AMERICAN EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH ASSOCIATION, INC. et al v. PUBLIC.RESOURCE.ORG, INC.

Filing 70

LARGE ADDITIONAL ATTACHMENT(S) Index of Consolidated Exhibits In Support of Public.Resource.Org's Motion for Summary Judgment and Opposition to Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment and Permanent Injunction by PUBLIC.RESOURCE.ORG, INC. #69 MOTION for Summary Judgment and Opposition to Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment and Permanent Injunction filed by PUBLIC.RESOURCE.ORG, INC.. (Attachments: #1 Exhibit 1, #2 Exhibit 2 [Sealed], #3 Exhibit 3 [Sealed], #4 Exhibit 4 [Sealed], #5 Exhibit 5 [Sealed], #6 Exhibit 6 [Sealed], #7 Exhibit 7, #8 Exhibit 8 [Sealed], #9 Exhibit 9, #10 Exhibit 10, #11 Exhibit 11 [Sealed], #12 Exhibit 12 [Sealed], #13 Exhibit 13 [Sealed], #14 Exhibit 14 [Sealed], #15 Exhibit 15 [Sealed], #16 Exhibit 17 [Sealed], #17 Exhibit 18 [Sealed], #18 Exhibit 19 [Sealed], #19 Exhibit 20 [Sealed], #20 Exhibit 21 [Sealed], #21 Exhibit 22 [Sealed], #22 Exhibit 23 [Sealed], #23 Exhibit 24 [Sealed], #24 Exhibit 25 [Sealed], #25 Exhibit 26 [Sealed], #26 Exhibit 27 [Sealed], #27 Exhibit 28 [Sealed], #28 Exhibit 29 [Sealed], #29 Exhibit 30 [Sealed], #30 Exhibit 31, #31 Exhibit 32 [Sealed], #32 Exhibit 33 [Sealed], #33 Exhibit 34 [Sealed], #34 Exhibit 35, #35 Exhibit 36, #36 Exhibit 37, #37 Exhibit 38 [Sealed], #38 Exhibit 39, #39 Exhibit 40, #40 Exhibit 41 [Sealed], #41 Exhibit 42 [Sealed], #42 Exhibit 43 [Sealed], #43 Exhibit 44, #44 Exhibit 45, #45 Exhibit 46, #46 Exhibit 47, #47 Exhibit 48, #48 Exhibit 49, #49 Exhibit 50 [Sealed], #50 Exhibit 51, #51 Exhibit 52, #52 Exhibit 53, #53 Exhibit 54, #54 Exhibit 55, #55 Exhibit 56, #56 Exhibit 57, #57 Exhibit 58, #58 Exhibit 59, #59 Exhibit 60, #60 Exhibit 61, #61 Exhibit 62, #62 Exhibit 63, #63 Exhibit 64 [Sealed], #64 Exhibit 65, #65 Exhibit 66, #66 Exhibit 67, #67 Exhibit 68, #68 Exhibit 69, #69 Exhibit 70, #70 Exhibit 71, #71 Exhibit 72, #72 Exhibit 73, #73 Exhibit 74)(Bridges, Andrew)

EXHIBIT 69

Executive Summary
• A 2-year investigation by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
demonstrated that Federal taxpayers are investing billions of dollars a year, $32 billion in the most
recent year, in companies that operate for-profit colleges. Yet, more than half of the students who
enrolled in in those colleges in 2008-9 left without a degree or diploma within a median of 4 months.

•

For-profit colleges are owned and operated by businesses. Like any business, they are ultimately
accountable by law for the returns they produce for shareholders. While small independent for-profit
colleges have a long history, by 2009, at least 76 percent of students attending for-profit colleges were
enrolled in a college owned by either a company traded on a major stock exchange or a college owned
by a private equity firm. The financial performance of these companies is closely tracked by analysts
and by investors.

• Congress has failed to counterbalance investor demands for increased financial returns with
requirements that hold companies accountable to taxpayers for providing quality education, support, and
outcomes. Federal law and regulations currently do not align the incentives of for-profit colleges so that
the colleges succeed financially when students succeed.

• For-profit colleges have an important role to play in higher education. The existing capacity of nonprofit and public higher education is insufficient to satisfy the growing demand for higher education,
particularly in an era of drastic cutbacks in State funding for higher education. Meanwhile, there has
been an enormous growth in non-traditional students-those who either delayed college, attend parttime or work full-time while enrolled, are independent of their parents, or have dependents other than a
spouse. This trend has created a "new American majority" of non-traditional students.

