Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 142 posts

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#71

Post by twblalock »

kosievdmerwe wrote: post #27
dangero wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's wrong with someone educating people and making a profit while doing it?

The problem with for-profit prisons is the misalignment between what's good for profit and what's good for prisoners. Where the prisoners can't "vote with their wallets" to counter-balance this misalignment. I don't see a similar issue with for-profit schools. In order to attract students they need to to provide good education and foster a good reputation.

> I don't see a similar issue with for-profit schools. In order to attract students they need to to provide good education and foster a good reputation.

Or they just need to dupe people who don't know any better.

A lot of the people who end up at these places are poor, don't have friends or relatives with college degrees, didn't get good advice, and simply don't know how to recognize a scam. Now they have six figures of student loan debt they can't get rid of, and a low-prestige degree that many employers won't even consider.

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#72

Post by coredog64 »

nickff wrote: post #40
swalsh wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, there are many examples of great for-profit institutions. The problem is there's little differentiating them from "predator" schools. One issue is information asymmetry.

There is informational asymmetry in every transaction (as well as in non-profit schools); this is a red herring (unless you can show that it is causing a specific, large, unsolved problem). The current administration has repeatedly demonstrated hostility towards for-profit schools, and has chosen to use discretionary enforcement of rules against them rather than enforcing standards universally, because they know that…

No doubt ITT's problem is that Kaplan University had already hired Anita Dunn and there wasn't another White House staffer ready to transition to the private sector.

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#73

Post by dangerlibrary »

nickff wrote: post #64
ajkjk wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The existence of information asymmetry isn't per se the problem, no, of course not. But it's not a red herring to mention if we can look at the world and see the information asymmetry doing active harm, which I think most commenters here would agree with. The opinion that large numbers of for-profit schools are convincing people to give them money and then providing almost nothing useful in return is so widespread no…

I would agree that "[t]he opinion that large numbers of... schools are convincing people to give them money and then providing almost nothing useful in return is so widespread now that I'd assume it to be everyone's default unless they specifically mention otherwise." According to the signalling theory of education and the opinion of many commenters here, a great deal (possibly a strong majority) of post-secondary ed…

Graduation rates at non profit schools are appalling. University of Pheonix routinely graduates less than 20% of its students within six years. Even if all of the benefit is signaling, which I disagree with, the students at many for profit institutions aren't even getting that benefit.

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#74

Post by gertef »

nickff wrote: post #40
swalsh wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, there are many examples of great for-profit institutions. The problem is there's little differentiating them from "predator" schools. One issue is information asymmetry.

There is informational asymmetry in every transaction (as well as in non-profit schools); this is a red herring (unless you can show that it is causing a specific, large, unsolved problem). The current administration has repeatedly demonstrated hostility towards for-profit schools, and has chosen to use discretionary enforcement of rules against them rather than enforcing standards universally, because they know that…

"Department officials say they are acting out of concerns raised by the for-profit chain’s accreditor, the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools, that ITT is not living up to the demands of its accreditation. ITT is under threat of having its accreditation revoked"

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#75

Post by TulliusCicero »

nickff wrote: post #40
swalsh wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, there are many examples of great for-profit institutions. The problem is there's little differentiating them from "predator" schools. One issue is information asymmetry.

There is informational asymmetry in every transaction (as well as in non-profit schools); this is a red herring (unless you can show that it is causing a specific, large, unsolved problem). The current administration has repeatedly demonstrated hostility towards for-profit schools, and has chosen to use discretionary enforcement of rules against them rather than enforcing standards universally, because they know that…

>There is informational asymmetry in every transaction

Yes, but informational asymmetry is a much bigger problem for larger, less frequent decisions, like buying a house, or going to college.

With small, frequent decisions, like buying groceries, you can quickly learn from your mistakes and the harm done from potentially choosing an inferior/overly expensive grocer a few times is small.

With college, if you don't figure out that the educational provider was poor until after you've graduated, you're already wasted tens of thousands of dollars and years of your life for a useless degree. That's a much bigger issue.

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#76

Post by nyargh »

dangero wrote: post #20
Unbeliever69 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When the discontinuation of federal prison article came up on hacker news I commented, "Now if we could only outlaw for-profit schools!"

What's wrong with someone educating people and making a profit while doing it?

Nothing, if they also accept the downside risk of financing a crap education. The default rates for many private universities are astounding - and the taxpayer helps backstop them from losses via federal student loans.

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#77

Post by grahamburger »

chris11 wrote: post #66
grahamburger wrote: post #49

A few years ago I had to make several hires in cities away from the main operations of our business. These were technical positions, but not really highly skilled positions - think geek squad level proficiency. Many of the candidates came out of ITT, and to be honest they were among the best candidates for this level position, or at least they interviewed the best. I got the impression that ITT spends a lot of time r…

What were the three questions?

I wish I could remember. I think one of them was something along the lines of 'what would you expect from an ideal candidate for this position?'

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#79

Post by nyargh »

awt wrote: post #70
nradov wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In principle there's nothing wrong with for-profit schools which train people on specific job skills or certification programs. There are some valuable skills that non-profit community colleges can't practically teach. But still the federal government should only support financial aid for such schools if they demonstrate a high rate of job placement for students who complete the program.

How about let individuals decide if a school is good, and not the federal government? AKA Capitalism.

Sounds good to me! No more federal student loans!

Re: ITT is no longer allowed to enroll students who rely on federal loans and grants

#80

Post by frozenport »

korethr wrote: post #43

I'm torn on this. Understand, I have little love for ITT, and I got my 4 year degree from there. In hindsight, I wish I'd done community college and the local university instead. I honestly believe I'd have had a better curriculum, better books and a better ratio of instructors who cared to ones who didn't. I believe I'd have had to take on less student loan debt, as well. That said, suppose ITT Tech does lose its ac…

Its been a black mark for a while. If you have plenty of prior work experience I would completely omit the education section in your CV.
Post reply on HN