The novel growth of for-profit edu...

The novel growth of for-profit educational providers has been undivided of the most watched tendency s in higher education (Blumenstyk, 2000; Burd 1998; Selingo, 1999; Strosnider, 1998) Despite the widespread attention, surprisingly little complex information exists about the for-profit phenomenon. Although the for-profit sector is not the simply source of new competition in higher education, the highly publicized vegetation of some forprofit institutions has generated increasing anxiety among the one and the other private non-profit and public bodys and universities.

To develop a better understanding of for what cause these institutions compare to public community society s with respect to their pupils and programs, the Community literary institution [i]or[/i] seminary of learning Research Center joined with the National Center for Postsecondary Improvement (NCPI) to manner of life a two-year study. The objective was to determine whether these pair types of institutions are competitive or complementary and by what means community colleges have responded to the growing of the for-profits.

The cogitation contrasted national data on for-profits with national data forward private non-profit and public postsecondary institutions, and examined case studious mood data comparing a high-quality for-profit chain - which we call Tech college edifice [i]or[/i] building - to three public community guilds located near branches of the chain.

Overall, the consideration identified two significant conclusions. Our analysis of available data indicates that although for-profit enrollment are growing, the market share remains small. The for-profits are not likely to become a major competitive threat to overall community guild enrollments in the foreseeable what may occur hereafter The increase in community community enrollments in the mid- to late-1990s outdoed the total for-profit enrollment in the two-year sector. nevertheless our case study suggests that the for-profit experience has important rebukes for community colleges, especially with regard to student services, program flexibility, the use of data for program improvement, curriculum growth and a focus on outcomes

Three Principal Questions about the For-Profits

Our application of mind addressed three main questions: (1) Does the expansion of for-profits threaten the enrollment base of community associations and other sectors of higher education? (2) Have for-profits expanded a more flexible and responsive regularity of delivering postsecondary educational services, especially to adult students? (3) Compared to public community society s what is the quality of education provided by means of for-profits?

The growth of for-profits as a competitive threat.

A 2001 report through the Education Commission of the States (ECS) points to a 78 percent pullulation in the number of for-profit two-year degree-granting institutions between 1989 and 1999 In the same period, the number of for-profit four-year institutions grew through an impressive 266 percent (Kelly 2001) According to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) 28 percent of all two-year stage granting institutions were for-profits according to the end of the 1990 (U Department of Education, 1999) In our opinion, an examination of enrollment patterns at hands a more meaningful picture.

Thus, we considered national data from the Integrated Postsecondary Educational Data regularity (IPEDS) (U.S. Department of Education, 1999) which provides a certain number of baseline comparison among three sectors: public, private not-for-profit, and for-profit institutions. Each sector is in cause to deviate divided among two- and four-year institutions. Community society s are in the two-year public category.

Student Populations: First, minorities, especially blacks and Hispanics, account for a larger share of for-profit enrollment than they do in either of the other sum of two units sectors. second, women are concentrated among the two-year for-profits. This may mirror the large number of cosmetology programs in this sector, although the accuracy of these data may be suspect since many for-profits did not report data in succession gender. Community colleges are from far the most important providers of education for part-time students

Enrollment at Two-Year Institutions. Based forward enrollments, the for-profit sector is and nothing else a minor player among two-year institutions. Moreover, for-profit enrollment actually dropp between 1992 and 1997 and while total enrollment among two-year institutions also inhuman the for-profits accounted for a smaller share of enrollment in 1997 than they did in 1992 It is also clear that a large majority of observers in two-year for-profit institutions are in place of educations that are not regionally accredited.

Enrollment at Four-Year Institutions. The for profits account for les than 2 percent of four-year enrollment nevertheless their total enrollments and enrollment shares in the four-year category grew between 1992 and 1997 Moreover, in sharp contrast to the two-year for-profits, about 60 percent of the scholars in four-year for-profits are chronicleed in regionally accredited institutions.

The vegetation rate of the four-year for-profits does give the impression that they at hand a serious and growing competitive threat. For example, EC (Kelly 2001) points on the outside that forprofit enrollment grew at 59 percent between 1989 and 1999 while enrollment in the public institutions (both two- and four-year) grew by dint of only 6 percent. While this is certainly a large difference, the product of forprofits started from of the like kind a low base that the 6 percent vegetation in the public sector enrollment actually delineates a larger number of scholars (600,000) than the total for-profit enrollment level after the growth (366,000).