Thursday, October 26, 2017

Like a Galapagos tortoise, Education Department ponders debt relief for students victimized by the for-profit colleges

Corinthian Colleges filed for bankruptcy in 2015, and ITT Tech went bankrupt a year later. Together, the two for-profit college companies left more than half a million students and former students in the lurch. Thousands of these victims filed so-called borrower-defense claims with the Department of Education, asking DOE to forgive their student loans on the grounds that they were defrauded.

The Obama administration approved regulations for processing these claims, but Betsy DeVos put them on hold. She was concerned, she said, that the Obama rules might give undeserving students "free money."

Now DOE has approved a panel of 17 experts to overhaul the Obama regulations. According to a story in Inside Higher Ed, the DeVos Department anticipates the new rules won't go into effect until 2019. Under that timetable, defrauded borrowers won't even have an avenue of relief until four years after Corinthian filed for bankruptcy.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of student borrowers who attended one of the Corinthian schools, ITT Tech, and dozens of other dodgy for-profit colleges will be making monthly loan payments for worthless education experiences. Hundreds of thousands of others will put their loans into deferment, which will relieve them from making loan payments but will cause their loan balances to go up due to accruing interest. And thousands more will simply default, which will allow the federal government's sleazy loan collectors to slap on penalties and fees to their loan balances.

But DeVos doesn't give a damn about the carnage wreaked by the corrupt for-profit college industry. In fact, she is doing everything she can to prop it up.

And so, Betsy DeVos, Amway heiress and for-profit co-conspirator, lumbers along like a Galapagos tortoise, oblivious to the misery experienced by millions of student debtors--who are now defaulting at the rate of 3,000 a day.

The DeVos Education Department ponders student-loan debt relief.
References

Danielle Douglas-Gabriel. Former ITT Tech students fight for some money in the company's bankruptcy case. Los Angeles Times, January 3, 2016.

Andrew Kreighbaum. Education Dept. Borrower-Defense Negotiators. Inside Higher Ed, October 26, 2017.

Shahien Nasiripour. Corinthian Colleges files for bankruptcy. Huffington Post, May 5, 2015.

The Wrong Move on Student LoansNew York Times, April 6, 2017.

3 comments:

  1. Totally agree with the author and my blog at outoftheashes is full of the comments by people, who are of the same opinion as well. It's a huge loan crisis.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I think this is thoroughly unparalleled.
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  3. I agree with you. The Obama administration approved regulations for processing these claims, but Betsy DeVos put them on hold. She was concerned, she said, that the Obama rules might give undeserving students testimonials on prowriterz "free money." This is a great step forward.

    ReplyDelete