This morning, the Obama Administration released its new proposed “gainful employment” rule, aimed at ending taxpayer support for college programs that claim to train people for careers as medical assistants, air conditioner repair technicians, or software coders, but instead consistently leave their former  students with shaky job prospects and insurmountable debt. Most of the big
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The Wall Street Journal’s Kimberley Strassel either has no understanding of campaign finance, or is willfully misleading her readers. In either case, her column today about the Koch brothers’ political spending — which parrots a meme that has bounced around conservative blogs and websites like a bad chain e-mail — gets the facts about Koch
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Former U.S. senator Bob Kerrey (D-Nebraska) will give keynote remarks at this spring’s annual convention of the for-profit college trade association, APSCU, in Las Vegas. It’s not really a surprise, since Kerrey recently co-authored a Wall Street Journal op-ed arguing against new federal rules to hold the troubled for-profit college industry accountable. But it’s a shame.
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“The air is fresher outside of Washington,” said Zach Wamp, a Republican politician after he left his seat in Congress. Wamp told reporters that he would not pursue a career in lobbying. Instead, he founded a firm that he said would focus on “business development” in Chattanooga, Tennessee. But like many other former officials, leaving
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As 4-methylcyclohexane methanol (MCHM), a coal-processing chemical, leaked into the Elk River in West Virginia last month, the health effects of the substance were not, and are still not, clear. Both federal and state officials know little about the chemical, even though it has been in use for decades. And if Eastman Chemical Company, the
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Last August, a Minnesota jury awarded Heidi Weber, a former dean at for-profit Globe University, $395,000 in damages against the school. Weber alleged that she was fired for complaining that Globe used false job placement statistics and engaged in other misconduct to recruit students. On Tuesday, the trial judge in the case rejected Globe’s motion
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A year ago, if you were Jack Massimino, CEO of  Corinthian Colleges, you might have been feeling pretty good.  Despite extensive evidence from congressional and media investigations that Corinthian, along with other big for-profit colleges, has been abusing students — luring them with deceptive recruiting, offering high-priced, low quality programs, and often leaving them without
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Developments are happening at lightning speed on for-profit college issues. This morning: 1. The Department of Veterans affairs launched a new website, the GI Bill Comparison Tool, allowing vets, and to some extent other students, to compare college options. The initiative is part of action on President Obama’s 2012 executive order to protect vets and current service
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