September/October 2010 Issue

You Know Your College Is Ripping You Off If…

How for-profit schools take students for suckers.

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Read also: The rest of the 2010 MoJo Mini College Guide, plus the 2009 MoJo Mini College Guide.

The for-profit education industry—think University of Phoenix, Corinthian Colleges, and schools owned by Kaplan—is booming. Enrollment at these institutions is growing 5 to 10 times faster than in all of higher ed combined. But with that growth has come an onslaught of criticism (PDF) for hard-sell recruiting tactics (PDF), risky loans, and inflated degrees. Here are three warning signs that your for-profit college may be cheating you out of your money—and an education.

Warning Sign #1: You were recruited at a blackjack table or soup kitchen. For-profit colleges spend huge amounts advertising at bus stops and online, but recruiters also visit (PDF) homeless shelters and casinos, where they often exaggerate their school’s rigorous academics and job-placement success rates.

You know your college is ripping you off if...

Warning Sign #2: You’ll be paying off your student debt well into your golden years. The average debt for a for-profit grad is $32,650, among the highest in all of higher ed. More than 90 percent of for-profit students borrow money, versus 70 percent at private schools and 50 percent at public universities. Several for-profits have been accused (PDF) of saddling (PDF) students with high-interest loans and other onerous terms.

Warning Sign #3: Every time you make a new friend at school, he disappears. Only one-third of for-profit students will have graduated (PDF) six years after they enrolled, compared to 55 percent at public schools and 65 percent at private colleges. Part of the problem is misleading information about a degree’s total cost, or disappointment at the quality of the education received.

Illustration: John Hersey

Also read: The rest of the 2010 MoJo Mini College Guide, plus the 2009 MoJo Mini College Guide.

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This is no time to come up short. It's time to fight like hell, as our namesake would tell us to do, for a democracy where minority rule cannot impose an extreme agenda, where facts matter, and where accountability has a chance at the polls and in the press. If you value our reporting and you can right now, please help us dig out of the $100,000 hole we're starting our new budgeting cycle in with an always-needed and always-appreciated donation today.

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