Former AG official: Abuses in for-profit education 'egregious'
Flickr photo by Ryan J. ReillyU.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-IowaIn the first of several planned Senate hearings investigating the for-profit education industry last week, a former supervising deputy attorney general testified that, based on her experience in California, consumer abuses in proprietary schools are among the most egregious in any industry and will require "stronger, tougher regulations than the Department of Education has yet proposed."
Witnesses at last week's three-hour hearing by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions were overwhelmingly critical of the for-profit education sector.
Committee chairman Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, led the charge, issuing a report saying the industry begs for oversight because taxpayers are investing billions of dollars in the colleges while student debt and default rates at these schools are disproportionally higher than at nonprofit and public universities.
For-profit schools enrolled more than 1.8 million students in 2008, less than 10 percent of all