Mildred Elley, a two-year proprietary college that opened its doors in Albany, N.Y., in 1917, prides itself on helping people get back to work. But Faith A. Takes, the college's owner and president, fears that a new federal proposal that would evaluate for-profit colleges by comparing their students' borrowing to their graduates' earnings will jeopardize her college's high-demand nursing, medical-assisting, and information-technology programs at the very time more adults are turning to the institution for training.
The Albion College Board of Trustees has agreed to reduce its faculty by the equivalent of 15 full-time positions, despite objections from the American Association of University Professors over how the college has handled the move.
PBS broadcast a documentary on for-profit higher education last week, titled College, Inc. It begins with the slightly ridiculous figure of Michael Clifford, a former cocaine abuser turned born-again Christian who never went to college, yet makes a living padding around the lawn of his oceanside home wearing sandals and loose-fitting print shirts, buying up distressed non-profit colleges and turning them into for-profit money machines.
The trustees of financially struggling Lambuth University, in Tennessee, have tentatively approved an investment firm's offer to acquire the private institution, the university has announced.