ERIC review: understanding the relationships between proprietary schools and community colleges: findings from recent literature.

This review explores the recent literature on proprietary schools. It examines the characteristics of proprietary schools and the distinctions between proprietary schools and community colleges. The authors close by posing the questions of whether proprietary schools are converging with community colleges and whether proprietary schools are a threat to community colleges. The study concludes that proprietary schools and community colleges have individual strengths that make each institution appealing to different segments of the student population. More research is urged to explore the possibility of future collaboration between proprietary schools and community colleges.

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If the educational literature makes anything about proprietary schools (1) clear, it is that they occupy a highly contested and ever-changing place within higher education. Arthur Levine, the President of Teachers College at Columbia University, remarked in 1998, "Within higher education, "proprietary' is still a dirty word" (Strosnider, 1998, para. 12). However, some view proprietary schools as a real threat to traditional public community colleges. For example, Tony Zeiss, president of Central Piedmont Community College in North Carolina, states, "Yes, there is competition for community colleges, and it's spelled with a capital 'P' for proprietary colleges" (Zeiss, 1998, p. 9). As the literature makes clear, the controversy aroused by proprietary schools revolves around several key unanswered questions. Are they threats to community colleges? Do they take advantage of gullible students and even more gullible policy makers? Or do they point to new and better ways of organizing curricula, students, and even institutions? What exactly are the implications of including shareholders within the group of stakeholders to whom proprietary schools are responsible?

Perhaps not one of these questions has a simple answer, but the education literature does provide ample food for thought for those who seek to understand these admittedly controversial institutions in more depth. This review will serve as a guide to recent publications on proprietary schools. It opens with an exploration of proprietary institutional types, students, and structure; then it proceeds to a discussion of two key issues of continuing concern to researchers, policy makers, administrators and stakeholders: Are proprietary schools converging with community colleges? Are they a threat to conventional community colleges?

Types and Scope of Proprietary Schools

Perhaps the most authoritative recent synthesis of the literature on the relationship of proprietary schools to community colleges can be found in Bailey and Badway (2001). Their relatively lengthy analysis, based on two years of research, was prepared for the National Center for Postsecondary Improvement. Asserting that the growth of proprietary schools has "been one of the most watched trends in higher education" (p. 5), Bailey and Badway sought "to develop a better understanding of how for-profits compare to public community colleges with respect to their students and programs and to evaluate the extent to which the for-profit colleges compete directly with community colleges" (p. 4). Bailey and Badway's research employed a two-stage design, in which they first analyzed national data sources, and then conducted case studies at proprietary schools.

Recent Growth and Success Measures

Like other researchers, Bailey and Badway (2001) note that proprietary schools have been the topic of a great deal of controversy within higher education: "... the highly publicized growth of some for-profit institutions has been an integral part of the discussions of the new educational environment and indeed has generated growing anxiety among both private non-profit and public colleges and universities" (p. 6).

Much of this anxiety has come from the rapid growth of proprietary schools. Currently, over 2,300 proprietary schools offer two- and/or four-year degrees and certificates in the United States (Roueche, Roueche & Johnson, 2002). Some of the best-known names in proprietary education are national entities, with campuses across the United States and sometimes in other countries as well. The Apollo Group's University of Phoenix has 58 campuses and 102 "learning centers" in at least 36 U.S. states, Puerto Rico. and Canada. These campuses enroll 116,000 students who enjoy the benefit of articulation agreements with at least 150 community colleges (Strosnider, 1998; Roueche, Roueche & Johnson, 2002). Other national "brands" include DeVry, with 21 campuses enrolling 47,000 students and ITT, with 78 campuses in 28 states (Strosnider, 1998; Roueche, Roueche & Johnson, 2002).

As Bailey and Badway (2001) relate, the Education Commission of the States reported an increase of 78% in for-profit two-year colleges from 1989 to 1999, which is an astonishing figure that pales in comparison to the even more astonishing 266% growth in for-profit four-year colleges in the same decade. The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) confirms these figures. The number of publicly-funded two-year colleges has remained fairly consistent between 1980 and 1998, ranging from 945 to 1,092. In comparison, the number of two-year proprietary institutions more than doubled from 1996 to 1997, increasing from 228 to 470 in just one year. As of 1998, the total number of publicly funded two-year colleges (1092) formed 62% of the total two-year institutions, with proprietary institutions (484) comprising 28% of the total two-year institutions, and private non-profit institutions (109) making up the remaining 10% (National Center for Education Statistics, 2000a).

