Last week, eight attorneys general called on the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to seek better protections for veterans defrauded by predatory institutions, CBS reported.
In a letter to VA Secretary Robert McDonald, the attorneys general of California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Mexico, Illinois, Oregon, Kentucky, and Washington urged the agency to use its authority to restore educational and vocational rehabilitation benefits to veterans who fell prey to deceptive and misleading enrollment tactics carried out by the now-defunct Corinthian Colleges and other for-profit schools.
While the U.S. Education Department (ED) has agreed to discharge student loans for some former Corinthian College students and is currently in the midst of negotiated rulemaking to determine how those students will get relief, the attorneys general ask the Department of Veterans Affairs to do its part.
"Rather than being honored, the veterans who enrolled in Corinthian schools were cheated out of these benefits," the letter states. "ED has acted to remedy the harms suffered by student borrowers who were defrauded by Corinthian and other unscrupulous institutions—we respectfully urge you to act in harmony with your sister agencies and offer similar relief to student veterans who were harmed by precisely the same misconduct."
Veterans have long been prime targets for unscrupulous for-profit colleges and their recruitment officers, thanks in part to federal funding provisions. The letter notes that veterans' education benefits do not count toward the federal 90/10 rule that limits for-profit colleges to receiving a maximum of 90 percent of their revenue from Title IV federal student aid sources.
The attorneys general argue that for-profit schools, such as Corinthian, "specifically target and prey on student veterans through recruitment events using false promises of job prospects and dishonest job placement rates . . . Moreover, student veterans often find themselves with limited to no benefits remaining, leaving them unsupported in reaching their educational and career goals."
The letter also calls on the VA to ensure that veterans have access to full and accurate information when choosing a school and to support states' efforts to protect veterans from misconduct by for-profit institutions.
Related Links
Letter to U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
https://oag.ca.gov/sites/all/files/agweb/pdfs/va-multi-state-letter.pdf
CBS SF Bay Area
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2016/02/29/attorney-generals-call-for-benefit-restoration-for-veterans-victimized-by-predatory-for-profit-colleges/