"University of Phoenix parent company to go private in $1.1b deal" by Danielle Douglas-Gabriel Washington Post February 08, 2016
Apollo Education Group, the publicly traded owner of the University of Phoenix, has agreed to be taken private by a group of investors in a $1.1 billion deal.
The agreement arrives weeks after the company reported a decline in revenue and another round of layoffs at the for-profit college. Phoenix, like other for-profit schools, has been battered by poor enrollment, government investigations, and heightened federal regulation.
One of the world’s largest private education companies, Apollo got its start in 1973. The company, based in Phoenix, runs schools that provide undergraduate, graduate, and career training throughout the United States, Asia, Africa, Australia, Europe, and Latin America.
Profits at Apollo have continued to slide over the last few years, with the company posting an operating loss of $61 million in the quarter ending Nov. 30. Sluggish enrollment at the University of Phoenix has put a damper on revenue.
The university has been at the center of several state and federal investigations into its recruitment and marketing practices. Late last year, the Defense Department suspended the school from recruiting on military bases and accessing federal education funding after it allegedy violated an executive order preventing for-profit colleges from gaining preferential access to the military.
Earlier this month, the Defense Department lifted the ban but said it would continue to monitor the school, the largest recipient of federal student aid for veterans, taking in nearly $1.2 billion in GI Bill benefits since 2009. Phoenix is still under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission for allegedly deceptive advertising and marketing. The regulator requested information about the school’s military recruitment, enrollment, and student retention, among other things.
It's the AmeriKan way those vets are fighting for!!!!
That's how they bring you the wars!!
Apollo is not the first company to go private in an attempt to save a flagging business.
But they do have wonderful television advertisements.
Education Management Corp., which operates the Art Institutes, Argosy University, Brown Mackie College, and South University, went private in 2006, using the flush of new capital to grow its online business. The move, however, was not enough to shield the school from a downturn in business. And it went public again in 2009.
‘‘As we’ve seen in the past with EDMC, taking one of these companies private doesn’t always result in better results down the line,’’ said Ben Miller, senior director for postsecondary education at the Center for American Progress. ‘‘On the positive side, [Apollo] going private should mean less pressure for quarterly targets that could have led to bad behavior, like pursuing students at all costs. On the downside, it means a lot less transparency.’’
Oh, so the government will be looted for even more money in the name of $erving veterans.
Hasn't the memory-holed VA scandal taught anyone anything?
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