Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) joined three other Democratic senators on Tuesday in demanding the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) take a harder look at its funding policies for for-profit colleges.
For-profit colleges, particularly the University of Phoenix, have come under scrutiny in recent months following a series of published reports about a variety of questionable recruiting practices.
“Many federal and state authorities, including a working group of 37 state attorneys general, are investigating various for-profit institutions and collecting evidence of erroneous job placement rates, misrepresentations of credit transferability, and other fraudulent behavior," Durbin said."[DOE] should request specific evidence from the investigating federal and state authorities and review such evidence to determine appropriate restrictions on the flow of federal student aid funding to the schools that are the subjects of such investigations.”
Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) also signed the letter that was sent to Ted Mitchell, the Under Secretary of the DOE.