Privatized "College" for the Poor at Public Expense: How Outrageous Can It Get

The execs of the for-profit college scam are scurrying around like fat cockroaches as the light bulb in Washington finally is turned on the feeding frenzy that W. unleashed during his reign of corporate terror.  Though these diploma mills enroll only 10 percent of the student population, they drain off 25 percent of the Pell Grant dollars from the federal treasury, most of which are never repaid by poor students without chance in hell of getting a decent job with the worthless degrees that the for-profit charlatans offer.  From the LA Times:

Overall, the repayment rates at these for-profit schools was only 36% in fiscal 2009, according to an analysis of the data conducted by the Institute for College Access and Success, a student-advocacy group.

By comparison, the repayment rate at private nonprofit schools was 56%, the group found. At public state colleges and universities, the rate was 54%.

Losing federal aid would effectively put many programs out of business: Some for-profit colleges rely on such funding for nearly 90% of their revenue — the maximum percentage allowed by the federal government.

Although just 10% of college students attend for-profit schools, the schools collect nearly 25% of the $24 billion the government allocates each year to fund Pell grants and Stafford loans.

And here are some other interesting facts regarding the exploitation of the poor from a report (pdf) in May 2010 by the Project on Student Debt:

• Almost one in four (24%) of all 2008 graduates from for-profit four-year colleges owed at least $40,000 in student loans, compared to just 6% of graduates from public four-year colleges and 15% from private nonprofit four-year colleges.

• Pell Grant recipients who graduate from four-year colleges are more likely to have high debt if they attended a for-profit college. Among graduating seniors, 23% of Pell Grant recipients from for-profit colleges carried at least $40,000 in student loans, compared to 14% at all other colleges.  

• The proportion of for-profit graduates with high debt is similar for all racial and ethnic groups (21-24%).

• Students who attend for-profit four-year colleges are more than twice as likely to default on their federal student loans as those from other four-year colleges. . . .