school is being monitored for shaky finances

[cheeseandcrackers]

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Hey all,
I just saw an article about the list of schools the US Board of Education is monitoring due to shaky finances. http://www.marketwatch.com/story/he...ir-shaky-finances-2015-04-03?dist=tbeforebell
And the school I'm attending, University of St. Au Gustine in San Marcos, is listed as one of the schools! Anyone have any input or feedback on whether this is safe or not? Anyone who's attended USA and can reflect on their time there? And if they encountered anything shady?
My tuition is on the line. Thank you for any responses!

 

[Archline]

Whoa, that was interesting to look at the list. Thanks for posting!

USA San Marco is HCM1 for financial responsibility. Yes that could be something to worry about, I would read up on what it entails. Maybe contact the school, as an accepted student you deserve some answers.

 

[okramango]

I always thought it was strange that they don't offer the Grad Plus loan. A few years ago, they claimed on their website that they planned to offer it "within a few months", but that eventually disappeared. Strange.

 

[foodislife]

Yes you should worry somewhat. IMO the lack of Grad Plus loans is a huge red flag. This makes school significantly more expensive because you won't qualify for student loan forgiveness or income based repayment on anything beyond $20,500/year. With what PTs get paid this could bury you in debt.

I worked in higher Ed for 5 years as an instructor at a community college and learned that many colleges are predatory when it come to launching degree programs (ex. PT/OT combined degree) because of the way federal loans are currently structured. Right now there is a huge loophole that actually incentivies school to raise tuition. Georgetown law first exploited this loophole. You can read about it here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...law-gets-uncle-sam-to-pay-its-students-bills/

Anyway, many schools are being scrutinized because it seems obvious they are using this loophole, or some version of it, to fund to get the federal government to fund a huge proportion of their operations. A lot of school do this, Medical schools are actually the worst offenders. I'll give you a personal example of this in another post.



So, St. Augustine may be one of these schools. This doesn't mean that they don't provide a good education, but it may mean that they have some less than ethical people running there university...

The bottom line is that if you are counting on federal loans to pay for your education, you better be sure they are allowed to offer enough to cover your tuition and other expenses.

 

[scrawnyguy]

Hey all,
I just saw an article about the list of schools the US Board of Education is monitoring due to shaky finances. http://www.marketwatch.com/story/he...ir-shaky-finances-2015-04-03?dist=tbeforebell
And the school I'm attending, University of St. Au Gustine in San Marcos, is listed as one of the schools! Anyone have any input or feedback on whether this is safe or not? Anyone who's attended USA and can reflect on their time there? And if they encountered anything shady?
My tuition is on the line. Thank you for any responses!

I would definitely be hesitant. Something similar happened at the school I went to for my undergrad. Apparently the president ran the place like it was his own personal piggy bank. They were put on probation and later lost accreditation after I graduated. My degree is accredited but it doesn't look great. I ended up getting another degree. The whole situation caused me to lose the little bit of hair I had left.

 

[starrsgirl]

^^^similar situation....only for me I just took pre req classes at a school that lost accreditation (finances AND other issues I believe). It was a bit of a pain during application time. Luckily, it worked out for me and I generally had a more current retake of the classes from there anyway so I didn't get pressed....but even getting my transcript from them was hard.

 

[GoSparta]

I interviewed there this summer, and the faculty was really great. The students seemed cool as well. I declined my acceptance for the reason that they did not have the Grad PLUS Loan. I also got a vibe where the university felt like a business rather than a school; that's just my own feeling. I was also told that the licensure pass rate was 96% during the interviews, but their official acceptance packet showed it was in the mid-high 80's for the 2012 and 2013 classes.

Saying that, I know A LOT of great PT's from there that I talk to frequently about injuries. They are awesome. They loved it there.