How can success be defined for these schools? This complex question has multiple answers, some of which will be discussed in more detail below, when we turn to considerations of these schools" curricula and pedagogical styles. However, because these schools are, by definition, oriented toward market forces and especially profit, it is appropriate to define their success at least in part on the basis of their status on Wall Street.

On this measure, proprietary schools have done very well, at least until recently. As Strosnider (1998) states, "Within little more than five years, postsecondary proprietary education has been transformed from a sleepy sector of the economy, best-known for mom-and-pop trade schools, to a $3.5-billion-a-year-business that is increasingly dominated by companies building regional and even national franchises" (para. 4). Indeed, the national higher education market has proven so lucrative that the well-known national Sylvan corporation has decided to focus exclusively on postsecondary education and plans to sell all non-postsecondary units (Blumenstyk, 2003). The University of Phoenix has done especially well, in financial terms, with revenues for the 2001 fiscal year exceeding $1 billion, which is a full 30% higher than in 2000 (Farrell, October 25, 2002). However, by 2002, proprietary schools had fallen, along with the rest of the market. As Olsen (2002) reports, investment in proprietary schools has fallen rapidly, even though their revenues and enrollment have continued to rise.

Who Attends Proprietary Schools?

There are many ways to measure success other than Wall Street financing, and it seems that any potential threat proprietary schools offer to community colleges comes not in their potential to make a profit, but in their potential to attract the public student population. According to the NCES. the overall proportion of two-year students in proprietary schools is quite low, hovering just under 5% through the late 1990s. However, this relatively small proportion does equate to a substantial overall number of students. Proprietary schools enrolled 173,489 students in 1996, while public two-year colleges enrolled 5,314,463, or 92%, of total enrollments (NCES, 1999).

Despite the seeming clarity of the NCES figures on total enrollment, considerable uncertainty continues to exist in the research literature on the characteristics of students at proprietary schools. For example, Cheng and Levin (1995) note that some researchers describe the student population as mostly female, while others hold that they are predominantly male. It seems that this apparent conundrum is attributable to insufficient attention to the type of proprietary school under consideration, with some types attracting more female students, and others attracting more males. Similarly, the literature offers little consensus on the race, ethnicity, or socioeconomic status (SES) of proprietary school students.

To resolve these inconsistencies, Cheng and Levin (1995) examined the High School and Beyond dataset collected by the NCES. Unfortunately, this dataset dates from 1980, with follow-up surveys through 1986, and so its facts are most likely no longer current. However, this limitation aside, it is worth noting that Cheng and Levin's results duplicated those of the more recent NCES studies. They found that students in both proprietary schools and private not-for-profit community colleges are more likely to be female, of lower SES, and have parents of lower educational levels. In addition, they are less likely to state that they desire a baccalaureate degree, and are more likely to express a desire for an educational certificate.

However, Cheng and Levin (1995) assert that differences between students in proprietary schools and traditional community colleges are diminishing. As they conclude, "Our results indicate that the often controversial depictions of student demographic characteristics at proprietary schools reflect to a certain extent the complex student body in these schools. However, while comparing the so-called proprietaries ... and community colleges, the trend of convergence [between proprietary schools and traditional community colleges] is apparent" (Cheng & Levin, 1995, p. 56). In a more recent analysis, Bailey and Badway (2001) return to NCES data and find that students of color, especially African Americans and Latinos, are more heavily represented at proprietary schools than at other types of postsecondary educational institutions. The NCES report Students at Private. For-Profit Institutions (2000b) reports that students at proprietary schools are more likely to be women, African Americans, and single parents than are students at other types of institution. Farrell (May 30, 2003) explored the attractiveness of proprietary schools for racial/ethnic minority students in some depth. Commenting on the significance of proprietary schools as degree-granting institutions lot racial/ ethnic minorities, she finds that Strayer University is the nation's fourth-largest granter of bachelor's degrees in business for African Americans. with the University of Phoenix being the sixth-largest granter.

