Education Secretary Dumps Discredited Accreditor
U.S. Secretary of Education John King today took the final step in the government de-recognizing the troubled Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools (ACICS). King concluded that ACICS has “exhibited a profound lack of compliance” with its responsibilities as an accreditor. King’s decision means that colleges accredited by ACICS will have to find new accreditors if they
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Department of Education Requires 25% Letter of Credit to Approve University of Phoenix Owner Change
The U.S. Department of Education today approved the application of the Apollo Education Group, owner of the University of Phoenix, to convert from being a publicly-traded company to one owned by private equity firms and still keep its eligibility for federal student grants and loans. But in a letter, the Department, expressly citing the multiple
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McCain Slams Pentagon for Protecting Troops from For-Profit College Abuses
Senate Armed Services Committee chairman John McCain (R-AZ) held a hearing last week for the express purpose of attacking the Defense Department’s 2015 decision to temporarily ban the for-profit University of Phoenix from recruiting U.S. military service members. Even though the Pentagon’s action was based on significant evidence that the University of Phoenix had engaged in
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Corinthian Colleges Files Show Big Fees to Google, BET, Lead Generators
As eight years of zigzagging but ultimately valiant efforts by the Obama administration to protect students and taxpayers from predatory for-profit colleges comes to a close, new documents, released to us under the Freedom of Information Act, shed light on a key chapter in that saga: The 2015 demise of one of the most abusive
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Judge’s Radical Exxon Ruling Could Turn The Legal System Upside Down
A Texas federal judge’s recent order — that the attorneys general of Massachusetts and New York must submit to questioning by lawyers for ExxonMobil about why they are investigating the company — is highly unusual and unwarranted, as is the underlying lawsuit brought by ExxonMobil against the prosecutors. If upheld, this approach could turn the
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8 New Reasons The Electoral College Shouldn’t Vote for Trump
Soon after the election, I was one of those arguing that Republican electors should vote for someone other than Donald Trump when the electoral college convenes on December 19. My contention was simply that Trump is fundamentally unfit to be president. Many Republicans declared Trump unfit during the 2016 campaign, and Trump has a disturbing record of bigotry, misogyny and
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Rumored Trump Education Pick Michelle Rhee Praised Predatory College Group
Former District of Columbia public schools chancellor Michelle Rhee is on the rumor list for Donald Trump’s Secretary of Education. (Fellow insistent public school “reformer” Eva Moscowitz apparently doesn’t want the job.) Rhee’s record as chancellor, pushing public charter schools and private school vouchers, and aggressively fighting against the D.C. teachers’ union, brought her to national
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Trump Testimony in the Trump University Case: Live or Tape?
Federal trial judge Gonzalo Curiel has set November 28 as the trial date for a lawsuit in which former students allege they were defrauded by Trump University. But over the weekend, lawyers for Trump filed papers asking Curiel to delay the trial, to be held in San Diego, until after January 20, when Donald Trump,
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