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Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

dfpi.ca.gov

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Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#261

Post by AdrianB1 »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #178
srndsnd wrote: post #6

I'm confused as to why this headline has to be so close to clickbait. I'm not even one to stand up for people like Lambda, I think a lot of bootcamps are shady at best, and actively deceptive at worst (Trilogy). It is definitely important to note that that these loans can be discharged in bankruptcy. But as far as I know, isn't this less stringent than typical student loans, which can't be discharged in bankruptcy? I…

"loans can be discharged in bankruptcy." To me the idea that in a 'free country' today you cannot clear your debts through bancrupcy sounds crazy, it's a practice that belongs in history books along with debtor prisons, bondage, endentured servitude, feudalism, having public holiday 'execution day' and slavery. In the UK we used execute people for vagrancy.

In my country personal bankruptcy does not exist, never did. For us the idea that in a 'free country' one can take a loan and declare bankruptcy not to pay it back sounds crazy. This is evidence of cultural differences, nothing else - definitely not 'free country' or education.

Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#262

Post by kelnos »

pbreit wrote: post #246
dragonwriter wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The clause makes Lambda appear less attractive so not clear why it would be included. It’s designed to dissuade people from seeking bankruptcy to discharge the debt.

I doubt it. Who would seek bankruptcy for 17% of their salary? And it also make Lambds FAR more unattractive.

The problem is if you can't get a job above a certain salary threshold. While Lambda's non-CA contracts allow for discharging the debt after 5 years of no job or low enough salary, it seems their contract for CA students does not allow for discharging the debt, ever.

Regardless, people don't necessarily go into bankruptcy over a single loan. It could be the combination of credit card debt, a mortgage, a car loan, plus the Lambda loan that puts them over the edge.

Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#263

Post by kelnos »

LMYahooTFY wrote: post #172
treesrule wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> While the referenced cases aren't good, not their mistakes alone Check notes: "notify students that the bankruptcy dischargeability provision language is not accurate" Just to be clear this isn't a "mistake" this is fraud.

This is not fraud, and it's barely even relevant. The ISA dissolves after 5 years even if you've paid nothing. The fact that it is dischargeable is itself interesting. Edit: said the opposite of what I meant

This isn't the ISA; it's a special contract only used for CA-based students that does not allow for a discharge after 5 years.

Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#264

Post by kelnos »

aerosmile wrote: post #77
sicromoft wrote: post #40

See also Lambda School’s Misleading Promises: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/02/lambda-schools-job-p...

I would be a lot more inclined to believe anything they said in this article if they didn't show such blatant bias for sensationalist reporting. > His previous work was mostly concerned with “growth hacking,” which is Silicon Valley jargon for finding underappreciated (or, less charitably, underhanded) ways of marketing something. So anyone who put the term "growth hacking" on their resume will now get publicly discr…

To me "growth hacking" has for a long time been associated with sketchy, underhanded practices and dark patterns.

Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#265

Post by brigandish »

pkdpic_y9k wrote: post #236
srndsnd wrote: post #6

I'm confused as to why this headline has to be so close to clickbait. I'm not even one to stand up for people like Lambda, I think a lot of bootcamps are shady at best, and actively deceptive at worst (Trilogy). It is definitely important to note that that these loans can be discharged in bankruptcy. But as far as I know, isn't this less stringent than typical student loans, which can't be discharged in bankruptcy? I…

Totally valid but just feel like I have to throw in that I went to a bootcamp, was very suspicious from the earliest stages of consideration but found on the other side that all the friends I made there who attended-even the one that failed out and went to another bootcamp-went from part time jobs making less than 30k a year to legit software engineering positions making 60~120k in less than a year. Im still surprise…

> That said it was the most competitive and highest ranked bootcamp then and now

You're allowed to say who it is - in fact, I think you should say who it is, reward quality and hard work!

Also, you might mention who does the ranking (possibly more important).

Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#266

Post by kelnos »

wheelie_boy wrote: post #133
sugarwater wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's worth mentioning the the CEO Austen had a post on here (now deleted) proclaiming to have creating a bot army via stealing people's pictures on Instagram. I would qualify that as "underhanded"

Link to the post: https://web.archive.org/web/20190703224616/https://news.ycom... It's also weird that the post is still up, but the username was changed from austenallred to another user: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13502774

The incredibly gross thing is that all but two replies are encouraging of that kind of behavior. The two that are negative and call out the dishonesty are downvoted.

Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#267

Post by kelnos »

reducesuffering wrote: post #155
wheelie_boy wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Link to the post: https://web.archive.org/web/20190703224616/https://news.ycom... It's also weird that the post is still up, but the username was changed from austenallred to another user: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13502774

Dang, is this a normal feature? Since when are users able to retroactively change the profile that made the comment? This looks like covering up a YC founder's past comment, but the archive still exists. According to snapshots it was modified over 2 years later.

The usual best way to get in touch with dang (or another mod) is to email hn@ycombinator.com. Likely to get a better answer via email, or perhaps he'll comment here if you call attention to it that way.

If something like this really happened, this is pretty disturbing. The _pecl account that now owns that comment was created on the same day the comment was posted, has 1 karma, and has not posted anything else.

Edit: just emailed hn@; hopefully someone there will follow up on this.

Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#268

Post by tomnipotent »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #138

The language violates the new California Consumer Financial Protection Law (CCFPL), which took effect this year At the risk of being misconstrued as defending predatory practices, it sounds like they quickly reached an agreement to comply with legal stuff that probably didn't exist when they wrote the language that's being updated.

> probably didn't exist

Except the language in the contract had always been deceptive, regardless of whether they were legally compelled to remove it. Lambda made a conscious decision to mislead customers for their own financial benefit, knowing full well that they were not covered by Section 523(a)(8).

They don't deserve credit for removing the language.

Re: Lambda School agrees to end deceptive educational financing practices

#270

Post by reitanuki »

lmm wrote: post #234
istjohn wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm honestly curious why this isn't a problem in the UK. What are we missing?

UK student "loans" aren't dischargeable in bankruptcy either - legally they're a tax rather than a loan.

Thank you! A lot of people seem totally incapable of grasping the fact that it's more of a tax rather than a loan. I'm glad it's not just me who has remarked this — I've been very unsuccessful in explaining it to people who shudder at it and treat it as any other loan...
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