Key Distinctions between Proprietary Schools and Community Colleges

Several studies have shed light on critical differences between community colleges and proprietary schools, especially in regard to curricula and student services. For example, in the second portion of their analysis of the role of proprietary schools within two-year education. Bailey and Badway (2001) undertook case studies of "Tech College," a proprietary school with campuses in several states, and three community colleges, each of which was near one of Tech College's campuses. For these case studies, they interviewed high-level administrators, including presidents and vice-presidents for academic services, spoke with students, and observed 12 classes. In addition, they analyzed curricular and statistical documents, such as enrollment data. As they state, the case studies are "organized to contrast basic institutional characteristics, including missions, selectivity, methods of curriculum development, faculty culture, course sequencing, student services, course scheduling, transfer functions, and the use of data in decision making" (Bailey & Badway, 2001, p. 20).

Curricula

The differences Bailey and Badway (2001) reveal between Tech College and the traditional community colleges are striking. The community colleges have much broader missions and courses of study. Tech College, in contrast, offers just nine degree programs, all related to career preparation. In keeping with their broader mission, the community colleges seek to serve a much wider range of stakeholders, from students to faculty unions to administrators to state officials to local businesses to the community in general. As Farrell (May 30, 2003) reports, the intensely focused curricula of proprietary schools can be very appealing to students who see education as a means to employment. Farrell quotes a former community college student who found DeVry attractive precisely because "the classes are a lot more focused because they are all about preparing me for one career" (para. 18), in contrast to her community college, about which she commented, "[1] had to take a lot of general-education classes, fulfill requirements--I just didn't see the point" (para. 18).

However, proprietary schools" limited curricula may keep them from achieving full recognition within the wider higher education community. Farrell (May 30, 2003) reports that the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities excludes proprietary schools from membership because, as Association president Antonio R. Flores states, "[They] tend to zero in on skills and training necessary to get jobs, and not so much on developing their students as engaged citizens" (para. 15).

Differences between proprietary schools and community colleges extend to curriculum planning as well. Bailey and Badway (2001) find that, at community colleges, the division usually decides on texts, leaving individual instructors free to choose teaching methods and evaluation procedures. Before any changes can be made to the curriculum at the community colleges, many levels of faculty and administrators are consulted. However, at Tech College, planning is much more streamlined, and the curriculum is more centralized and standardized, which is not without some advantages to students. Farrell (February 14, 2003) writes of the way in which the University of Phoenix plans new courses: Administrators design them to be taught by "Joe," a mythical novice instructor who would do better, or so Phoenix officials believed, if very little in his course planning were left to him to decide. This top-down approach leaves little to chance, or to an instructor's imagination.

As Bailey and Badway (2001) comment, "This standardization affords students the possibility of taking a consistent series of courses even though they may attend different branch campuses or need to change from day to evening classes" (p. 25). In a trade-off, though, Tech College offers far fewer electives, or curricular freedom of any sort. While teaching styles are more or less similar, students at Tech College have earlier and greater opportunities for hands-on learning through labs and the like.

Outcomes: Degrees, Certificates and Transfer

Like their public two-year counterparts, proprietary schools offer both degrees and certificates. However, as Bailey and Badway (2001) note, certificates assume a much more prominent role at proprietary schools than at public community colleges. Of the 662,000 degrees and certificates public two-year colleges awarded in Bailey and Badway's analysis, 35% were certificates; however, 57% of the degrees and certificates given by proprietary schools were certificates. Degrees and certificates at proprietary schools tend to be concentrated in just a few, usually technical or business-related, areas of study, in contrast to the literally hundreds of programs found at larger community colleges (Bailey & Badway, 2001).

The predominance of certificates and restricted course offerings should not lead one to think, however, that proprietary schools are limited to relatively quick courses of study, as they have been in the past. Indeed, in 2002, the University of Phoenix began to offer doctoral programs in business administration, education and health-care administration and hoped to enroll 300 to 500 doctoral students (Farrell, September 30, 2002). In addition, it should be noted that many proprietary schools function as both two- and four-year schools, with students free to choose either an associate or a baccalaureate degree.

Kintzer (1996) finds that, because very few formal articulation agreements exist between proprietary schools and community colleges, students encounter great difficulty in transferring credits from one type of school to the other. As he notes, "Relationships between proprietary schools and counterparts in public education--community colleges--remain strained. Some attempts to work together and to exchange students can be traced to individual institutions, but again, transfer agreements are virtually non-existent" (Kintzer, 1996, p. 23).

