Dear Friends,
This beautiful city San Diego has been the home to a disproportionate percentage of financial appearing felons and shady deal makers. Ponzi appearing schemes in finance have been a local culture over the years and now higher education is following suit with its own version of the same....
There is a behemoth for profit _____University here headquartered in San Diego which is under deep scrutiny by the US Senate Education Committee, under Senator Tom Harkin's leadership. The CEO of this organization calling itself a university took home $20 million, 20 times that of Harvard's. President. Mostly the source is federal money, i.e.. taxpayers' support.
To what extent is such borderline educational trickery invading the whole higher education industry? Well, it may just be a national scam of proportions. The US Senate Education Committee is moving forward and will bring it all out into the sunshine from the shade.
There are two other smaller institutions in San Diego, both for profit institutions, which enroll hundreds maybe thousands of foreign students, skirting the law. It is possible to "buy an I-20," the document that is the on-ramp to the student visa, for about $300 per month. These students sign up for classes which may or may not meet. Many of the students work illegally and just do not study. They make a mockery of the good schools where students abide by the rules and the regulations.
Maybe about 1000 international students are at the bottom of the educational hierarchy in this beautiful city, seeking their living in marginal jobs while they pay a few hundred dollars per month to be able to be "a student in good standing". In Pleasanton, California last month, March, 2011, an entire bogus school was busted by the feds and many students were taken to the airports in shackles...many of the 1000 students scrambled to find other real schools...There was a nationwide federal alert about these students.
But, in San Diego, folks and friends, we have two bogus schools operating here and now in downtown and old town ...does anyone care...the State, INS, SEVIS, ICE, Accreditation? It is a sham. When we as a real school conduct our affairs with good practices and tradition, we see these several schools continue to enroll the students who want cheap schedules and false programs, i.e., non existing real programs that look like the real thing. We follow standards to a T, and watch these violators in broad daylight and sunshine!
Who allows shady places where abuse of students and this gray-market student system can flourish....? Is this the San Diego we wish to show to the nation and to our families and children. Why have we not seen the FBI, SEVIS, INS, ICE, the State of California jump in to close them down? Is someone saying that this is not good for the city and sitting on this? Is the system itself able to defend itself with executive bullies or bullied up business models?
Imagine if you witnessed a thief trying to steal your own or your neighbor's car. You watch.... What will you do? Will you just say, let him deal with it, its not my problem....OR, will you care to jump in to stop this?
So, there are foreign owned "schools" which are modified diploma mills and safe harbors for international students wanting to work, not study, in the US economy. They operate in sunny daylight in San Diego......and another in North County selling degrees in Vietnam with no US approval to do so.
We care. I care very much about this and the abuse we see. I care that our public enforcers are not doing the job. By not doing so, the authorities are actually encouraging more abuse.
California was a place at one time where there was a chaos of higher education and nearly no regulation. Distance education muddies the water. We are back almost to where we started .
What is needed is a hard and tough conclusion to this Senate Investigation. Harkin needs to push for serious reform and overhaul regional and national accreditation systems that have no current similarity or uniformity. No one is talking about the ultimate elephant in the room, a single federal accreditation system. It would be a tsunami of jobs and egos and turf that would be swept away in a true investigation....
Will the Harkin LEADERSHIP TEAM BE ABLE TO CARRY REFORM ALL THE WAY? It may. But, it may not because it may be buried by other news items. Senator Harkin's work must not be lost in the Washington shuffle.....
Accreditation is the next behemoth in the room to fix. There are such disparities across the various systems.
Why has not the system been cleaned of violators. Banks would be so cleaned.....power plants would be so cleaned....Higher Education is untouchable....even with foreign owners with contempt, shady practices will flourish where shady people are. Even in beautiful cities.
So, until the students and families just get wise and wake up, they will blindly pay and subject themselves to a series of bogus places and shady faces who will look down and never be proud in the true sun....
Dr. Mike McManus, Ph.D.
