Tracking successes, trends at trade schools
Standing out amid the few grey columns of help-wanted blurbs in my Sunday paper is a quarter-page multi-colored patchwork of come-ons for trade and technical schools.
“Out of work or laid off? Get certified in 6-12 months” shouts New Horizons, which promises careers in project management and security. “We specialize in displaced workers.”
U.S. Truck Driver Training School Inc. promises guaranteed employment, great pay, job security and benefits. Superior Medical Education says you can “Be an Emergency Medical Technician in only 1 Semester! Payment plans available.” Meanwhile Kaplan Career Institute offers “freedom and independence” as an electrical technician, or “ a career helping people” as a medical assistant.
With so many displaced mid-career workers seeking a new niche, as well as the usual crop of post-high-school students looking for practical career training in lieu of a liberal arts degree, the for-profit education business is booming.
For workers, there’s security in learning a trade or personal service skill like massage therapy, which can’t be outsourced or computerized. For investors, some analysts have suggested that shares of publicly traded education firms are “recession proof” and reports suggest they’ve been attracting more attention in the last year or so from large private-equity firms fleeing traditional industries.
National enrollment figures are difficult to nail down because there’s an overlap between the wholly private programs and those run by public institutions such as community colleges.
The statistics problem is compounded by a rather mazelike oversight system including state boards, national accrediting bodies and other agencies. The best source I could find is this state-by-state, 82-page directory of higher ed officials at the Council of Recognized National Accrediting Agencies site.
While you’ll have to nail down some enrollment figures now that the semester is under way, the numbers aren’t as compelling as the stories behind the students. This topic screams out for a multi-media package with video of hands-on training, interviews with displaced workers describing the pros and cons of a career change, a regional interactive map showing school locations, a consumer caveats fact box, links to schools and other elements.
Check with your state’s attorney general about scams associated with trade schools and/or financial “aid” programs.
The U.S. Department of Education has a channel devoted to career and technical schools including consumer and some regulatory information.
You can search for trade schools in your zip code radius via the DOE’s Career Navigator tool. (Hint: click on “2-year or less” in the ‘institution type’ field to focus the search on commercial trade schools.)
Other resources include:
The Career College Association — a trade group for vocational schools and for-profit operators like the University of Phoenix
The Association for Career and Technical Education, while primarily addressing high-school programs, does offer substantive state-by-state information about dual-enrollment programs, ethics and the like.
This education stocks index by TickerSpy will give you a lead on major publicly traded players in the for-profit school market; click on their ticker symbols for corporate info.
The Council on Higher Education Accreditation has several articles about “degree mills” and links to similar material at the state level.
