick fix is wrong, that they can make the time for it, use a library computer if they don’t have one…they NEED this. Omit, enhance, and manipulate…guilt if you must!The single biggest “objection” you’ll be encouraged (for unspoken threat of termination) to overcome is the application fee. Sure, it’s not much, but the majority of students don’t have it, choosing rather to spend it on food, or avoiding cell phone service interruption, drugs, or getting it waived to enroll in a university that will charge them thousands more. It’s now your job to call them every day to help them “overcome this challenge.” Can they ask the church? Parents? Find some bottles and cans to recycle? The reality is that while a few of them are late bloomers and/or working professionals that bring the necessary experience and education to succeed. The the vast majority are low SES, or flat broke, with little education experience, poor skills, and even poorer consumer awareness. They all have only one thing in common: a social security number! A number that grants access to Federal Aid that you’re now going to help a corporation plunder. Legally.

At the beginning, you’re told you’re going to help “untraditional” students: students that are getting to college late or disheveled; they may have had children, or found good jobs out of high school, or went to prison. Duh, untraditional students typically don’t have great academic skills, and learn worst when content is presented only verbally/linguistically (reading/writing). Our students are provided supplementary videos, etc., but they’re assessed by “projects” which are essentially short term papers that they research in the library, and by contributing to discussion board topics. Reading. And writing. How does setting up a student to fail help her/him/it?

Someone end this.

doctorthomas,

You’re kind, and yes, i’m working my way out of here. I can’t believe i was foolish enough to think it would be any different. I’ll be axed soon enough for not enrolling students, though that will not be the reason given, I can guarantee it. Honestly, i enroll very, very few students, and that’s how I live with myself. I recently enrolled a student because he’s traveling extensively, needed online classes, and brought real experience to his education. I’m not claiming all for profit education is bad. Admissions “recruiting”, is evil, though.

Don’t get me started about traditional state schools. In my experience, it’s a who’s on first scenario at all turns. It’s difficult to navigate, fees and tuition are mysterious, and it’s difficult to find real help or guidance.

I believe there ARE some great programs; for profit, online, and otherwise. I’ve been regularly impressed with what Drexel is doing, even if it’s expensive.

I just think, after this experience, that for profit “advising” should be highly regulated, and that online and/or accellerated for and non-profit programs should be reserved for those that can effectively demonstrate the ability to succeed and show real promise for paying it off. This is not news though; it’s inexcusable that DOE has let this happen. How are we going to forclose on or repossess a college education when the FA bubble pops?

Yes, you are correct, Dr. Thomas.

There are a lot–I mean, A LOT–of complaints about Remington online. And these are exactly the kinds of complaints usually leveled at proprietary institutions: rip-offs, hard sales tactics, promises too-good-to-be-true, expensive, poor instruction.

Actually, my for-profit experience was at an institution much like yours–multi-state regional but not one of the giant profit systems. And my for-profit experience included just such unbelievably rosy numbers as you cite above (a 85% job placement w/in 90 days), just the kind of claim that has gotten the for-profit sector in trouble. Interestingly, many of the online student complaints about Remington have to do with the inability to find employment despite recruiter promises and steep tuition. I could not find anything that would verify what you’ve claimed above–at least not online–while the anecdotal evidence online, while certainly not complete or scientific, would suggest that Remington is pretty much exactly what a skeptic might expect.

The most damning thing, in my estimation, is the complete lack of faculty profiles–who teaches at Remington?

Then there is this from the Huffington Post:

“ABC has once again caught for-profit colleges engaging in bad behaviors.

“This time, the offenses involve bad advice and hyperbolizations.
After a Remington College professor was surprised to find two convicted felons on his class roster, ABC sent an undercover producer posing as a convicted felon to meet with a Remington recruiter. When the producer told the recruiter of his felony conviction, the recruiter assured him they would work with him and that he could find work in law enforcement or corrections. But according to the Texas Department of Public Safety, those convicted of felonies are barred from working in those areas.”

