In 2012, the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions issued a report on for-profit higher education, which by then enrolled some 2 million students, 10 percent of degree matriculants in the United States. Targeting single moms, veterans, dislocated and unemployed workers with low incomes and inadequate academic preparation who qualified for federally-funded grants and loans, the for-profit colleges and universities provided substandard teaching and virtually no counseling or academic services, the committee revealed. Over half of the students in these institutions withdrew within two years. Graduates found they did not qualify for work in the chosen fields. The default rates of graduates and drop-outs on student loans was 46 percent.

Source: For-profit colleges — but not their student ‘customers’ — have a friend in Betsy DeVos | TheHill