Education Department discharges $1.5 billion for 79,000 former Westwood College students
Source: Yahoo! Finance
Yahoo Money
Student loans: Education Department discharges $1.5 billion for 79,000 former Westwood College students
Ronda Lee
Tue, August 30, 2022 at 1:24 PM
The Education Department (ED) is discharging $1.5 billion in student loans for 79,000 former defrauded students who attended for-profit Westwood College from January 1, 2002, through November 17, 2015, when it stopped enrolling new students before closing September 2016. ... Even if borrowers have not applied for a borrower defense discharge, relief will be granted without any additional actions by borrowers.
This action follows a two-year investigation into Westwood’s conduct, which had previously resulted in the approval of $130 million in borrower defense discharges for approximately 4,000 borrowers, according to Tuesday’s press release from ED. It also follows President Joe Biden’s measures last week to stem the student loan crisis, including forgiving up to $20,000 in debt.
“Westwood College’s exploitation of students and abuse of federal financial aid place it in the same circle of infamy occupied by Corinthian Colleges and ITT Technical Institute,” James Kvaal, ED’s under secretary, said in a statement. “Westwood operated on a culture of false promises, lies, and manipulation in order to profit off student debt that burdened borrowers long after Westwood closed. The Biden-Harris Administration will continue ramping up oversight and accountability to protect students and taxpayers from abuse and ensure that executives who commit such harm never work at institutions that receive federal financial aid again.”
Westwood College made "substantial misrepresentations" about job placement rates to its students, according to ED’s findings, including “misleading guarantees” about getting jobs in their field of study and “assurances of unrealistic post-graduation salaries,” extensive misrepresentations that its criminal justice program would lead to jobs with the the Chicago Police Department or the Illinois State Police Department, and exaggerations about “the transferability of its credits” when the institution knew those credits “would rarely transfer.”
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Read more: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/student-loans-discharges-westwood-college-students-172413411.html
Where did the money go?
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