Deming David, Goldin Claudia, Katz Lawrence
Future Child. 2013 Spring;23(1):137-63. doi: 10.1353/foc.2013.0005.
For-profit, or proprietary, colleges are the fastest-growing postsecondary schools in the nation, enrolling a disproportionately high share of disadvantaged and minority students and those ill-prepared for college. Because these schools, many of them big national chains, derive most of their revenue from taxpayer-funded student financial aid, they are of interest to policy makers not only for the role they play in the higher education spectrum but also for the value they provide their students. In this article, David Deming, Claudia Goldin, and Lawrence Katz look at the students who attend for-profits, the reasons they choose these schools, and student outcomes on a number of broad measures and draw several conclusions. First, the authors write, the evidence shows that public community colleges may provide an equal or better education at lower cost than for-profits. But budget pressures mean that community colleges and other nonselective public institutions may not be able to meet the demand for higher education. Some students unable to get into desired courses and programs at public institutions may face only two alternatives: attendance at a for-profit or no postsecondary education at all. Second, for-profits appear to be at their best with well-defined programs of short duration that prepare students for a specific occupation. But for-profit completion rates, default rates, and labor market outcomes for students seeking associate's or higher degrees compare unfavorably with those of public postsecondary institutions. In principle, taxpayer investment in student aid should be accompanied by scrutiny concerning whether students complete their course of study and subsequently earn enough to justify the investment and pay back their student loans. Designing appropriate regulations to help students navigate the market for higher education has proven to be a challenge because of the great variation in student goals and types of programs. Ensuring that potential students have complete and objective information about the costs and expected benefits of for-profit programs could improve postsecondary education opportunities for disadvantaged students and counter aggressive and potentially misleading recruitment practices at for-profit colleges, the authors write.
营利性学院，即私立学院，是美国增长最快的高等院校，招收的弱势和少数族裔学生以及那些未做好上大学准备的学生比例过高。由于这些学校，其中许多是大型全国性连锁学校，其大部分收入来自纳税人资助的学生助学金，政策制定者不仅对它们在高等教育领域所起的作用感兴趣，而且对它们为学生提供的价值也感兴趣。在本文中，大卫·戴明、克劳迪娅·戈尔丁和劳伦斯·卡茨研究了就读营利性学院的学生、他们选择这些学校的原因以及一系列广泛衡量标准下的学生成果，并得出了几个结论。首先，作者写道，证据表明公立社区学院可能以低于营利性学院的成本提供同等或更好的教育。但预算压力意味着社区学院和其他非选拔性公立机构可能无法满足高等教育需求。一些无法进入公立机构理想课程和项目的学生可能只有两种选择：就读营利性学院或完全不接受高等教育。其次，营利性学院在提供明确的短期课程以帮助学生为特定职业做好准备方面似乎表现最佳。但营利性学院的结业率、违约率以及攻读副学士学位或更高学位学生的劳动力市场成果与公立高等院校相比并不理想。原则上，纳税人对学生助学金的投资应伴随着对学生是否完成学业以及随后是否赚取足够收入以证明投资合理并偿还学生贷款的审查。由于学生目标和项目类型差异很大，设计适当的监管措施以帮助学生在高等教育市场中做出选择已被证明是一项挑战。作者写道，确保潜在学生拥有关于营利性项目成本和预期收益的完整且客观的信息，可以改善弱势学生的高等教育机会，并对抗营利性学院激进且可能具有误导性的招生行为。
