Dive Brief:
- Besides “heightened cash monitoring,” which has gotten a lot of attention since the Department of Education released the names of schools under the financial scrutiny, the DOE also has two other accountability measures with which to rate institutions.
- The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that only 26 colleges fall into sanctions territory on all three measures, which include the aforementioned cash monitoring, financial responsibility scores, and cohort default rates.
- Knowing the list of institutions under heightened cash monitoring isn’t as helpful as knowing why an institution is on the list or whether it is under any other sanctions, which might provide a fuller picture of the institution’s overall health.
Dive Insight:
After first refusing, the Department of Education revealed a list of nearly 550 colleges and universities under financial scrutiny that limits their access to federal financial aid dollars. For-profit institutions made up more than half of those receiving sanctions and historically black colleges and universities were overrepresented on the list. As the Chronicle explains, however, being under heightened cash monitoring doesn’t say much about an institution. This is brought into sharp relief by the lack of overlap among sanctions categories. It remains to be seen whether colleges will be stigmatized by the list and face falling enrollment, or whether prospective students will ignore the new information all together.