• In theory, for-profit colleges should be well-equipped to meet the needs of non-traditional students .
They offer the convenience of nearby campus and online locations, a structured approach to coursework
and the flexibility to stop and start classes quickly and easily. These innovations have made attending
college a viable option for many working adults, and have proven successful for hundreds of thousands
of people who might not otherwise have obtained degrees.

•

But for-profit colleges also ask students with modest financial resources to take a big risk by enrolling
in high-tuition schools. As a result of high tuition, students must take on significant student loan debt to
attend school. When students withdraw, as hundreds of thousands do each year, they are left with high
monthly payments but without a commensurate increase in earning power from new training and skills.

• Many for-profit colleges fail to make the necessary investments in student support services that have
been shown to help students succeed in school and afterwards, a deficiency that undoubtedly contributes
to high withdrawal rates. In 2010, the for-profit colleges examined employed 35,202 recruiters
compared with 3,512 career servic,es staff and 12,452 support services staff, more than two and a half
recruiters for each support services employee.

• This may help to explain why more than half a million students who enrolled in 2008-9 left without
a degree or Certificate by mid-2010. Among 2-year Associate degree-seekers, 63 percent of students
departed without a degree.

•

The vast majority of the students left with student loan debt that may follow them throughout
their lives, and can create a financial burden that is extremely difficult, and sometimes
impossible, to escape.
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• During the same period, the companies examined spent $4.2 billion on marketing and recruiting, or
22. 7 percent of all revenue. Publicly traded companies operating for-profit colleges had an average
profit margin of 19. 7 percent, generated a total of $3 .2 billion in pre-tax profit and paid an average of
$7.3 million to their chief executive officers in 2009.

•

In the absence of significant reforms that align the incentives of for-profit colleges to ensure colleges
succeed financially only when students also succeed, and ensure that taxpayer dollars are used
to further the educational mission of the colleges, the sector will continue to turn out hundreds
of thousands of students with debt but no degree, and taxpayers will see little return on their
investment.

The Federal Investment and the Changing Sector

•

In the 1990s, two-thirds of for-profit colleges enrolled students in training programs lasting less than
1 year. The sector was primarily composed of small trade schools that awarded Certificates and
diplomas in fields like air-conditioning repair, cosmetology, and truck driving. While Certificate and
diploma offerings have continued to grow, growth in degree programs has been more significant.
Between 2004 and 2010, the number of Associate degrees awarded by for-profit colleges increased
77 percent and the number of Bachelor's degrees awarded increased 136 percent.

• For profit colleges are rapidly increasing their reliance on taxpayer dollars. In 2009-10, the sector
received $32 billion, 25 percent of the total Department of Education student aid program funds.

• Pell grants :flowing to for-profit colleges increased at twice the rate of the program as a whole,
increasing from $1.1 billion in the 2000-1 school year to $7 .5 billion in the 2009-10 school year.

• Among the companies examined by the committee, the share of revenues received from Department
of Education Federal student aid programs increased more than 10 percent, from 68.7 in 2006 to 79.2
percent in 2010.

• Committee staff estimates that in 2009 when all sources of Federal taxpayer funds, including
military and veterans' benefits, are included, the
15 publicly traded for-profit education companies
received 86 percent of revenues from taxpayers.
•

For-profit colleges also receive the largest share
of military educational benefit programs: 37
percent of post-9/11 GI bill benefits and 50
percent of Department of Defense T\lition
Assistance benefits flowed to for-profit colleges
in the most recent period. Because of the cost
of the programs however, they trained far fewer
students than public colleges. Eight of the top
10 recipients of Department of Veterans Affairs
post-9111 GI bill funds are for-profit education
companies.

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Revenue Collected by 15 Publicly Traded For-Profit

111 Federal Dollars

!i1l State Aid Dollars

I

Why Are Companies that Own For-Profit Colleges Financially Successful
High Cost ofPrograms:
•

Most for-profit colleges charge higher tuition than comparable programs at community colleges and
flagship State public universities.
o
o

•

Associate degree programs averaged four times the cost of degree programs at comparable
community colleges.

o
•

Bachelor's degree programs averaged 20 percent more than the cost of analogous programs at
flagship public universities.

Certificate programs similarly averaged four and a half times the cost of such programs at
comparable community colleges.

