Colleges in Dire Financial Straits

[polly_mer]

Also from IHE, the University of Arizona has bought for-profit Ashford University:


https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/backlash-begins-against-university-arizonas-acquisition-ashford-university


A lot of anger being expressed over a public institution seeking to turn a predatory for-profit into a cash cow.

Our colleges have to survive somehow.

Some subset of the colleges and universities need to survive.  Arizona as a state has far more seats than than the state needs.

[Wahoo Redux]

Also from IHE, the University of Arizona has bought for-profit Ashford University:


https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/backlash-begins-against-university-arizonas-acquisition-ashford-university


A lot of anger being expressed over a public institution seeking to turn a predatory for-profit into a cash cow.

Our colleges have to survive somehow.

Some subset of the colleges and universities need to survive.  Arizona as a state has far more seats than than the state needs.

Okay.  Fair enough.  Our colleges have to prosper somehow.  Now all those on-line students can get the benefit of a bona fide well-respected university on those unavoidable on-line degrees and UofA can fund all that awesome research and teaching.  Turn that predation legit.

[jimbogumbo]

Also from IHE, the University of Arizona has bought for-profit Ashford University:


https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/backlash-begins-against-university-arizonas-acquisition-ashford-university

Damnit, Purdue pulled this scam first!


A lot of anger being expressed over a public institution seeking to turn a predatory for-profit into a cash cow.

Our colleges have to survive somehow.

Some subset of the colleges and universities need to survive.  Arizona as a state has far more seats than than the state needs.

Okay.  Fair enough.  Our colleges have to prosper somehow.  Now all those on-line students can get the benefit of a bona fide well-respected university on those unavoidable on-line degrees and UofA can fund all that awesome research and teaching.  Turn that predation legit.

[polly_mer]

Also from IHE, the University of Arizona has bought for-profit Ashford University:


https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/backlash-begins-against-university-arizonas-acquisition-ashford-university


A lot of anger being expressed over a public institution seeking to turn a predatory for-profit into a cash cow.

Our colleges have to survive somehow.

Some subset of the colleges and universities need to survive.  Arizona as a state has far more seats than than the state needs.

Okay.  Fair enough.  Our colleges have to prosper somehow.  Now all those on-line students can get the benefit of a bona fide well-respected university on those unavoidable on-line degrees and UofA can fund all that awesome research and teaching.  Turn that predation legit.

Arizona State already has a very good online program.  Southern New Hampshire already has a very good online program that enrolls students in Arizona as do dozens of good state schools.

The time for University of Arizona to get in the online game for the good of Arizona students who needed online was 15 years ago.

[Wahoo Redux]

Also from IHE, the University of Arizona has bought for-profit Ashford University:


https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/backlash-begins-against-university-arizonas-acquisition-ashford-university


A lot of anger being expressed over a public institution seeking to turn a predatory for-profit into a cash cow.

Our colleges have to survive somehow.

Some subset of the colleges and universities need to survive.  Arizona as a state has far more seats than than the state needs.

Okay.  Fair enough.  Our colleges have to prosper somehow.  Now all those on-line students can get the benefit of a bona fide well-respected university on those unavoidable on-line degrees and UofA can fund all that awesome research and teaching.  Turn that predation legit.

Arizona State already has a very good online program.  Southern New Hampshire already has a very good online program that enrolls students in Arizona as do dozens of good state schools.

The time for University of Arizona to get in the online game for the good of Arizona students who needed online was 15 years ago.

I think you should tell them that they missed the boat and they're are not allowed online!   We can only have so many online schools, after all, what with all these masks and everything! ;)

[Aster]

"My diploma mill is better!"

"No, my diploma mill is better!"

"You're all wrong. This diploma mill is better."

[polly_mer]

I think you should tell them that they missed the boat and they're are not allowed online!   We can only have so many online schools, after all, what with all these masks and everything! ;)

If the goal is to save the university, then buying a dud is much less effective than licensing celebrities to give mass lectures with fabulous production values and allow the general public to buy season tickets.

Everyone has online.  Nobody else would have, say,  HIST 105: Penn and Teller Splat Their Way Through History.

[Wahoo Redux]

"My diploma mill is better!"

"No, my diploma mill is better!"

"You're all wrong. This diploma mill is better."

Well...actually yeah.  That pretty much sums it up. 

What do we expect these college presidents and BoTs to do? 

Perhaps, as Polly is so eager to opine, they should begin to cut-back and close down gracefully.

But does that sound like human nature, or something these people want to tell their campuses, or fit with the business model creeping over academia?

How is Purdue Global doing?

