On the recordFebruary 17, 2011
I rise against this amendment and to express my strong support for the Department of Education's proposed federal student aid funding rules for postsecondary education programs that prepare students for gainful employment in a recognized occupation. The program includes a loan repayment rate measure to assess how effectively program attendees repay the student loans they borrow; debt to earnings measures that assess the relationship between the student loan debt of program completers and their earnings; and a stringent performance threshold for each of the three measures. I strongly support these 'Gainful Employment Rules' because they protect students from fraud, which has adversely impacted the minority student population. These rules were a response to the Department of Education's recent investigation findings that some for-profit institutions were promising students' job placement upon completion of their programs and not following through on their commitment. Consequently, students who enrolled in these schools were unable to pay off student loans because they were never placed in the jobs they were promised and could not find employment. According to the Institute for College Access and Success, the student default rate at for-profit colleges is the highest at 25 percent in comparison to private non-profit schools at 7.6 percent, and public schools at 10.8 percent respectively.