Student Services

The substantial differences between proprietary schools and community colleges in regard to student services can often be traced to these institutions' very different missions. Because the proprietary schools are not obligated to serve all students, as are the community colleges, they deny admission to some students who perform poorly on placement tests, especially in reading and writing. However, students who are accepted (and who pay tuition) usually benefit from a wide array of highly coordinated student services, all engineered to move students through the program successfully.

Farrell (May 30, 2003) notes the significance of integrated student services in making proprietary schools appealing to many racial/ethnic minority students. Of particular interest for students, according to Farrell's analysis, are job placement services that make proprietary schools seem like a more certain path to employment.

Indeed, perhaps the greatest contrast between Tech College and the community colleges that Bailey and Badway (2001) studied is in student services. At Tech College, a great emphasis is placed on admissions, counseling and student services, and these services are often tightly integrated to better assist students in achieving their degrees or certificates. For example, administrators track dropout rates from particular courses, and sometimes intervene when these rates increase. In fact, some admissions staff at Tech College receive bonuses based on recruited students" completion rates. Not surprisingly, career placement rates are very high, with approximately 95% of those Tech College graduates who look for work finding a job (a fact which the college highlights on its website).

In another example of the high priority placed on Completion rates at proprietary schools, Rosa (1997) studied the effectiveness of a retention program employed at Topeka Technical College. She asserts that student completion rates at proprietary institutions are critical for evaluating the outcome of the institution, and the outcomes are key for future accreditation. In contrast, as Bailey and Badway (2001) note, student services at community colleges are highly fragmented, with the colleges often not gathering sufficient data to make comparisons of job placement rates possible.

Unresolved Issues: Convergence and Threats

Are Proprietary Schools and Traditional Community Colleges Converging?

With the above overview of general trends in proprietary schools in hand, it would be useful to conclude this review by focusing on two unresolved sets of issues that have received a great deal of attention in the educational literature: the (possible) convergence between proprietary schools and community colleges, and the (possible) threat that proprietary schools might pose to public community colleges.

Volume 91, Community Colleges and Proprietary Schools: Conflict or Convergence?, of New Directions for Community Colleges (1995), approaches the issue of convergence between proprietary schools and community colleges from a number of perspectives. Nearly all the chapter authors take one side or another of this debate, using arguments rooted in studies of educational history, missions, curricula, and finances to bolster their points.

Clowes (1995) sets the tone for the volume by noting that proprietary schools are "silent partners" in U.S. higher education. Clowes then asserts that proprietary schools are becoming more and more like community colleges, largely because of the effect of accreditation on proprietary schools. As he comments, "Accreditation demands bring the two types of institutions closer and closer together in curriculum, financial aid policies, and management practices" (p. 11). In summary, Clowes states that proprietary schools and community colleges have "different histories but perhaps a shared future" (p. 13).

Hittman (1995) echos and elaborates on Clowes's assertions through his investigation of convergence between the missions of proprietary schools and community colleges. Hittman found that "debate during the 1992 reauthorization of the Higher Education Act (HEA) has altered the prevailing impression of dissimilarity of mission and has catapulted career colleges into the consciousness of public policy makers and public postsecondary leaders alike" (p. 17). Hittman continues his argument by noting that, since the reforms associated with the changes made in response to the 1992 HEA reauthorizations, proprietary schools have been increasingly subject to regulatory pressures at the local, state, and federal level, much as community colleges are. In addition, proprietary schools have come to resemble community colleges in their reliance (via their students) on federal financial aid and have begun to offer many student services formerly provided only by community colleges. As Hittman concludes, "Career colleges and community colleges have each embraced that which is traditionally perceived to be the strength of the other. This has blurred the once-stark distinction between them but has provided a broad array of delivery mechanisms for specialized postsecondary education and training" (p. 24).

As Hittman (1995) notes, the recent emphasis by the proprietary schools on achieving accreditation has contributed greatly to the trend toward convergence between these schools and public community colleges. A sea change came to proprietary schools in the early 1990s, when scandals concerning recruiting, loan default rates, and poor educational outcomes (e.g., completion rates) led to tougher federal standards for schools that wanted to participate in Title IV federal student loan assistance. As Bailey and Badway (2001) comment, "The 1992 regulations increased the minimum length of eligible programs, decreased institutional reliance on Title IV funding sources, tightened recruiting and admissions procedures, and established more stringent accreditation standards" (p. 11).

