Someone with more time and money than me has created a great web resource for potential students about the difference in missions among institutional types. Now y’all can stop sending all your cousins to talk to me.:)
Visit www.forprofitu.org for more clear, insightful information like this:
Q: I’ve never heard of Education Management Corporation. What is it?
A: Education Management Corporation (EDMC) ranks as one of the largest for-profit education companies. Based in Pittsburgh, it runs 105 colleges across the country. Lots of students, lots of money.
Q: Why should I care that my college is operated by a corporation?
A: As a corporation, EDMC’s CEO and Board of Directors are influenced by Wall Street, and their mission is to make a profit. Education may be secondary. How do they make a profit? They get federal student loans and tuition payments of students. Then they spend some on students’ education and the rest is profit. This often comes at the expense of students, who accumulate mountains of debt from student loans and can often fail to graduate with a degree. Unlike at non-profit colleges and universities, your student payments are going towards the profit of a company, rather than only towards your education.