Nevada AG Targets For-Profit Colleges

(LAS VEGAS KXNT)–The Nevada Attorney General has joined 13 other state AG’s in supporting a proposed bill in Congress targeting the marketing and recruitment practices of for-profit colleges and universities.

The schools have been under fire for years from disgruntled students who say they have been mislead through school advertising and recruitment campaigns that inflate the graduation rates and job prospects for students.

The bill in the U.S. Senate is called the ProtectingFinancial Aid for Students and Taxpayers Act. Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto says “we have to do more to prevent good intentioned students, including veterans, from falling prey to a fast sales pitch from a for-profit college with a questionable reputation.”

The AG’s claim that the largest for-profit education companies are receiving at least 86 percent of their revenues from federal student air programs, including the GI Bill and Pell grant programs.

Thirty of the largest education companies spent over $4 billion on marketing in 2009–an average of $2200 per student, and more than a fifth of the school’s overall revenue.

The AGs say marketing budgets at these schools approach 40 percent of tuition revenues.

By comparison, the typical public university spends about one percent of its federal aid dollars on recruitment and advertising.

LAS VEGAS KXNT