July 02, 2015
By ANNE FLAHERTY
Associated Press
Exotic dancers hired as admissions counselors. Recruiters told to seek out "impatient" individuals who have "few people in their lives who care about them." Military personnel still recovering from brain damage told to sign on the dotted line.
In the two decades since trade schools started popping up on U.S. stock exchanges to maximize profits, allegations of misconduct have been rampant. On July 1, new rules went into effect for any school with a career-training program. Graduates have to be able to earn enough money to repay their student loans, or a school risks losing access to financial aid. In general, annual loan payments shouldn't exceed 20 percent of a graduate's discretionary income or 8 percent of total earnings.
It's a modest step, consumer advocates say, that will probably succeed in shutting down the most obviously fraudulent programs, often criminal justice and medical training programs that can cost as much as $75,000 but aren't sought after by employers. Still, the government's new definition for "gainful employment" is unlikely to change what's become a complicated, enduring problem in the U.S.
Too many poor kids, mostly minorities, are reaching adulthood with little education, no prospect of attending a four-year traditional college and not enough time, money or knowhow to figure out an alternative path through a local community college. What these students do have is eligibility for government-backed student loans and grants, making them targets for predatory lending schemes that look much like tactics used by subprime lenders during the housing crisis.
Meanwhile, there remains little appetite in Congress and the White House to wade into the business of deciding which diplomas and schools are worthwhile. House and Senate Republicans have proposed blocking enforcement of the regulations, while the White House said it's backing off from the idea of developing its own college ratings plan.
"This is a civil rights issue, plain and simple," said Maura Dundon, senior policy council at the Center for Responsible Lending, which estimates that 28 percent of black students studying for a four-year degree are enrolled at a for-profit college compared to only 10 percent of white students.
For-profit schools say they are meeting a need of students looking for job training.
"Who else in higher education is educating these students? I have yet to get a cogent answer to this," said Noah Black, a spokesman for the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities, or APSCU, a group that represents the $30 billion-a-year industry and sued unsuccessfully to block the regulations.
Republicans in Congress have swung behind the industry, saying the Education Department's debt-to-earnings ratio doesn't make sense.
"If every graduate in the University of Tennessee's political science program were to come work on Capitol Hill, then that program would be shut down," said Sen. Lamar Alexander, who chairs the committee that oversees education and labor issues.
Well intentioned or not, the unfettered rise of for-profit colleges since the 1990s is costing taxpayers. For-profit schools consistently take in more federal loan money than nonprofit schools, despite enrolling a smaller number of students. Yet, for-profit students also account for 47 percent of all federal student loan defaults, according to a 2012 Senate investigation.
In addition to loan defaults, state and federal investigations have turned up widespread allegations of fraud and deceptive business practices, particularly in the case of the now-defunct for-profit chain Corinthian Colleges. The findings have been so startling that last month the Education Department launched a major consumer bailout program and appointed a "special master" to oversee debt relief for students.
Certain Corinthian-related programs, including those at Heald College, were deemed so unfair and predatory that the Education Department set up a website to make the process of debt relief easier for those students. Officials estimate bad debt resulting from Heald College at about $542 million.
The total could climb. The Education Department estimates it loaned some $3.6 billion in the past five years to Corinthian students before the government forced it to sell or close its campuses.
Other for-profits too are showing signs of trouble: ITT Educational Services, Education Management Corp., University of Phoenix, Career Education Corp., Kaplan and DeVry University are among those that have disclosed to shareholders that they are or have been subjects of investigations by state or federal authorities.
"These are our taxpayer dollars that form federal student loans, that are used to educate people and supposedly place them in jobs. When did that cease to be a public trust?" said Jack Conway, the state attorney general in Kentucky and the leader of a working group of 37 states investigating for-profit schools.
The latest regulations have so far survived two challenges in court, but include what reform advocates say is still a big loophole: The regulations only consider graduates of a program and whether they can find employment. The rules don't consider how many students attend a school and drop out, either because they were never qualified in the first place or because they realized the program wasn't going to get them a job.
