During the last presidential race, then-candidate Joe Biden pledged to “strengthen college as a reliable pathway to the middle class.” But after four years of dogmatic crusades against alternative higher education options, it’s clear that campaign promise was malarkey. Unfortunately, President Biden’s real intentions have been laid bare. There was never any intention to “strengthen” college.
Biden would rather strengthen the status quo. Instead of disrupting the broken higher education model, the Biden administration has sought to prop up failing conventional colleges and universities, while arbitrarily harassing and penalizing innovative schools that provide opportunity and choice for students.
While Biden and his appointees signaled their antipathy for non-conforming higher education options even before taking office, few could have predicted how brazen their attacks would be.
At this point, the administration doesn’t even bother to mask — or factually support — its hostilities. Just two months ago during testimony before Congress, Education Secretary Miguel Cardona vowed to “shut down” the country’s largest Christian university.
The Department of Education’s hit list grows almost daily. Only weeks after announcing a record $37.7 million penalty against Grand Canyon University, the department leveled an equally unprecedented fine against Liberty University, another leading Christian university.
Both actions came just months after a $6 million penalty against faith-based Ashland University. Ten of the 13 schools targeted by Biden’s Student Financial Aid Office of Enforcement were career colleges, as were most of the 150 schools named in the Department of Education’s weaponization of the Sweet v. Cardona settlement.
The administration’s scrutinize-and-penalize campaign is not about student interests or well-being. It’s a concerted effort to snuff out educational choice and pigeon-hole students into schools that promulgate the far left’s “woke,” anti-conservative, anti-American agenda. And the elite, household-brand universities in the good graces of the Biden Department of Education are spending big money to keep their preferential status.
In 2020, conventional colleges and universities contributed nearly $306 million to Democratic candidates, compared to less than $34 million to Republican candidates.
The mission of the U.S. Department of Education, in its own words, is to “promote student achievement and preparation” by “fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access.”
Faith-based schools, career colleges, and other unconventional paths to a higher education degree — which provide students personalized programming, flexible schedules, and career-applicable instruction, frequently at a fraction of the cost of larger, better-known universities — certainly align with that mission.
Yet, Biden’s Department of Education is intent on shutting these programs down, to the point that it has ignored what should be its priorities.
The Department’s botched rollout of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) upended hundreds of thousands of high school graduates’ college aspirations, and minority, low-income, and first-generation prospective students have been hurt the most.
Enrollment on college campuses could fall by 20% next year.
Nevertheless, the president’s budget proposal calls for an increase in funding for the Federal Student Aid Office of Enforcement to hire more lawyers.
Think about that.
Amid the worst fiasco in higher education in recent memory, the Biden administration wants to give the very office responsible a raise.
And for what?
To fast track its attack on unconventional college options.
This is a protectionist racket — with the U.S. Department of Education serving as the enforcer.
Americans are frustrated with the failing model of higher education President Biden and his advisers are so desperate to preserve.
Almost a third of Americans say a college degree is no longer worth the costs.
Nearly half believe it’s only worth it if a student doesn’t have to take out a loan.
It’s not hard to see why families are fed up.
The price of a four-year education is skyrocketing while universities have been on an “unfettered spending spree” that’s failed to improve student outcomes.
Sadly, the Biden administration’s insistence on propping up this broken model of higher education comes at students’ expense.
Its assault on faith-based schools, career colleges, and other alternatives has cut off good options for prospective college-goers — particularly underserved students who do not fit the cookie-cutter profile. About a third of Gen Z’ers are putting their college dreams on the shelf indefinitely in favor of careers that don’t require a degree.
The Department of Education will continue to close the doors on students unless Congress takes action and implements guardrails to stop the attack on non-conventional higher education options.
Four years ago, President Biden pledged to widen the pathway to a college degree.
It’s time he made good on that promise by creating a level playing field for schools and students. And if he won’t do it, Republicans should.
(This op-ed originally ran at Newsmax on July 9th.)
