With millions of young adults heading off to college this month, federal regulators are reminding those consumers to do their homework. Okay, not that homework, but the kind related to researching college-sponsored bank accounts. [More]
college
NFL Sunday Ticket Now Available To College Students At A Discount
By 8.10.15
College students often live far from where they grew up, meaning they can’t usually watch their hometown NFL team play on Sunday afternoons. DirecTV and its new parent AT&T are hoping to reach these young football fans by offering a discounted rate for online access to NFL Sunday Ticket. [More]
University Of Phoenix Faces Probe Into Military Recruiting Practices
By 8.10.15
A little more than a week after federal regulators set their sights on the University of Phoenix for possible deceptive and unfair business practices, the California Attorney General’s office is joining the investigation party by opening a probe into the for-profit college’s military recruitment practices. [More]
Prisoners Will Soon Be Eligible For Pell Grants To Finance Education
By 7.31.15
Twenty years after passing a law that banned prisoners from financing higher education with federal grants while incarcerated, the government is ready to begin investing in the education of inmates. [More]
Regulators Investigating University Of Phoenix’s Business Practices
By 7.30.15
Apollo Education Group, owners of the country’s largest for-profit college – University of Phoenix – is the latest target for federal regulators set on reining in the for-profit education industry for engaging in allegedly deceptive marketing practices. [More]
When Comparing Colleges, It Would Help To Know If A School Is Under Investigation
By 7.22.15
Many consumers thinking of pursuing a higher education weigh the pros and the cons of a specific college: tuition, convenience, available areas of study. Last month, the Department of Education announced it would make the college shopping experience a little easier for prospective students by creating a consumer-facing online college comparison system. While the tool will no doubt be helpful, consumer advocates warn that, as it stands, the system will be missing a vital information: whether or not schools are party to investigation, lawsuits or settlements over harmful and deceptive practices. [More]
![Students are spending less on college course materials even though they are still buying the same amount of textbooks and other items. [Source: NACS]](../../../../consumermediallc.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/couresmaterials.png?w=300&h=225&crop=1)
Increased Competition, New Options Means College Students Are Paying Less For Course Materials
By 7.22.15
Once upon a time, most college students had very few choices when it came to the textbooks and other course materials they were required to buy each semester: Pricey new books or not-quite-as-pricey used copies, and most of these were gone quickly. But now there are multiple online competitors for buying, renting, and reselling these materials and a new survey shows that students are paying a lot less. [More]
![[Source: Sallie Mae]](../../../../consumermediallc.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/fig2.png?w=300&h=225&crop=1)
Families Going Deeper Into Their Own Pockets To Pay For College
By 7.20.15
College spending continues to rise, but not all American families are taking measures to bring down the amount of their own money they have to spend to educate their children. [More]
Oregon Becomes Second State To Offer Free Tuition To All Graduating High School Students
By 7.8.15
Thousands of recent high school graduates in Oregon now have the chance to attend community college without the worry of accumulating loads of debt they may never be able to pay back, as lawmakers in the state recently approved a bill to establish the second program in the country to offer students help in paying for college. [More]
New Jersey Legislation Would Create Student Loan Lottery To Let You Gamble Away Your Debt
By 7.8.15
While lottery proceeds may do an awful lot of good for state coffers, the odds of winning are microscopically small, and anyone who has lived in a poverty-stricken neighborhood has likely seen people who can’t afford to lose any money throwing away what little they have on a nose hair’s chance that they might win something. So why not apply that same model to the $1 trillion student loan debt problem? [More]
Students At Closed Corinthian Colleges May Ask For Federal Student Loan Relief
By 6.8.15
Getting a student loan discharged is not easy. Even bankruptcy is not usually enough to shake off that debt. But recent students at schools under the Corinthian Colleges Inc. [CCI] umbrella (Everest, WyoTech, Heald) will get the chance to request that some of all their federal student loan obligation be lifted. [More]
Health Insurer Anthem Offering Employees Free College
By 6.2.15
What do Fiat Chrysler, Starbucks and health insurer Anthem have in common? As of today, they each offer to foot the bill for their employees to attend college. [More]
Executives For The World’s Largest Diploma Mill Arrested
By 5.27.15
Less than two weeks after an investigative report detailed how a Pakistan-based IT company allegedly raked in millions of dollars a month by selling bogus diplomas, degrees and certifications through a series of fake websites and forceful sales calls, authorities in the country say they’ve arrested the chief executive of Axact. [More]
For-Profit Educator Ashworth College Settles FTC Charges It Misrepresented Career Opportunities, Transfer Credits
By 5.26.15
Federal regulators’ crackdown on the for-profit education industry continued today as Georgia-based Ashworth College agreed to settle Federal Trade Commission charges the company misled students about career training and credit transfers. [More]
Senator Calls For Investigation Into Three For-Profit College Chains, Restrictions On Future Campus Sales
By 5.19.15
The struggle to protect students from potentially harmful for-profit college chains continued today as Illinois Senator Dick Durbin urged the Department of Education to investigate the business practices of three of the country’s largest propriety education companies – ITT Educational Services, Career Education Corporation, and Education Management Corporation. [More]
10 Things We Learned About The World’s Largest Diploma Mill
By 5.18.15
Earning a diploma can take years, but some people simply don’t have the time. For that reason, companies have been cropping up year after year offering consumers the chance to obtain a diploma, degree or certification in exchange for hundreds – and sometimes thousands – of dollars. A new report from the New York Times details how one company allegedly rakes in millions of dollars a month by selling those bogus documents though a series of fake websites and forceful sales calls. [More]
CFPB Wants To Hear Your Comments On Student Loan Servicing Practices
By 5.14.15
Outstanding student loan debt now totals more than $1.2 trillion in the U.S., and it’s only going to grow as college tuitions continue to outpace inflation. Meanwhile, student loan servicers aren’t exactly making it easy for borrowers to pay down that debt with confusing and inconsistent policies and an apparent reluctance to work with troubled borrowers. In an effort to see if the repayment process can be made less byzantine, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is asking for you to share your thoughts on the state of student loan servicing. [More]
What Did Your Mom Teach You About Money?
By 5.5.15
When I was in first grade, the lunch lady at my school informed me that my parents had overpaid for my meals for the month, and sent the extra money home with me, as I remember it. I took it to my mom, who said that everyone should have a bank account, and that we could use that $18 or so to start one for me. And to add to that — she said that moolah could grow to a larger amount all by itself through a magical thing called “interest.” [More]