White House officials said the rules are the toughest viable legal option at a time when many lawmakers are defending the industry. They estimate the regulation will affect some 841,000 students enrolled in training programs that won't result in employment.
"This industry is well-funded, has powerful backers in Congress and has worked relentlessly to avoid even the most commonsense measures," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said. "But today, despite their efforts, new safeguards for students become a reality."
APSCU's Black said the administration's focus on employment makes the regulations unfair. Nonprofit public and private colleges churn out numerous degrees that don't immediately translate into jobs, he said.
"By whose metric are these worthless degrees?" he asked.
June 25, 2015
By Judy Lin
Associated Press
Gov. Jerry Brown signed a spending plan this week that uses California’s growing surplus to fund new initiatives aimed at providing relief to the poor.
The new budget beginning next month will establish an earned income tax credit for working-poor families, boost the number of state-subsidized child care slots and expand state-funded health care coverage to children from low-income families who are in the country illegally.
The state also will adopt an amnesty program for residents who can't afford to pay off spiraling court fines and traffic penalties that have resulted in 4.8 million driver's license suspensions since 2006.
Brown announced the signing with a brief message on Twitter. The governor included a photo of himself with his fellow Democratic leaders, Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins of San Diego and Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon of Los Angeles.
A subsequent news release from his office called it “a balanced, on-time budget that saves billions of dollars and pays down debt, while directing more resources to schools and low-income Californians.”
Lawmakers passed a compromise $115.4 billion budget last week to meet Brown’s demands for fiscal restraint by agreeing to use a lower projection for state revenues. Legislative leaders also got to fund their priority social programs to help those who have missed out on the state's economic recovery.
Atkins, in a statement, called the result “a prudent and progressive budget that will make California a better place to live, work and play.”
The new budget, which totals $167.6 billion when adding in special and bond funds, allocates billions more for schools — from kindergarten through community college — and channels additional money to schools with high levels of poor children and English-language learners. Public colleges and universities are also getting more support in exchange for undergraduate tuition freezes.
Republicans had a mixed reaction. While they liked using Brown's lower overall budget figure and setting aside more money for the rainy day fund, GOP members worry the state is still carrying too much debt, particularly for public employee pensions and their retirement health benefits.
“I remain concerned that the record high spending levels will not be sustainable in the near future, and I disagree with some of the priorities in this budget plan,” Senate Minority Leader Bob Huff, R-San Dimas, said.
Although the budget is complete, the governor and lawmakers still have financial decisions to make.
The Legislature has convened two special sessions to address how California pays for roads, highways and other infrastructure, as well as financial fixes to Medi-Cal, the state’s health care program for the poor, which covers more than 12 million Californians, or nearly one-third of the state population.
The governor and legislative leaders also were unable to reach agreement on how to spend a growing pot of money collected from the state’s landmark effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Cap-and-trade funding was taken out of the budget to give them more time to negotiate a way to spend that money.
In signing the budget, Brown sparingly used his veto authority to trim $1.3 million in spending, mostly to reduce funding for the restoration of Clear Lake in Lake County. Brown said there are existing grants available to support the project.
He also rejected a provision to pay the cities of Sacramento and West Sacramento $15 million to take ownership of Tower Bridge, a yellow vertical lift bridge that leads to the state Capitol.
Brown said he supports the state relinquishing the bridge but believes it should be negotiated with the state transportation department.
June 18, 2015
City News Service
The median price of a home in Los Angeles County rose by 5.4 percent in May, compared with the same month a year ago, while the number of homes sold edged up by 1.4 percent, a real estate information service announced. According to CoreLogic, the median price of a Los Angeles County home was $485,000 last month, up from $460,000 in May 2014. A total of 7,153 homes were sold in the county, up from 7,051 during the same month the previous year. In Orange County, the median price was $610,000 last month, up 2.5 percent from $595,000 in May 2014. The number of homes sold rose by 7.4 percent, from 3,219 in May 2014 to 3,458 last month.
A total of 21,644 new and resale houses and condos changed hands in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino and Orange counties last month, according to CoreLogic. That was down 1.7 percent from 22,020 in April and up 4.9 percent from 20,627 in May 2014. The median price for a Southern California home was $426,000 in May, down 0.7 percent from $429,000 in April and up 2.2 percent from $417,000 in May 2014.
