Many of us have encountered the proverbial shady salesman at one point in our lives.
The one who will mislead you into thinking that investing in his “multi-level marketing” plan will conjure money out of thin air with little effort.
Many who buy into this pie in the sky delusion are left feeling cheated and financially ruined.
We all know these manipulative types are out there, but what we may not realize is that we are constantly exposed to advertising from an industry that employs many of the same deceptive techniques to drive sales: for-profit colleges.
Companies like ITT Technical Services, Devry Education Group and Apollo Education Group have enticed low income students with promises of an expanse of career options and high-paying jobs.
More often than not, these are either extremely misleading or entirely untrue.
If the legal history of the for-profit college industry is any indicator, maybe it’s time for more oversight.
On April 4, it was reported that Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey filed a lawsuit against ITT Tech, a leading for-profit college.
The lawsuit alleges that the company, which operates more or less like any business, provided false statistics regarding job placement rates among graduates of its Computer Network Systems program.
ITT Tech claimed that between 80 and 100 percent of the program’s graduates earned jobs, but the firm did not disclose the misleading criteria it used in its calculation.
It considered anyone earning a job remotely related to computers a successful hire.
The real number was determined to be closer to 50 percent.
Some careers included department store sales associate and customer service associate.
Graduates should consider applying for jobs in the corporations that have educated them, where CEOs and other upper-level executives earn seven-figure salaries.
Corinthian College has also faced more than its fair share of legal proceedings and investigations.
In 2015, campuses were shut down following a $30 million fine from the U.S. Department of Education for providing fraudulent statistics, as well as displaying a “blatant disregard for the federal student aid program,” according to Huffington Post.
These firms’ exploitation of those in search of an education and a better life is disheartening.
Even more, many of those who attend these institutions typically do so out of a lack of other options.
Despite accounting for only 13 percent of federal student loans, students at for-profit colleges are victim to nearly half of all defaults.
The predatory nature of the system should be clear by now.
As light is shed on the unsavory tactics of these pseudo-universities, students and governments are becoming more keen to their tactics.
This issue is systemic and must be dealt with now. For-profit colleges, you’ve flunked out.
dkilcull@indiana.edu