President
California International Business University
This beautiful city San Diego has been the home to a disproportionate percentage of financial appearing felons and shady deal makers. Ponzi appearing schemes in finance have been a local culture over the years and now higher education is following suit with its own version of the same....
There is a behemoth for profit _____University here headquartered in San Diego which is under deep scrutiny by the US Senate Education Committee, under Senator Tom Harkin's leadership. The CEO of this organization calling itself a university took home $20 million, 20 times that of Harvard's. President. Mostly the source is federal money, i.e.. taxpayers' support.
To what extent is such borderline educational trickery invading the whole higher education industry? Well, it may just be a national scam of proportions. The US Senate Education Committee is moving forward and will bring it all out into the sunshine from the shade.
There are two other smaller institutions in San Diego, both for profit institutions, which enroll hundreds maybe thousands of foreign students, skirting the law. It is possible to "buy an I-20," the document that is the on-ramp to the student visa, for about $300 per month. These students sign up for classes which may or may not meet. Many of the students work illegally and just do not study. They make a mockery of the good schools where students abide by the rules and the regulations.
Maybe about 1000 international students are at the bottom of the educational hierarchy in this beautiful city, seeking their living in marginal jobs while they pay a few hundred dollars per month to be able to be "a student in good standing". In Pleasanton, California last month, March, 2011, an entire bogus school was busted by the feds and many students were taken to the airports in shackles...many of the 1000 students scrambled to find other real schools...There was a nationwide federal alert about these students.
But, in San Diego, folks and friends, we have two bogus schools operating here and now in downtown and old town ...does anyone care...the State, INS, SEVIS, ICE, Accreditation? It is a sham. When we as a real school conduct our affairs with good practices and tradition, we see these several schools continue to enroll the students who want cheap schedules and false programs, i.e., non existing real programs that look like the real thing. We follow standards to a T, and watch these violators in broad daylight and sunshine!
Who allows shady places where abuse of students and this gray-market student system can flourish....? Is this the San Diego we wish to show to the nation and to our families and children. Why have we not seen the FBI, SEVIS, INS, ICE, the State of California jump in to close them down? Is someone saying that this is not good for the city and sitting on this? Is the system itself able to defend itself with executive bullies or bullied up business models?
Imagine if you witnessed a thief trying to steal your own or your neighbor's car. You watch.... What will you do? Will you just say, let him deal with it, its not my problem....OR, will you care to jump in to stop this?
So, there are foreign owned "schools" which are modified diploma mills and safe harbors for international students wanting to work, not study, in the US economy. They operate in sunny daylight in San Diego......and another in North County selling degrees in Vietnam with no US approval to do so.
We care. I care very much about this and the abuse we see. I care that our public enforcers are not doing the job. By not doing so, the authorities are actually encouraging more abuse.
California was a place at one time where there was a chaos of higher education and nearly no regulation. Distance education muddies the water. We are back almost to where we started .
What is needed is a hard and tough conclusion to this Senate Investigation. Harkin needs to push for serious reform and overhaul regional and national accreditation systems that have no current similarity or uniformity. No one is talking about the ultimate elephant in the room, a single federal accreditation system. It would be a tsunami of jobs and egos and turf that would be swept away in a true investigation....
Will the Harkin LEADERSHIP TEAM BE ABLE TO CARRY REFORM ALL THE WAY? It may. But, it may not because it may be buried by other news items. Senator Harkin's work must not be lost in the Washington shuffle.....
Accreditation is the next behemoth in the room to fix. There are such disparities across the various systems.
Why has not the system been cleaned of violators. Banks would be so cleaned.....power plants would be so cleaned....Higher Education is untouchable....even with foreign owners with contempt, shady practices will flourish where shady people are. Even in beautiful cities.
So, until the students and families just get wise and wake up, they will blindly pay and subject themselves to a series of bogus places and shady faces who will look down and never be proud in the true sun....
Dr. Mike McManus, Ph.D.
President
California International Business University