The for-profit education companies examined
rarely set tuition below available Federal
student aid.
Internal company documents provide
examples of tuition increases being
implemented to satisfy company profit
goals, that have little connection to increases
in academic and instruction expenses,
and demonstrate that for-profit education
companies sometimes train employees to
evade directly answering student questions
about the cost of tuition and fees.

Average Tuition and Fees at For-Profit and
Public Colleges
$62, 102

$70,000 1
$60,000

~I

$50,000
$34,988

$40,000
$30,000
$20,000
$10,000

I

$0 ~-Average Certificate Average Associate Average Bachelor's
Program
Degree
Degree

I

•For-Profit Colleges

1&

Public Colleges

• Aggressive and Sometimes Misleading and Deceptive Recruiting Practices:

• Documents indicate that the recruiting process at for-profit education companies is essentially a
sales process. Investors' demand for.revenue growth is satisfied by enrolling a steady stream of new
student enrollees or "starts." During the period examined, at many companies the performance of
each person in the admissions chain, from CEO to newly-hired junior recruiters, was rated at least in
part based on the number of students enrolled.

• The committee found that the 30 for-profit education companies examined employed 35,202
recruiters, or about one recruiter for every 53 students attending a for-profit college in 2010.

• Documents demonstrate that in order to achieve company enrollment goals, recruiting managers
at some companies created a boiler-room atmosphere, in which hitting an enrollment quota was
the recruiters' highest priority. Recruiters who failed to bring in enough students were put through
disciplinary processes and sometimes terminated. Before a ban on incentive compensation was reinstituted in mid-2011, recruiters' salaries at many for-profit colleges were tightly tied to enrolling a
certain number of new students.

• Internal documents, interviews with former employees, and Government Accountability Office
(GAO) undercover recordings demonstrate that many companies used tactics that misled prospective
students with regard to the cost of th~ program, the availability and obligations of Federal aid, the
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time to complete the program, the completion rates of other students, the job placement rate of other
students, the transferability of the credit, or the reputation and accreditation of the school.

• For-profit colleges seek to enroll a population of non-traditional prospective students who are often
not familiar with traditional higher education and may be facing difficult circumstances in their lives.
Recruiting materials indicate that at some for-profit colleges, admission representatives were trained
to locate and push on the pain in students' lives. They were also trained to "overcome objections"
of prospective students in order to secure enrollments. Additionally, companies trained recruiters to
create a false sense of urgency to enroll and inflate the prestige of the college.

• For-profit colleges gather contact information of prospective students, or "leads," by paying thirdparty companies known as "lead generators" that specialize in gathering and selling the information.
Among the 62 lead generators used by companies analyzed, the cost per lead ranged between $10
and $150. Lead generators advertise themselves as a free, safe, and reliable way to get information
about college, but lead generator Web sites generally direct students only to schools and programs
that pay them, and have a history of engaging in online marketing using aggressive and misleading
methods.

• Servicemembers, veterans, spouses, and family members have become highly attractive prospects
to for-profit colleges, and many schools have put significant resources into recruiting and enrolling
students eligible for these benefits.
o Lead generation Web sites, specifically designed to attract members of the military and veterans,
use layouts and logos similar to official military websites, but do not inform users that the
purpose of the site is to collect contact information on behalf of the site's for-profit college
clients.
o

Internal documents show that some schools' pursuit of military benefits led them to recruit from
the most vulnerable military populations, sometimes recruiting at wounded warrior centers and
veterans hospitals.

o

In addition to aggressively seeking military personnel, the investigation showed that some
recruiters misled or lied to service members as to whether their tuition would be fully covered by
military benefits.

How Are Students Performing

Status of Students Enrolled in For-Profit
Education Companies in 2008-9, as of 2010

Because a large proportion of students
Qegree Level
··Enrollment
attending for-profit colleges are not first time,
full-time students, and therefore fall outside the
Associate Degree
474,817
62.9
Department of Education's tracking of student
Bachelor's Degree
54.3
374,264
outcomes, it is difficult to understand how many
Certificate
246,792
38.5
students are succeeding at for-profit colleges
All Students
1,095,873
54.4
and in what types of degree programs. To fill
the information gap, committee staff analyzed
retention and withdrawal information for a cohort of students enrolling between 2008-9 and found that:
•

596,556 students who enrolled in 2008-9, or 54 percent, left without a degree or Certificate by
mid-2010.

