Ballots cast in November will help decide how the federal government confronts the costs of college and what role the private sector plays in higher education.
Universities in Brazil have long been for the privileged few. Only 11% of the population of working age has a degree – and such scarcity has brought rich rewards. Graduates earn, on average, 2.5 times more than those without degrees, and five times as much as the majority who never finish secondary school, reports The Economist.
When a Senate committee led by Democratic U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa concluded its two-year investigation of 30 for-profit colleges in July, it issued a harsh assessment of the companies that run them, citing predatory recruiting practices, harassment of students and poor results.
Not all college educations are created equal. And as long as a university’s prestige has been associated with its exclusivity, the rungs of higher education have been racially stratified. Nowhere is this reality more clear than today, when the for-profit college giant the University of Phoenix, is graduating the most college graduates of color in the nation.
Although private non-profit colleges and universities have a long and distinguished history throughout the world, what has come to be known as ‘for-profit higher education’ is a relative newcomer.
When resources are limited, philanthropy isn't the best practice. Advocating this mantra, the Planning Commission has retained a suggestion to allow higher education institutions to run for profit in the final draft of the 12th Five-Year Plan.
For-profit universities in Brazil are benefiting as rising incomes and greater access to credit boost demand for higher education in Latin America’s largest economy, where fewer than 1 in every 10 Brazilians has a college degree.
The Washington Post Co.’s Kaplan higher-education division will close nine campuses and consolidate four others into existing nearby locations, the company said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The company said it would stop new enrollments at the nine campuses it is closing, but that it would continue teaching the students currently enrolled there.
For-profit colleges collected $32 billion from the federal government in the 2010-11 academic year, but three of those schools will now be cut off from that money.
People who attend private profit-making schools account for 47 percent of all those with a loan in default. Public schools account for 42 percent; private nonprofit, 12 percent. Loans are considered in default when payments are 360 days delinquent.
DeVry Inc.'s CEO Daniel Hamburger said Thursday that he sees better times ahead for the for-profit education company given a recent acquisition, cost-cutting measures and improving enrollment trends at some of its schools.