College Chain In Kentucky Accused Of Cheating Students Out Of Financial Aid (995 hits)
Here we go again with another SCANDAL! Rememeber when former NY Attorney Gen Andrew Coumo broke the news back in 2007 that revealed widespread unethical relationships between schools and lenders, with colleges and universities accepting gifts and other inducements from loan companies. ... http://www.newamerica.net/blog/higher-ed-w...
Now the Kentucky Attorney General filed suit Wednesday against a chain of for-profit colleges in the state, claiming that administrators at Daymar Colleges have consistently deceived students by making false promises about the ability to transfer course credits and have forced them to purchase textbooks and supplies at substantially marked-up rates.
Attorney General Jack Conway (D), who is leading a multi-state investigation into for-profit colleges with top prosecutors from 18 other states, alleged that Daymar Colleges violated state consumer protection laws by engaging in “unfair, false, misleading and deceptive acts and practices” involving financial aid and recruitment of students. The suit seeks damages and restitution for approximately 5,000 students who were allegedly swindled by the schools.
The for-profit college industry, which has tripled in size over the past decade, is facing increased scrutiny on a national scale as evidence mounts that some schools are aggressively recruiting unsuspecting students and capturing disproportionate shares of federal student aid dollars as revenues. Many students leave the schools with unmanageable debts and little in the way of job prospects, leading to a high rate of federal student loan defaults.
Although Conway has been conferring with other state attorneys general from around the country, the case against Daymar Colleges is confined to Kentucky. Daymar operates 16 campuses in Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana, along with an online program. The schools have among the highest student loan default rates in the state, with nearly 37 percent of students at one of the Daymar schools defaulting on loans within three years of leaving the institution, according to data from the Department of Education.
In addition to the multi-state probe into for-profit colleges, Conway’s office in Kentucky is investigating six other colleges in the state over potential misrepresentations about job placement and misleading recruiting tactics that violate state consumer protection laws. “We need to make sure that these institutions … are just as interested in taking care of students and finding them a job and educating them as they are in getting their hands on public taxpayer money via student loans,” Conway said.
