U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Rohit Chopra, former student-loan ombudsman at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and current senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, met on Tuesday to discuss enhancing oversight of for-profit colleges.
They discussed ideas such as closing loopholes that allow for-profit colleges and unaccredited schools to recoup millions in taxpayer dollars without delivering acceptable educational value. In some cases, unaccredited schools have been receiving G.I. benefits despite federal regulations in place to prevent this.
“Federal oversight agencies can barely keep pace with an industry whose primary focus seems to be finding new ways of exploiting federal education programs to access taxpayer dollars,” Durbin said. “Now we have evidence that even unaccredited institutions have found a loophole allowing them to fleece taxpayers while taking advantage of America’s veterans. This is disgusting. I appreciate the efforts of investigative reporters and advocates like Rohit Chopra, who not only work to expose the abuses of this industry, but also propose solutions. It’s time for Congress to wake up and put an end to this gravy train.”
Last week, Durbin spoke on the Senate floor, calling on the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs to crack down on such abuses.
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