Is this fair to post? Maybe, maybe not. But it would seem to suggest just exactly the problem of educating for money.

i really should proofread these things.

moongate,

I hate to say I told you so.
The motivated gripers will always complain but NEVER outline their culpability in the situation. Having dealt with those types of students — many of whom also attend junior colleges — I can recite by rote the many excuses and recriminations about how their failure was not really THEIR fault. No, it was the school, or the textbook wasn’t clear enough, or the teacher wouldn’t let them turn in their work three weeks late. But the many who were successful ADULT learners are better educated in the field than their commuity college counterparts.

re: Enrolling felons in CJ — I found the exact same SINGULAR instance of Larry Stewart discovering felons in his class. And so, you fire the recruiters. Problem solved and message sent.
Find me 30 instances and we’ll compare those to the thousands of students in the CJ program at Remington for statistical significance. Really? Do we base arguments on one instance?

What you also ignore is that the local community colleges are enrolling felons into Crim Justice or Admin of Justice or Justice Studies as well.
If you have a felony, it is highly unlikely (particularly in today’s economy) that you will ever be a sworn officer, but a felony does not disqualify you from working in other functions in law enforcement, depending on your jurisdiction. New Orleans is infamous for hiring felons as SWORN OFFICERS in the 1970′s and 1980′s.

However, the broader picture is that community colleges and state schools can and do enroll the same way, but don’t even ATTEMPT to place students or to measure their lack of post graduation success.

You stated you worked at a for-profit (while neglecting to name it), that also had career placement, while hinting that they didn’t meet their obligations. Do we consider ourselves leaders? Do we work to correct it or do we wash our hands and walk away? I don’t need a state regulation to tell me how to do the right thing?

UOP grossed over 4 billion dollars last year. In this economy and with the circumstances that many find themselves in, grant money (and loan money, where possible) is being used to support households. This is one reason why students do not graduate–many of them never intended to. Second, the open enrollment allows acceptance of students who do not have the skills to be in college in the first place. Again, another factor in the low percentage of graduates. Finally, the entire curriculum for UOP is available online for a nominal fee on multiple sites. Most of the students who enroll know this. The school is aware of this –yet will not spend the money to re-do the curriculum. Many students sadly enroll thinking that they can cheat their way to a degree. Few accomplish this–but some do. I have no sympathy for the “for-profits”. If they survive, they survive. If they don’t–I could care less. In the case of UOP one of the VPs made over 18 million dollars –while they pay their facilitators pennies and the work is unbelievable (i.e., there is a lot of work).

In the spirit of full disclosure I am a Bryn Mawr graduate. However, my view is not a reflection of that other than the reality that for me my education in an all female institution has been very much empowering and has shaped my life in many ways. Many years ago when working on my doctorate I did some work on women as entrepreneurs and found that in general (and I too have experienced my share of exceptions) women are the kinds of leaders who care. A report today http://www.news.com.au/business/female-bosses-ditch-the-harshness-and-embrace-a-caring-workplace/story-e6frfm1i-1226223480446 confirms this to some degree. It has been observed that firms with more women on the board do better and survived the financial crisis better. There is more evidence than can be cited here. It stands to reason to me that more women in global leadership is an important and necessary goal. I applaud Jane for her leadership in this effort.
Marcia Y. Cantarella, PhD (Bryn Mawr BA ’68) Author, I CAN Finish College: The Overcome Any Obstacle and Get Your Degree Guide

Since 1996, SPHere – Sustainable Peace Here (spherecommunity.org) has been empowering Nepalese women through literacy, women’s groups and micro-enterprise. Tharu women, the indigenous tribals of Nepal’s Terai, were illiterate in 1996; they did not have access to money or economic choice. Today, women in Bachhauli VDC have started their own bank (Pancha Tara) and are providing loans to village men. SPHere’s grassroots women’s empowerment program has been very successful. While many such projects fail, I have developed very clear guidelines for success during my 15 years working in Nepal. Huldah Warren