CP Stands Up For Students’ Rights at Dept of Ed Hearing

Yesterday, I testified at the public meeting held by the Department of Education regarding the implementation of a regulatory definition of gainful employment. The public meeting was one of several opportunities for public input on this issue. The Department is in the midst of a year long process to explore and strengthen integrity in academic programs that receive student aid. The gainful employment definition is just one of the areas about which the Department is issuing regulations, but  it has garnered the most controversy and was the subject of this week’s public meetings.

I spoke yesterday as a student’s advocate and as a member of the committee that was charged with helping the Department define gainful employment. My goal yesterday was to hammer home a message that is, unfortunately, faint amongst the roar of lobbyist and PR professionals that the for-profit associations have hired. I spoke in collaboration with student advocates Rich Williams and Getachew Kassa of US PIRG and the United States Student Association. Our message was that the Department of Education is right to issue the gainful employment regulation that will:

1. Increase access to quality, affordable higher education for all and protect vulnerable students and taxpayers by uplifting good programs and encouraging poor performing programs to make adjustments to serve students better.
2. Not single out any one sector and instead apply to all sectors, consistent with the statute.
3. Ensure students are prepared for in-demand jobs and able to repay their loans and ending recruitment practices that promise high paying job for yield insurmountable debt.
4. The majority of the other speakers at the public meetings own, work for,  or were hired to represent  for profit schools and did not share our perspective. The executives of these for-profit schools, who fear their programs of high cost, low quality education will be compromised bythe Department’s efforts, strongly oppose these regulations and are putting large resources toward trying to stop them.

The aggressive lobbying against the regulations make public meetings like the ones convened this week so important. I applaud the Department of Education for taking so much time to ensure that all voices are heard on this issue. I hope the Deaprtment will continue to move forward to establish effective regulations on these programs to prevent waste and abuse of student aid dollars and to ensure that students receive training that will help them further their careers.

Angela is the policy and advocacy manager for Campus Progress. She graduated from Western Michigan University.

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