Coalition Letter To Congress Defending Gainful Employment, Student Loan, Other Protections

We joined The Institute for College Access and Success, the AFL-CIO, Americans for Financial Reform, Consumers Union, Student Veterans of America, Veterans for Common Sense and a total of 53 organizations in a letter to the Congress opposing any effort to delay, roll back, or repeal the Department of Education’s gainful employment rule, ‘borrower defense’ and college accountability rules, or the ban on incentive compensation for encouraging enrollment in for-profit schools.

Excerpt:

As organizations working on behalf of students, consumers, veterans, servicemembers, faculty and staff, civil rights, and college access, we write to convey our strong support for the continued implementation and enforcement of important Education Department accountability provisions designed to protect students and taxpayers from unmanageable student debt and waste, fraud and abuse in higher education. In particular, we oppose all actions to delay, weaken, or repeal the gainful employment, incentive compensation, or recent “borrower defense to repayment” and college accountability regulations. Each of these accountability measures is essential to protecting students and taxpayers from sudden school closures and other misconduct by unscrupulous colleges, and to maintaining the integrity of our federal aid program.

We believe protections for students and taxpayers should be strengthened, not scaled back. Veterans, low-income students and students of color have been disproportionately harmed by predatory colleges. Last month, 16 organizations representing millions of military servicemembers, veterans, survivors, and military families voiced their strong support for these protections and urged Congress to fully uphold them. In addition, 20 state Attorneys General recently wrote Congress expressing concern that rollbacks of recent protections “would again signal ‘open season’ on students for the worst actors among for-profit postsecondary schools.” That is because multiple investigations have revealed that federal taxpayers are subsidizing schools and programs that consistently leave students and veterans with loans they cannot repay and credentials they cannot use. Some schools have gone so far as to recruit people who are homeless, enroll students without their consent, and use tactics that invoke “pain” and “fear” to pressure students into enrolling.