“Home price gains continue to run at much lower levels than a year ago, when most counties logged double-digit annual increases in their median sale price,” said Andrew LePage, a data analyst for CoreLogic.
“The 2.2 percent annual gain in Southern California’s median price last month was the lowest in three years, but that’s partly because of a shift in market mix, with a higher share of sales occurring in more affordable areas.”
June 11, 2015
By James Clingman
NNPA Columnist
“In the Northern states, we are not slaves to individuals, not personal slaves, yet in many ways we are slaves of the community…It is more than a figure of speech to say that we are a people chained together. We are one people – one in general complexion type, one in degradation, one in popular estimation. As one rises, all must rise, and as one falls all must fall. Having now, our feet on the rock of freedom, we must drag our brethren from the slimy depths of slavery, ignorance, and ruin. Every one of us should be ashamed to consider himself free, while his brother is a slave.” Frederick Douglass
One conclusion I have drawn from working in the collective economic empowerment vineyard for years is that “We” fail because “I” gets in the way. Black folks adore the statement, “I am because we are, and because we are, therefore, I am.” Oh, if we would live by that statement rather than merely recite it. Frederick Douglass and other ancestors knew they were all in this thing together, and that no Black man or woman would rise without the rest of us rising. Have we come so far since his time that we no longer believe in the collective? Have we achieved so much and risen so high as individuals that we have lost sight of our brothers and sisters?
Considering how we are so into words these days, I thought it appropriate to offer a change in how we perceive and use the word “We.” Each of us should adopt the thought that there is an “I” in “We” and realize, as our forefathers and mothers did, no matter the level of anyone’s individual success, he or she is still included in the “We.” That way we can eliminate much of the ego that tends to separate us from one another.
The “I,” when it stands alone, is dangerous. It is rife with self-aggrandizement, self-delusion, vulnerability, and sometimes self-destruction due to its tendency to make an individual think his or her success was obtained without the help of anyone else. But add the “I” to the word “We” and watch what happens. The “I” is still successful, and it uplifts the “We” by its individual success.
The “We” is strong. It overflows with self-reliance, self-determination, love, trust, respect, and cooperation. The collective aspects of success, whether one person attains it or everyone in the group attains it, fills the “We” with pride and the “I” with strength to do even more. Thus, I would assert to you that there is an “I” in the word, “We;” it’s a small “i” and it’s silent.
The “I” is silent, not in the sense that it never speaks out or never does anything for itself as an individual, but rather it appreciates and respects the “We” so much that it is willing to make individual sacrifices to uplift the “We.” Just as Frederick Douglass said, “As one rises, all must rise…” He understood his obligation to his people and acted upon it, irrespective of the fact that he had attained tremendous success and was “accepted” in social and political circles in which his brothers and sisters were rejected. Jackie Robinson said, “We might make it as individuals, but I think we have to be concerned about the masses of [Black] people.” Both men understood the inside-outside game quite well.
While Douglass was unwilling to do what Harriet Tubman and John Brown did, he knew Black people needed a spokesperson, a protest organ, and he was not afraid to tell it like it was and speak truth to power, as he did in his newspaper, The North Star and his famous July 4th speech: “What is it to me?” he asked. Although Douglass was an “inside” man, he heaped praise on “outsider,” Harriet Tubman, in a written tribute to her: “I have had the applause of the crowd and the satisfaction of being approved by the multitude, while the most that you have done has been witnessed by a few trembling, scarred, foot-sore bondmen and women, whom you have led out of the house of bondage.”
The inside-outside strategy worked well for those two stalwarts and with many other historical figures. What about us today? Are those on the inside so comfortable that they think they are not vulnerable to the same treatment the outsiders are receiving? Are the outsiders so envious of the “success” of the insiders that they spend their waking hours trying to bring the insiders down?
If we adopt the notion that there is, indeed, an “i” in “We,” the battles Black people are fighting in this country will be won. Group ego beats individual ego any day. To remind us, let’s change the spelling of “We” to “Wie.”