Fannie Mae Goes to College

Is it a scam, a great business model, or the way we should provide higher education to the masses?  For-profit colleges market heavily to low-income high school graduates.  The federal government provides Pell and other grants and loans with the money going directly to commercial colleges.  The students accumulate huge loan debt with the promise their future incomes will be higher so they can pay them off.  The students may or may not ever graduate to realize that potential, but the debt persists.  The statistics simply don’t exist for the money Congress and the current administration are pushing into their goals for 80% of high school students to go to college and for the federal government to loan them the money they need.   

With Fanny Mae, we added to the national debt, and we all will pay in the long run.  With student loans, if we add to an individual’s personal debt, who’s going to bail that person out later?   

The Eduguru speaks: How about some accountability for the for-profit colleges?  Maybe students should get refunds if they don’t graduate.  Maybe they should get a warranty on their future earnings based on the ad they responded to when they were recruited.