B'sides, is there any reason a legitimate university shouldn't offer mass online education?  I keep hearing about how academia should be helping these low-SES students----seems like this is just such an approach---and I keep hearing about how academia should be responsive to students----ditto.  And we need to look at the future of ed, I guess. 

You're right, of course, but it is also true that we as a community simply approach everything with a hefty dose of negativity and wanting-cake-and-eating-it-too.

[kaysixteen]

Obviously I, like many academics of a certain age, have a strong, almost visceral, bias against online ed, esp for-profit diploma mills, of course, but I am wondering, has anyone actually done any systematic research wrt exactly how competent online higher ed education is, esp when such online schools are not for-profit diploma mills?

[polly_mer]

Obviously I, like many academics of a certain age, have a strong, almost visceral, bias against online ed, esp for-profit diploma mills, of course, but I am wondering, has anyone actually done any systematic research wrt exactly how competent online higher ed education is, esp when such online schools are not for-profit diploma mills?

I don't have a study at my fingertips, but the impression from the past ten years is one can do excellent online education in specific fields with sufficient resources.

The sticking point is usually devoting sufficient resources to:

* have course designers work with subject matter experts to design a course that draws on the best activities for online.  This is usually the better part of a year when done right.

* support the professors to allow them to focus on teaching and student interaction instead of the nuts and bolts of uploading material and troubleshooting the website.

* support the students from registration through final exam to help them focus on the material and becoming an independent learner.  The more complicated the typical student's life, the better the baseline process needs to be.  The less prepared the average student is, the higher the bar needs to be for a streamlined process to ensure successful onboarding to the program.  This means a lot of staff in IT, generalized bureaucracy, and the tutoring center.  Putting non-academic student support on individual faculty violates point two.

Excellent online is expensive to run and even more expensive to run when targeting a population that can't go to college full-time residential because of their life circumstances.  Having good national online programs is a better overall plan than supporting half-assed programs if the goal is reaching more people who need online.

[Parasaurolophus]

IHE picked up some local reporting that Carthage College (Kenosha, WI) is in trouble; up to 20% of faculty will lose their jobs. Oddly Carthage's undergraduate FTE enrollment was higher in 2019 than it was pre-2008 recession. Yet it went from positive net revenue of $19 million in FY 2017 to a deficit of $5 million in FY 2018. And it looks like Carthage implemented a tuition reset right before the 2019-20 academic year. Something is very wacky.

https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/2020/07/19/carthage-college-proposal-lay-off-faculty-draws-student-protest/5468267002/ indicates that Carthage College is worried about the demographic cliff and students voting with their feet for pre-professional majors. My bet is that enrollment in expensive-to-deliver majors has increased while enrollment in cheaper majors like philosophy is crashing.

College Scorecard indicates that Carthage currently has 63 fields of study with only 40 having usable data.  Carthage doesn't even have the nursing mentioned in the article, but only has allied health.  The top ten majors by number of graduates includes biology (a liberal arts field) but no humanities.

Combining the information from the article and College Scorecard indicates Carthage is making the first big step to acknowledging they are not in fact a liberal arts college.  Their Carnegie classification does not reflect being a LAC.

Carthage has announched it's getting rid of Classics, Great Ideas, and Philosophy. Some Philosophy courses will be taught out of "another humanities department" (ugh). Biology, English, Modern Languages, Music, Physics & Astronomy, Political Science, Religion, and Sociology & Criminal Justice are safe. (In fairness, their Philosophy program doesn't look great to me, and I'm not surprised their majors/minors are so low. But I guess there's only so much you can do with two faculty.)

All faculty will see their course loads increase by 1 more course a year.


Also from the Q&A, since you mentioned it:

Will Carthage still be a liberal arts institution?

Absolutely. Carthage has always been, is, and will always be a liberal arts institution. We will continue to offer courses and majors across the liberal arts and sciences, and all of our students will continue to fulfill their general education requirements in these liberal arts.

[Wahoo Redux]

Obviously I, like many academics of a certain age, have a strong, almost visceral, bias against online ed, esp for-profit diploma mills, of course, but I am wondering, has anyone actually done any systematic research wrt exactly how competent online higher ed education is, esp when such online schools are not for-profit diploma mills?

I too am of a certain age and reacted with typical negativity to the entire idea of computer-college.  We should expect a learning-curve and bobbles along the way (MOOCs anyone?).  When has anything worked smoothly out of the gate?

I still prefer the classroom experience, but the last 6 months has increased my appreciation for online learning.  We are getting more usable tools, as well as developing online teaching techniques.  At my school, at least, we already have instructor groups which meet regularly to practice the technology, and several of us are spending our own money on supplementary applications.  I suspect we are not alone.

And no matter what, distance ed is here. 

Why is a UofA degree automatically a diploma mill anyway? 

