Over the course of two short years and through quiet regulatory actions, many of which have not garnered many headlines, Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has loosened accountability for U.S. schools and colleges, putting millions of students at risk of civil rights abuses and fraudulent financial schemes. Through aggressive use of its regulatory…

The Australian Government provides basic operating grants to universities, which are used to teach domestic undergraduate students. It imposes a productivity offset on the grants to encourage improvements in university productivity. But it is not transparent and does not vary across universities. Thus, universities have little incentive to improve…

This hearing is the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions' fifth oversight hearing on the law to fix No Child Left Behind. This hearing examines issues in the implementation of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), focusing on perspectives from education stakeholders on proposed regulations. Following opening statements by Honorable…

The 90/10 rule dictates that no more than 90 percent of institutional revenue at a for-profit college or university (FPCU) can come from Title IV funds. The rule, originally an 85/15 ratio, was introduced in the 1992 amendments to the Higher Education Act and has been debated for 25 years. Proponents argue the rule raises institutional quality by…

While advocates of the proposed "Gainful Employment" regulations promise a variety of improvements for students attending for-profit colleges and universities (FPCUs), there is little research on how these institutions are responding to this heightened form of accountability. Through interviews with senior executives of FPCUs, we used…

This hearing is the first of six hearings the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions will hold to make sure that the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) is being implemented in the way it was written in the states and school districts. The hearing focuses on the perspective of education leaders. After an opening statement from Honorable…

This document records testimony from a hearing held to learn what actions the Department of Education intends to take to implement the Every Student Succeeds Act and to help ensure the department acts in a manner that strictly adheres to the letter and intent of the law. Under the new law, authority over accountability, teacher quality, and school…

A phenomenon with far-reaching effects on nonprofit investment management and governance has become a little-noticed yet powerful force in boardrooms over the past decade. Despite its wide-ranging implications, this development has largely gone undocumented. This paper seeks to draw attention to this change and its implications, and to trace a…

Enacted in 2014, the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) brought numerous changes to existing federal employment and training programs, including requiring the Department of Labor (DOL) and the Department of Education (Education) to implement a common performance accountability system across the six WIOA-designated core programs. WIOA…

Publicly reporting timely, actionable, and comprehensible education data is one of the most powerful ways states can promote transparency, strengthen accountability, and ensure that everyone with a stake in education--parents, educators, policymakers, and members of the public and press--has access to the information they need to make good…

This article explores issues of school choice in Spain and the United States by examining the roles and functions of "centros concertados," publicly funded private schools in Spain, and public charter schools in the United States, to provide key insights into the similarities and differences between them. After making a national…

This document records testimony from a hearing held to examine the implementation of the promise to restore state and local control over K-12 education through the Every Student Succeeds Act. The passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act puts states and school districts back in charge of education and includes more than 50 pages of provisions to…

The prospect of an IRS 403(b) audit can be daunting, but as the old saying goes, knowing is half the battle. Understanding what to expect during the audit process and having the proper internal controls are the keys to avoiding stress. As part of a traditional IRS 403(b) plan audit, the Internal Revenue Service has requested that plan sponsors…

The purpose of this study was to examine the general trend of education governance in the Canadian province of Ontario since 1995 when the Progressive Conservatives led by Michael Harris formed a new majority government. The article is divided into three sections. The first section provides the context and a historical background of Ontario…

For nearly half a century, the federal government has largely outsourced the determination of which colleges and universities are eligible to receive federal taxpayer money--in the form of student grants and loans--to member-based, geographically oriented accrediting agencies. This outsourcing of responsibility, however, has failed to protect…