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•

298,476 students who enrolled in 2-year Associate degree programs in 2008-9, or 63 percent,
departed without a degree. Nine companies had Associate degree programs with withdrawal rates
over 60 percent.

•

Online: Among companies that provided data that enabled committee staff to compare students
attending online and on-campus, students attending online withdrew at much higher rates. Sixtyfour percent of students attending online programs left without a degree compared to 46 percent of
students attending campus-based programs offered by the same companies.

•

Publicly Traded: Colleges owned by a company that is traded on a major stock exchange had 20089 student withdrawal rates 9 percent higher than the privately held companies examined. Among
the 15 publicly traded companies, 55 percent of students departed without a degree. Among the 15
privately held companies examined, 46 percent of students departed without a degree.

Whv Do Many Students Fail to Complete For-Profit Programs
Spending Choices ofFor-Pro.fit Education Companies:
•

For-profit colleges devote tremendous amounts ofresources to non-education related spending
including marketing, recruiting, profit and executive compensation, while spending relatively small
amounts on instruction. In fiscal year 2009, the education companies examined by the committee
spent:
o

$4.2 billion or 22.7 percent of all revenue on marketing, advertising, recruiting, and admissions
staffing.

o

$3.6 billion or 19.4 percent of all revenue on pre-tax profit.

o

$3 .2 billion, or 17.2 percent of all revenue on instruction.

o This means that the companies together devoted less to actual instruction costs (faculty and
curriculum) than to either marketing and recruiting or profit.
o

Additionally, the CEOs of the publicly traded, for-profit education companies took home,
on average, $7.3 million in 2009. In contrast, the five highest paid leaders oflarge public
universities averaged compensation of $1 million, while the five highest paid leaders at nonprofit colleges and universities averaged $3 million.

Academic Quality:
•

Undercover observation by the GAO and student complaints reveal that some for-profit schools
have curricula that do not challenge students and academic integrity policies that are sometimes not
enforced.

•

The use of part-time faculty is a key component of the efficiencies the for-profit model can
deliver, but it must be balanced with ensuring that the faculty is able to exercise genuine academic
independence and has a vested stake. in the quality of the institution. The investigation found that
in 2010, 80 percent of the faculty employed at the schools examined was part-time. Ten companies
had more than 80 percent part-time faculty and five companies had more than 90 percent part-time
faculty.

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Student Services:
•

The investigation found that while for-profit colleges make large investments in staff to recruit new
students, once a student is enrolled that same level of service is often not available. This is true
even though the companies seek to enroll the students that research demonstrates are most critically
in need of those services. As Dr. Arnold Mitchem, president of the Council for Opportunity in
Education told the committee: "First of all, we all need to understand there's a radical difference
in educating and graduating a low-income first-generation student than there is a middle-income
student ... [In] the for-profit sector they address the financial barriers, but they have not adequately
addressed the supportive services barriers."

•

While the investigation demonstrated a wide variety among for-profit colleges in the commitment
to student services staffing and to the student services provided, overall the companies examined
employed almost three times as many recruiters as student service representatives.

Career Placement Services:
• The disparity in staffing is more acute
when it comes to career services staff. The
committee staff analysis indicates that forprofit colleges employ about 10 recruiters for
every career services staff member. · Despite
advertising that attending the school is a
pathway to a better job or career, two of the
largest for-profit colleges have no career
services staff to help students.

Staffing Levels at 24 For-Profit Education Companies,

2007-10
40,000
35,000
..

J

30,000

., 25,000
!:!.

f
~
z

• Testimony and internal documents indicate

i
1

20,000

w

~

35,202

1

15,000
10,000
5,000

1,800,000

1,200,000

~

""

:>

1,000,000 ;:;;
.
800,000

l

0

:;;

.a

600,000

'l

400,000

g

z

200,000
2007

2008

2009

2010

that at some for-profit colleges career
Enrollment -career Services __,.Recruiting ·-'"'""''Student Services
services staff are often more focused on
meeting placement quotas required by
some accreditors than actually helping students achieve quality jobs in the field of their degree or
Certificate.

Programmatic Accreditation and Licensure:
•

Some for-profit colleges train students in fields that require programmatic accreditation, in addition
to institutional accreditation, in order for graduates to obtain employment in the field. Institutions that
offer programs that lack programmatic accreditation are inconsistent in how they disclose this lack
of programmatic accreditation. While some programs are upfront about this issue, others post the
disclosure deep in their Web sites or in the fine print in their enrollment agreements, while framing
the disclosure in terms that makes it difficult for students to recognize the gravity of this issue.

