When For-Profits Target Low-Income Students
Arnold L. Mitchem,
Forbes
10.26.10
http://www.forbes.com/2010/10/26/for-profit-education-low-income-diversity-lifestyle-mitchem.html

. . .

Here are the facts: Low-income Americans are
disproportionately represented at for-profit
institutions. This class (and sometimes racial and
ethnic) stratification is troubling for two reasons.
First, there is little evidence that this stratification
is the result of the informed choice of students or
their families. Second, in far too many cases, students
who enroll in programs at proprietary institutions do
not improve their life chances or increase their social
mobility. In actuality, these students graduate at very
low rates and with few or no viable employment options.

. . .

The sophisticated marketing and recruiting techniques of
many for-profit institutions thereby take on a predatory
nature, similar to what we have seen in the subprime
mortgage crisis in the mortgage industry. These high-
pressure transactions, in which institutions promise
quick degrees and jobs in exchange for high tuition, are
deeply dishonorable because there is an inherent
inequity in the relationship between the low-income
consumer and the industry. Students often have no
knowledge of comparable programs offered by public
colleges in their communities at lower cost so they are
unable to judge the true value of the for-profit
certificate or degree program.

As troubling as such an unequal relationship between
buyer and seller may be, it might be justified if the
seller's product offered the promised outcome. But in
too many cases, students leave for-profit institutions
in worse circumstances than they were before they
enrolled.

. . .

But policymakers must also address the larger questions
of access and equity that the well-publicized cases of
unsavory practices illuminate. If the playing field is
to be truly leveled, low-income students must have
access to the full range of postsecondary institutions--
not just the ones that are savvy enough to get their
recruiting information into students' hands. Ensuring
college opportunity for all requires that the nation
make a substantial investment in pre-college counseling
and advising for low-income, first-generation students
and their families--a much larger effort than we have
undertaken to date.

Arnold Mitchem is president of the Council for
Opportunity in Education, the only national organization
dedicated to furthering the expansion of postsecondary
opportunities for low-income and first-generation
students.

[moderator: for the entire article
http://www.forbes.com/2010/10/26/for-profit-education-low-income-diversity-lifestyle-mitchem.html]

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