Abstract
Although for-profit education is an important topic in adult education scholarship, information about the way in which for-profit colleges are run and the particular clientele for which they aim has remained largely elusive. In Lower Ed: The Troubling Rise of For-Profit Colleges in the New Economy, Tressie McMillan Cottom argues that for-profit colleges target economically insecure populations, leading them into even deeper financial instability through student debt. A sociologist who has investigated the business strategies of for-profit education, McMillan Cottom critiques for-profit colleges for extracting tuition costs from financially vulnerable individuals with little to no job security, problematizing the way capitalist economists widely consider the for-profit college business healthy for the economy. The American “education gospel,” according to McMillan Cottom, convinces all citizens that education is the key to success. Thus, many people, especially those with fewer job opportunities, are eager to pay for education, even when tuition costs lead them into deeper debt. While working as an enrollment coordinator for two for-profit colleges prior to her scholarly career, she noticed how for-profit colleges attracted single mothers and people of color through specially designed sales pitches. In addition to drawing conclusions about the recruitment methods of these institutions, McMillan Cottom claims that since a for-profit college’s first concern is profit, not education, money received from tuition goes into advertising, stimulating company growth, and increasing the value of its shares rather than improving educational resources.
McMillan Cottom interprets this situation not only as a sociologist and a former enrollment coordinator but also as a Black woman cognizant of the vulnerability of other Black individuals who believe in the education gospel. She arrives at her findings through means such as analyzing sales pitches directed toward her as a Black woman when she applied at a number of for-profit colleges for her research, and by interviewing Black students of for-profit colleges about their experiences in these schools. One point of concern for McMillan Cottom is how those in higher income brackets, particularly her fellow academics, perceive for-profit college students as naive or irresponsible for acquiring student loan debt in pursuit of for-profit college degrees, while, as she argues, this choice is based on their limited available options. Although McMillan Cottom criticizes how these businesses are managed from an ethical perspective, she claims that even if such colleges were outlawed, some other means of for-profit education or professional development would materialize due to the strong need of financially insecure people for increased job security. McMillan Cottom urges that making public higher education more available to Black students would go a long way toward improving the livelihood of Black individuals in the United States.
With regard to the quality of the education for-profit schools provide, McMillan Cottom relies on speculation and commonsense reasoning instead of providing readers with solid research confirming her claim that for-profit degrees are worthless. Overall, her argument hinges on the underlying logic in for-profit education seeking opportunity from economically vulnerable populations, which she supports through several case studies, interviews, and her own experiences in posing as a prospective student for a for-profit college. Readers may wonder why McMillan Cottom did not pursue the very important point of whether for-profit degrees actually have any worth on a résumé or CV (curriculum vitae) with her interviewees or report their responses alongside the other information she collected from them about their for-profit experiences. Data about their job outcomes would have provided vital information about the value of for-profit education. Alternatively, she could have utilized her network of contacts to glean this information from employers themselves, or even followed through as a fake for-profit student to assess the quality of the education in comparison to her own education at a not-for-profit university. Despite this shortcoming in the work, her research clearly indicates not only that for-profit schools intentionally target ethnic minorities, particularly women, but also that the exploitation that results from this contact ultimately boosts the economy, a provocative and compelling ethical argument.
Lower Ed will be of value to those interested in problems of inequality in the higher education system, particularly regarding the limited choices for people of color seeking better job security in the present economy. Adult education scholars concerned with gender and race, social sciences, or higher education in the neoliberal economy will find McMillan Cottom’s work valuable for how it provides new insights into for-profit education, a subject that has been previously understudied. Her most compelling takeaway for adult education scholars may be her indictment of the education gospel as a social problem, which allows corporations to profit from the most financially insecure Americans. McMillan Cottom’s provocative argument alludes to related questions about how public colleges and universities may also support this exploitation by upholding the ideal of education but remaining inaccessible to minority populations financially, as well as through certain kinds of admission criteria.