ONLINE SCHOOLS

Once again, online schools are in the news.

This time, findings at 15 online schools threaten the reputations of approximately 2,000 online higher education institutions.

At the heart of the allegations are billions of dollars in federal student financial aid that are up for grabs.

The recent study was instigated by legislators and carried out by federal investigators at the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). Several investigators posed as potential students in order to check into the recruiting practices of a small sample of for-profit online schools.

They discovered that out of the approximately 2,000 online schools, 15 of them may be using high-pressure, deceptive sales tactics. The offending online schools allegedly provided misleading information to prospective students– primarily about future jobs earnings and the total cost of their education.

Some special-interest legislators are pushing to disqualify online schools from federal financial aid eligibility. Of course, if they are successful, online students could lose the option to shop around for their online education. They could be forced to choose from limited offerings at traditional colleges and universities.

The findings of the GAO are unfortunate; and offending online schools need to change their recruiting policies.

However, the allegations do challenge prospective students to do their homework before committing to any education program — either online or traditional.

Prospective students should:

• Visit the web page of the chosen online school or on-campus institution and check out tuition rates, number of classes required for degree completion and additional fees that may be charged.
• Compare the online degree programs of several online schools — especially costs and degree requirements.
• Check out the accreditation details of each school and go to the Department of Education website to confirm that the college or university is legitimate.
• If dealing with a college recruiter who is making promises that sound too good to be true, get the promises in writing. If the recruiter makes excuses for writing down  and signing the information, then the information should not be trusted.

Prospective students should also remember that problems with 15 online schools out of 2,000 do not accurately represent the entire online education community.

And hopefully, all colleges and universities will tweak their recruiting practices to insure that prospective students are thoroughly and accurately informed about all aspects of their degree programs.

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