[jimbogumbo]

I messed up a quote function earlier. Sorry.

I have had quite an opportunity (not one I sought) to look at Purdue Global courses. They, as when they were  Kaplan before, are simply not good. Kaplan was IMO predatory, especially in its targeting go young veterans.

Ashford U is no different. Given the Kaplan-Purdue lack of changes, I have no confidence that now that is magically University of Arizona Online it will be transforMed either. Below is a list of issues (okay, copied from Wikipedia) re Ashford.

Lawsuits and controversies
Audits, investigations, and lawsuits (2006-2011)

According to U.S. Senate testimony by Arlie Willems, retired reviewer for the Iowa Department of Education, the Iowa Department of Education denied Ashford University's request in 2006 to offer an online Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) on the grounds that the program "was more a collection of discrete courses than a cohesive program, was understaffed for appropriate interaction with students and supervision of both courses and clinical experiences, including student teaching. Many faculty members lacked appropriate academic background and/or experiences for their assigned responsibilities. The most serious concern noted by the team was the lack of responsibility on the part of the program in providing quality clinical experiences, the aspect of teacher preparation considered the most important by preparation programs in Iowa."[64]

Willems also testified that Ashford entered into partnership with Rio Salado Community College whereas education courses from the Ashford BA in Social Science with a Concentration in Education could apply to Rio Salado's post-baccalaureate teacher education program. Once students have completed the online Ashford BA and the online Rio Salado teacher education program, they are eligible for an Arizona teaching license. Willem's noted that this partnership could be seen as a creative way to solve a problem in order to continue drawing students, or it could be seen as a way to circumvent the accountability system for quality in order to continue collecting tuition from students. An individual who has attained an Arizona license in this way does not automatically receive an Iowa license because Iowa and Arizona do not have a reciprocity agreement.

According to Willems, complaints from Ashford students concerning this agreement and licensure include:
1) Individuals from Iowa and many other states had completed Ashford's online Bachelor of Arts in Social Science with a Concentration in Education. These individuals had been led to believe that, upon completion of this program, they would be eligible for a license in their home state because Ashford has a state-approved teacher education program (the on-ground undergraduate program).
2) Individuals were students or graduates of the Ashford online baccalaureate program, but were not aware of the need to complete the Rio Salado program as well in order to receive an Arizona license. These individuals were not even aware of the Rio Salado partnership.
3) Ashford students were intending to complete student teaching through Rio Salado College and believed they would then automatically be eligible for an Iowa teaching license.
4) Students were completing an online degree through Ashford in early childhood believed that this degree would lead to an Iowa teaching license. It does not.[64]
In May 2008, the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Inspector General (OIG) audit services division commenced a compliance audit of Ashford University covering the period March 10, 2005, through June 30, 2009. The OIG audit reached the following conclusions:

Audit focus[65]   Audit result[66]

Compensation policies and practices relating to enrollment advisers   Rewarded recruiters based on their success in securing enrollments
Calculation, timeliness, and disbursement accuracy of Title IV program funds   Improperly retained at least $1.1 million during the 2006–7 period
Student authorizations to retain credit balances   Kept credit balances without the proper authorization
Maintenance of supporting documentation for a student's leave of absence   Took too long to return money awarded to students who withdrew

The stock of Ashford's parent company, Bridgepoint Education, fell the most in almost five months when the misuse of federal student aid was first publicly disclosed in 2009.[65] When the official results were released in 2011, Senator Tom Harkin said this audit "reveals the same troubling pattern of for-profit colleges' taking advantage of students and taxpayers." The Department of Education has not yet responded to the findings.[66]
The audit was the subject of a U.S. Senate committee hearing on March 10, 2011.[67]

A Bloomberg News report revealed that Ashford was recruiting disabled soldiers at the Wounded Warrior Battalion at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, including a Marine with a traumatic brain injury.[68]

