Dive Summary:
- In an announcement published in Wednesday's Federal Register, the U.S. Department of Education revealed its plans to continue trying to institute stricter standards on vocational higher education programs.
- The announcement calls for "key stakeholders"--including students, consumer-advocacy groups and university leaders--to join a rule-making committee set to debate new "gainful employment" regulations this September.
- A previous "gainful employment" rule proposed in 2011 would have taken federal aid from career-focused programs whose graduates had high debt-to-income ratios and slow loan repayments, but was partially blocked by a federal judge, and the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities, which represents for-profit education companies, is already criticizing the new effort.
From the article:
... The department's call for a negotiated rule-making committee to debate new "gainful employment" regulations this fall is only the agency's latest effort to clamp down on vocational programs, which can advertise big employment rewards but end up saddling student with unsupportable debt. ...