Filed under: News, Politics, President Obama, Race and Civil Rights
Ads for medical technician, medical transcriptionist, and dental assistant dominate daytime television.
"My mommy works with doctors," said one kid used in an advertisement for a medical assistant. Almost 43 percent of students who attend these for-profit trade schools are people of color.
While there's nothing wrong with pursuing a certificate in one of these programs to provide for your family, all too often I see young blacks and Latinos attain these certificates and then cease their education. In addition, many of these programs have come under scrutiny for dishonesty, fraud and criminal behavior.
For example,a recent investigation from the Government Accountability Office found many of these programs are advertising for training in jobs that are outdated or not hiring. They lie about the income prospects of their graduates. In addition, some of these schools are practicing student loan fraud. Students are taking out tens of thousands of dollars in loans for worthless degrees. Other schools aren't even accredited. Students are manipulated into applying for student loans and supporting documents have been falsified.
According to Politico in the last year, "trade schools took in $4 billion in federal Pell grants and $20 billion in taxpayer-funded student loans. Enrollment in for-profit programs has soared, jumping from 673,000 students nationwide in 2000 to 1.8 million in 2008."
That's a lot of taxpayer money potentially being wasted and the reason why President Obama's push to produce an additional 5 million community college graduates by 2020 is worth pursuing.
Of course, for-profit schools like the University of Phoenix, other trade schools, and testing services like Kaplan are fighting the push. They have mounted a powerful lobby against the reforms.
Community college is a great option for kids of all races who might not want to go or are not ready to go a four-year college. Veterans or older adults can also use community colleges to engage in a lifetime of learning and better themselves.
"They may not go to four-year colleges right away, but the community college system can be just a terrific gateway for folks to get skills," said Obama. "Some start at a community college and then go on to four-year colleges. Some just get technical training, get a job and then come back maybe five years later to upgrade their skills or adapt them to a new business."
"We want to make it easier to connect students looking for jobs with businesses looking to hire. We want to help community colleges and employers create programs that match curricula in the classroom with the needs of the boardrooms."
Obama is putting taxpayer money behind the effort.
The health care legislation signed into law earlier this year included $2 billion to fund the Community College and Career Training initiative to try to improve graduation rates. The 2009 stimulus bill also had $3.5 billion in Pell grants aimed at helping low-income students at hundreds of community colleges, according to White House officials, as well as $1 billion in workforce training programs at community colleges.
Community colleges often end up with the responsibility of educating kids who graduate high school unprepared for higher learning. That difficulty of just catching up often causes many students to drop out. Many of these kids may also have to work while going to school. Some money should be used to provide assistance to young people who need help in their quest for higher education.
Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee is rightly questioning the argument of for-profit schools that the issue is about minority access to training.
"It is wrong to pretend that for-profit colleges with student rates of high debt but low success are offering real college access to underserved student populations," he told Politico. Some "poor performing" schools, Harkin said, are "no different than subprime mortgage lenders pretending to help working families find a place to live."
Instead of just working with a doctor, maybe the person targeted by that trade school commercial can choose to become a doctor.