Students aren’t the only ones benefiting from the billions of new dollars Washington is spending on college aid for the poor.
An Associated Press analysis shows surging proportions of both low-income students and the recently boosted government money that follows them are ending up at for-profit schools, from local career colleges to giant publicly traded chains such as the University of Phoenix, Kaplan and Devry.
Last year, the five institutions that received the most federal Pell Grant dollars were all for-profit colleges, collecting over $1 billion among them. That was two and a half times what those schools hauled in just two years prior, the AP found, analyzing Department of Education data on disbursements from the Pell program, Washington’s main form of college aid to the poor.
This year, the trend is accelerating: In the first quarter after the maximum Pell Grant was increased last July 1, Washington paid out 45 percent more through the program than during the same period a year ago, the AP found. But the amount of dollars heading to for-profit, or “proprietary,” schools is up even more about 67 percent.
For-profit colleges say the country has little choice but to accept their help to achieve President Obama’s goal of getting every American to enroll in some form of education beyond high school. The for-profit schools have space while community colleges are bursting at the seams. Besides, their convenience and career-focused curriculum are clearly winning customers, who are free to use their aid where they choose.
But critics say the increased federal aid has unleashed a new gold rush. They complain the industry has too many incentives simply to enroll students and tap the spigot from Washington and not enough to make sure students succeed.
The industry is “an aggressive sales operation that has a voracious appetite for recruiting the poorest students,” said Barmak Nassirian, associate executive director of AACRAO, a group representing admissions officers and registrars at traditional colleges. “The victims here are the students themselves and the taxpayers, who have to pick up the tab.”