What Are the Consequences tor Students
•

Ninety-six percent of for-profit students take out student loans, according to the most recent U.S.
Department of Education data. In comparison, 13 percent of students at community colleges, 48
percent at 4-year public, and 57 percent at 4-year private non-profit colleges borrow money to pay
for school.

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•

For-profit schools enroll far more highdollar borrowers. Fifty-seven percent of
Bachelor's students who graduate from a
for-profit college owe $30,000 or more. In
contrast, 25 percent of those who earned
degrees in the private, non-profit sector
and 12 percent from the public sector
borrowed at this level.

• Because many students who attend for-

Share of Students Borrowing by Sector, 2009
100% '
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%

96%

profit colleges are unable to get financing
through private lending companies,
Community
Four-Year
For-Profit
Four-Year
many participate in institutional loan
Colleges
Colleges
Public
Private
programs operated by for-profit education
Colleges
Colleges
companies. The committee staff found
that institutional loans operated by forprofit education companies often carry high interest rates, and do not provide students with the same
safeguards as Federal loans.

• In 2009 seven large for-profit education companies offered institutional loans with interest rates
ranging from 11.2 to 18 percent. During this period the Stafford loan rate was 5.6 percent. These
same companies listed expected default rates of 42 to 80 percent.

• Students who attended a for-profit college accounted for 47 percent of all Federal student loan
defaults. More than 1 in 5 students enrolling in a for-profit college-22 percent-default within 3
years of entering repayment on their student loans.

• Default rates are driven by students who drop out, those who are left with debt but little means to
repay it given the incomplete education and lack of a degree. Students' ability to repay their loans is
tightly tied to whether the student stayed in school and achieved a degree.

• Students who attend for-profit schools are more likely to experience unemployment after leaving
school. According to a National Center for Education Statistics study, 23 percent of students who
attended for-profit schools in 2008-9 were unemployed and seeking work.

Why is This Happening
•

Accreditation: The self-reporting and peer-review nature of the accreditation process exposes it
to manipulation by companies that are more concerned with their bottom line than with academic
quality and improvement. Accrediting agencies seek to help colleges improve. Because of this
institutional focus on continuous improvement, they sometimes appear to have difficulty drawing
and enforcing bright lines and minimum standards.

•

State Oversight: State oversight of for-profit education companies has eroded over time due to a
variety of factors, including State budget cuts and the influence of the for-profit college industry with
State policymakers. The U.S. Department of Education had never defined minimum requirements
for State authorization, and many States have taken a passive or minimal role in approving
institutions, reviewing and addressing complaints from students and the public, and ensuring that
colleges are in compliance with State consumer protection laws.

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• Federal Law and Regulation: Federal regulations impose two key checks on for-profit colleges: the
proportion of Federal money that the colleges collect, known as the 90/10 rule, and the percentage
of students who may default on Federal student loans before the college loses eligibility for Federal
financial aid. In addition, some accreditors also require colleges to meet standards regarding the
percentage of graduates who obtain employment in their field of study. Some for-profit colleges
employ questionable tactics to meet these requirements.

• The investigation documented the use of multiple strategies to comply with the letter of the 90/ 10
rule with policies that defy the goal and spirit of the regulation.
o

Since for-profit colleges report 90/10 figures by Office of Postsecondary Education ID (OPEID)
numbers, instead of by campus, and one OPEID may contain multiple campuses, some
companies consolidate and switch campuses between OPEIDs to lower their reported 90/10
number regardless of the proximity of the campus.

o

Some for-profit colleges have stopped the flow of student aid funds to certain OPEIDs at the end
of the fiscal year. This tactic may hurt students because campuses that do not receive student aid
funds may not disburse, in a timely manner, living-expense checks to students who depend on
those funds to pay for books, housing, food, transportation, and childcare.

o

Some schools have raised their initial enrollment fee-which must be paid in cash-or insisted
on cash payments from students in order to lower their reported 90/10 ratio. While asking
students to make up-front payments on their education can be a good idea because it is interestfree and also helps them to understand what it will be like to make payments on their loans later,
it seems that some for-profit schools are primarily seeking to drive down their 90/10 ratios with
these cash payments.

o

Department of Education regulations dictate that scholarships awarded to a student do not count
as Federal financial aid and instead count on the "IO" side of the 90/10 calculation, but only if
the scholarships are awarded by an organization independent of the school. Several companies
that operate for-profit colleges have designed scholarship programs that should be more closely
scrutinized.