2011 Iowa Attorney General investigation and US Senate hearings

According to a February 15, 2011, filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Ashford University and its parent company, Bridgepoint Education, received a letter from the Iowa Attorney General's office on February 9, 2011, requesting "documents and detailed information" from January 1, 2008, to the present to determine if Ashford's business practices possibly violated the state's Consumer Fraud Act.[69]
On March 10, 2011, Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) chaired a hearing of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee that examined a case study of Ashford's parent company, which has experienced near-exponential profit growth in the last few years despite low graduation rates. Bridgepoint owns two universities that it purchased when both were near bankruptcy, Ashford University in Iowa and the University of the Rockies in Colorado. When it purchased Ashford University in 2005, it had fewer than 300 students but in 2010 it claimed to have over 78,000 students, 99% of which were online.[70][71][72]
Senator Harkin took issue with success of the company saying that while Bridgepoint may have had record profits the students were not succeeding. According to information provided by Senator Harkin in the committee hearing, 63% of students who enrolled at Ashford University during the 2008-2009 school year withdrew before completion of their prospective program. Senator Harkin pointed out that Bridgepoint recorded more than $216 million in profits in 2010; of which 86.5 percent of its revenues come from federal funds. In reference to the dependence of Bridgepoint on public funds, Senator Harkin was quoted as saying, "I think this is a scam, an absolute scam."[71]
Kathleen Tighe, who is an inspector general with the U.S. Department of Education, testified at the hearing that in an audit of Ashford, she discovered Ashford was improperly distributing student aid to students. "Seventy-five percent of the improper disbursements to students in our sample were made to students who never became eligible," Tighe said. Bridgepoint hadn't returned the improperly obtained student aid to the federal government, and said on a recent report she'd seen that Bridgepoint was "sitting on $130 million" in these types of funds.[71]
Due to the ongoing Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA) proceedings, and in order to preserve due process, Ashford's parent company, Bridgepoint Education, chose not to send executives to the HELP committee hearing while engaged in negotiations with FSA.[73] Rather, Bridgepoint published a summary of responses called Bridgepoint Education Transparency.

Audits, investigations, and lawsuits (2011-2019)
Ashford has also been audited for its recruiting and finance practices in a U.S. Department of Education audit. Bridgepoint Education responded in March 2011 with a report asserting that the information used in the Senate hearing was either inaccurate or incomplete.[74]
On December 3, 2014 a suit was filed in Arizona federal court charging that Bridgepoint Education is violating the Telephone Consumer Protection Act by robocalling sales prospects. Similar suits were filed in October in federal court in San Diego and the Northern District of Ohio.[75]
In 2015, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau reported that they were investigating Ashford University related to '"unlawful acts or practices related to the advertising, marketing or origination of private student loans."'[76]
In 2016, Bridgepoint Education received a subpoena from the Securities and Exchange Commission related to the potential joint resolution of investigations by the California Attorney General and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.[77]In 2016, a former senior vice president at Ashford University alleged that Bridgepoint falsified its financial reports by inaccurately projecting the student retention rate.[78] On September 12, 2016, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau fined Bridgepoint Education, the parent company of Ashford University, $31.5 million for deceiving students about the cost of private student loans; $23.5 million is supposed to be for relief and refunds to consumers.[79] In 2016, the Iowa Department of Education notified Ashford that it would discontinue approval for GI Bill benefits after June 30.[80]
In September 2017 the Department of Veterans Affairs accepted the shift in its state-based eligibility for veterans' benefits from Iowa to Arizona, but also stated in a letter that the VA has independent regulatory authority aside from the Arizona State Approving Agency.[25][81][26] In September 2017, the VA gave Ashford approval to enroll GI Bill students indefinitely.[82] Ashford University and its parent company Bridgepoint Education were the subject of an investigation published in The Chronicle of Higher Education. The article included information about Bridgepoint's political moves with Arizona politicians in order to maintain GI Bill funding. [83] In November 2017, the California Attorney General brought a lawsuit against Ashford and its parent company Bridgepoint for engaging in "unlawful marketing, sales and debt collection practices".[84]
In March 2019, Bridgepoint Education reported that it had made unreliable statements about its earnings and losses. [85]The company estimated an operating loss of $13.6-$14 million loss for the quarter ending in December 2018. [86]Ashford University was featured in an NBC News Investigates piece that aired April 14, 2019. One recruiter, Eric Dean alleged that Ashford was targeting veterans with PTSD. [35]

[Wahoo Redux]

You know, I don't think that there's any argument that, for the most part, these proprietary online schools have been a sham.  But they serve a specific demographic which we all understand.  Why not have this demographic served by us?

I did the Wiki on Purdue Global.  The jury is out, and all of the criticism was leveled before Purdue really had a chance to shape the program----people simply assumed it would be a disaster.  I do not know enough to prognosticate, but we need to give these universities time to transform these awful programs.

There is just something about the way we think of education in our culture.

[jimbogumbo]

You know, I don't think that there's any argument that, for the most part, these proprietary online schools have been a sham.  But they serve a specific demographic which we all understand.  Why not have this demographic served by us?

I did the Wiki on Purdue Global.  The jury is out, and all of the criticism was leveled before Purdue really had a chance to shape the program----people simply assumed it would be a disaster.  I do not know enough to prognosticate, but we need to give these universities time to transform these awful programs.

There is just something about the way we think of education in our culture.

I can state with 100% certainty that Purdue is not shaping anything about Purdue Global. I'm happy to have a private conversation.