The Profits of Failure: For-Profit Colleges and the Closing of the Conservative Mind

Most of us know little about for-profit colleges in part because theyre widely viewed as the second-class citizens of higher education. Parents dream of sending their kids to an Ivy League school a flagship research university their alma mater or a regional NCAA powerhouse but not of sending their children to a for-profit college. Thats a mistaken bias. Each year good for-profit colleges train thousands to work as medical assistants business administrators RNs cosmetologists-jobs that can change their lives. Bad for-profit colleges however leave many thousands of students in debt and jobless. The federal government heavily subsidizes for-profit colleges so regulation could determine the fate of billions of taxpayer dollars and is therefore of interest to all of us-were helping fund those colleges including the disreputable ones. Typically the students who attend for-profit colleges are among Americas most vulnerable: single moms disadvantaged adults veterans minority students and mid-career employees looking to better their lives. The worst scandal in higher education is the subpar training that so many of them receive at inadequate for-profit institutions. The 2019 college-admissions bribery scandal pales beside the injustices that countless adults suffer at the hands of low-performing and predatory schools. In 2019 three such college chains closed a total of eighty campuses midsemester stranding 32000 students just partway through their courses. After years of sacrifice and hard work they faced trying to complete their degrees at other institutions-if they could find any that would accept their credits-or canceling their federal loans and starting their career education all over again. Since 2016 nearly 300000 students have filed to have their loans forgiven alleging that their for-profit colleges defrauded them. What could our government do to limit such abuses? The Profits of Failure offers a definitive answer.