o

Some schools increase tuition in order to create a gap between the total amount of Federal aid a
student can receive and the cost of attending. This illustrates the fundamental problem with the
cost of for-profit schools-that the tuition fees and other academic charges bear no relationship
to the cost of providing the education. This gap means that students attending these schools must
find even more financing by taking out private loans, taking on more debt through a private or
institutional loan, or making monthly cash payments, often by credit card, directly to the school
to pay for the artificially high cost of the school. The student is left with more debt, likely at a
higher rate of interest, so the sch?ol can generate sufficient non-Federal income.

o Because neither Department of Defense (DOD) nor Veterans Affairs (VA) educational benefits
originate in Title IV of the Higher Education Act, money received through these programs is not
counted as Federal financial aid for the purposes of 90/10. This loophole creates an incentive to
see servicemembers as nothing more than "dollar signs in uniform."

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•

Many for-profit education companies also commit significant resources to default management
efforts that keep students out of default for the duration of the 2-year (soon 3-year) monitoring
window. Default management may involve a multitude of strategies premised on sound goals,
such as enrolling students who are likely to graduate and succeed, giving those students the support
and tools they need to learn and secure a degree that is valued in the job marketplace, helping
them secure a well-paying job, and offering financial literacy classes and quality debt counseling.
However, internal documents show that at some schools the emphasis is on signing students up
for forbearance and deferment with the sole goal of protecting the colleges so that they do not lose
access to Federal taxpayer-funded student aid dollars.
o Evidence suggests that some for-profit colleges use forbearance and deferment as tools to move
the school's default rate, without concern for a students' particular situation or whether it is in the
best financial interest of the individual. Many students will end up paying more over the life of
their loan after a forbearance or deferment.
o

As default rates have increasingly become a problem for for-profit colleges, many have turned
for help to third party vendors that operate call centers with hundreds of employees trained to
"cure" student defaults. While the vendor used by at least 12 of the 30 companies examined
counsels delinquent students on all repayment options, including income-based repayment
options, internal documents demonstrate that the majority of students approached by the vendor
end up in forbearance, leading to' increased debt. Documents obtained from four large for-profit
education companies demonstrate that, on average, over 75 percent of the students "cured" were
forbearances or deferments, while only 24 percent were the result of a student making payments
on their loans.

o

For-profit colleges market themselves as career focused, and encourage students to enroll by
offering the prospect of better jobs and better wages. Accordingly, for-profit colleges use job
placement data to promote their programs, and to satisfy national accrediting agencies and State
regulators that the students who complete the programs are finding jobs in their field. However,
when job placement rates are audited by outside agencies, problems have repeatedly been found,
and a number of law enforcement investigations over the past 5 years have revealed falsified
information in the placement rates of some colleges.

o

Rapid enrollment growth and lack of adequate policies and procedures have also led to situations
in which for-profit colleges have improperly retained unearned title IV student aid funds that
should have been returned to the Department of Education, or are not returning the funds in a
timely matter.

What Needs to Be Done
•

Enhance transparency by collecting relevant and accurate information about student outcomes.
o Require that the Department of Education collect comprehensive student outcome information
and enable data retrieval by corporate ownership;
o

Establish a uniform and accurate methodology for calculating job placement rates;

o

Increase the regulation of private lending.

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•

Strengthen the oversight of Federal financial aid.
o Tie access to Federal financial aid to meeting minimum student outcome thresholds;
o Prohibit institutions from funding marketing, advertising and recruiting activities with Federal
financial aid dollars;
o Improve cohort default rate tracking by expanding the default reporting rate period beyond 3
years;
o Require that for-profit colleges receive at least 15 percent of revenues from sources other than
Federal funds;
o Use criteria beyond accreditation and State authorization for determining institutions' access to
Federal financial aid.

•

Create meaningful protections for students.
o

Create an online student complaint clearinghouse, managed by the Department of Education,
for the collection and referral of student complaints to appropriate overseeing agencies,
organizations and divisions;

o Prohibit institutions that accept Federal financial aid from including mandatory binding
arbitration clauses in enrollment agreements;
o Enforce minimum standards for student services that inelude tutoring, remediation, financial aid,
and career counseling and job placement;
o Extend the ban on incentive compensation to include all employees of institutions of higher
education, and clarify that this ban extends to numeric threshold or quota-based termination
policies.

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