Recently, for-profit school admissions have skyrocketed. For-profit schools are definitely a good option for some people, but they have their pros and cons. One problem is that credits likely won't transfer, so if you aren't in it for the long haul, and don't get all the way through your education, you're likely to have wasted your time. Without a certificate or degree to show for it, your credits are useless to you.
Another problem is that these schools are wonderful about helping people find financial aid. Now, this doesn't sound like an issue until you're unable to pay back the loans--either because the economy's got you down regardless of your new credential or because you didn't finish your program and thus have no new job prospects.
High school graduates--or even dropouts--from Houston's lower-income high schools, including Jones, Furr, Chavez, and others, are examples of the common demographic that these colleges recruit, and knowing the dangers as well as the advantages of these sorts of schools is extremely important.
However, now the college are recruiting a new group: homeless people and those in halfway houses. These students were given a hard sell, and walked through the application process.
All this is wonderful, except that many of these students are saddled with debt they can't repay. Financial aid is easy to come by, but it's taxpayers that end up footing most of the bill, and Houstonians are no exception. Even without state taxes, we pay our share of financial aid debt that's defaulted upon.
Comments
Where is your source for this information? To throw out a statistic like 5% of UOP's students are homeless without providing your source is irresponsible journalism. Your information about credits not transferring is also not correct. As long as the school is regionally accredited the credits taken there will transfer to any other regionally accredited school. I don't know what qualifications you have to write this article, but this is a very poorly written article full of inaccuracies.
I am interested in knowing which for profit schools are you specifically referring to? Is it just UOP? I read your link to the Business Week article, and I am not so sure it is saying what you perceive it to be saying.
"High school graduates--or even dropouts--from Houston's lower-income high schools, including Jones, Furr, Chavez, and others, are examples of the common demographic that these colleges recruit, and knowing the dangers as well as the advantages of these sorts of schools is extremely important."
Thank you for this stereotypical statement...This could easily offend anyone who from a lower-income bracket and have been to these schools. There are many people who are from a lower-income bracket and have graduated from these high schools(Jones, Furr, Chavez) that have been successful at many reputable colleges.
Wow I would think that a graduate from such a prestigious University such as Rice would at least read the article they where going to write about. I found the stats you so graciously decide to pull from the original article.
"The privately held Drake College of Business, which trains people to be medical and dental assistants, relied on taxpayers for 87% of its revenue in 2007. Almost 5 % of the student body at its Newark (N.J.) branch is homeless, says Jean Aoun, director of admissions and student services there. Late in 2008, it began offering a $350 biweekly stipend to students who show up for 80% of classes and maintain a "C" average."( Business week magazine article April 30, 2010)
Wow. What crack journalism! Is it possible for you to butcher the facts and details of another article, plagiarized none the less, and reprint it here with any more inaccuracies? Amazing. If you do not graduate from Rice, you are obviously not smart enough to write an article like this (sarcasm).
Even University of Phoenix teaches about 1) plagiarism and 2) sourced statistics. Did you even look anywhere other than the BizWeek article you ripped off for some information? If you turned this in as an assignment in one of those "online college" journalism classes you'd probably get an F and dismissed from the class.
Thank you all for the feedback.
Paula: the stats came from the articles to which I linked, and my information about credits not transferring comes directly from places like ITT Tech's commercials ("credits earned are unlikely to transfer" is the direct quote.)
To those who feel I plagiarized--I don't claim all original content! A blog is an aggregate of other content, and I see nothing wrong with pulling statistics from an article to which I have linked.
Ray: Everest College is one that was mentioned in several articles.
Carmen: I certainly meant no disrespect--clearly, there are many successful graduates of these schools. I merely meant that students who go to schools that are statistically high in economically disadvantaged students are often more likely to be targeted. I meant nothing about intelligence or potential to succeed, and I don't feel I said anything about those things, either.
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