The tightened accreditation standards of the post-1992 era have been crucial for bringing proprietary schools into closer alignment with the rest of the educational sector. Bailey and Badway (2001) use the term Accredited Career College, or ACC, to indicate those proprietary schools that are accredited by either a regional or national agency. Such accreditation has significant curricular implications. "Although the ACCs maintain an emphasis on applied education for career preparation, they also incorporate general education into their technical degree programs, and offer developmental education, English as a Second Language, and at times extensive student support services. Many of these reformed schools have come to resemble their public two- and four-year counterparts" (p. 12).

Prager (1995) delves into more depth on the role of accreditation in determining relationships between proprietary schools and other sectors of higher education. Prager found significant policy implications in the growing tendency toward accreditation for proprietary schools: "From a public policy perspective, national accreditation confers upon private career colleges the same acceptability in the new accreditation environment as that conferred by regional accreditation with the potential for improving the transfer and articulation climate" (p. 68).

Accreditation issues and, more generally, the role of proprietary schools relative to other institutions were considered by Chaloux (1995) as well, who comments on the lack of oversight for proprietary schools, stating, "The proprietary sector remains an enigma to many state higher education agencies and poses many problems for state planners. Although the educational objectives of the community colleges and institutions in the private sector seem, in many instances, to be the same, the state's treatment of these institutions is markedly different" (p. 81).

Perhaps because of the benefits of accreditation, and perhaps because of increased lobbying efforts, proprietary schools have gained new respect within the federal government. For example, Farrell (December 12, 2002) comments, "The U.S. Department of Education's recent decision to ease regulations governing postsecondary proprietary institutions demonstrates its increasingly positive view of the industry, according to an Education Department official who spoke here this week at a conference on education and finance" (para. 1). Such thawing relations between proprietary schools and the government can be discerned in the late 1990s, as well, with Burd's 1998 Chronicle of Higher Education article, "For-Profit Trade Schools Win New Respect in Congress."

However, even as more and more proprietary schools achieve accreditation, others continue to engage in practices that detract from their reputation. These negative practices can hinder convergence between proprietary schools and traditional community colleges. For example, Farrell (April 18, 2003) notes that some students have paid large tuitions, only to realize that their school was not accredited. In one case, she refers to a student who described her education as "worthless" (para. 4), but was not able to sue to recover any of her tuition because she signed a clause before enrolling at the college stating that she would submit any grievances to binding arbitration. While these arbitration clauses are common among proprietary schools, some of the larger institutions, such as the University of Phoenix, feel they are unfair to students and do not use them.

Finally, through their study of curricula at proprietary schools and community colleges throughout the United States, Hyslop and Parsons (1995) offer more arguments for the convergence of these two types of schools. As they note, "Career colleges, technical colleges, proprietary institutions, and corporate classrooms ... seem to be joining with public, comprehensive community colleges in contributing to societal reform and renewal" (p. 42).

In contrast, some of the authors in Community Colleges and Proprietary Schools: Conflict or Convergence? make additional arguments against the convergence thesis. Moore (1995) takes issue with what he terms the "organic convergence hypothesis," which holds that these seeming vectors of convergence are inevitable. Moore contends that surface similarities between community colleges and proprietary schools were forced as the result of adaptations to meet federal financial aid policies. For Moore, these adaptations hide real, probably enduring, differences between the two types of institutions, including dissimilarities of mission, governance, size, cost, market orientation, time horizon, and ties to the remainder of the higher education universe.

Are Proprietary Schools a Threat to Community Colleges?

If scholars are divided on the question of current or eventual convergence between proprietary schools and community colleges, there is even less agreement on whether proprietary schools pose a threat to more traditional forms of two-year education. Some commentators, such as Zeiss (1998), see a clear and present danger facing community colleges: "If we don't meet the needs and expectations of students, the for-profit colleges and training organizations certainly will: indeed they already have the jump on us" (p. 9).

For Zeiss (1998), the recent success of proprietary schools has meant that community colleges must adapt quickly, or risk losing a substantial portion of their students. Zeiss asserts that both students and employers now demand skills that proprietary schools can provide perhaps more easily and effectively than can community colleges, and that there is a "serious mismatch between educational policy and market need [and so] there is no certainty that community colleges can dominate those new roles" (p. 11). Zeiss's argument can be summarized succinctly: "Those colleges that attempt to protect their time-honored traditions without providing new delivery options for their students are doomed to extinction" (p. 12).

Jones's (1996) ideas may provide additional insight into Zeiss's argument. According to Jones, there will be an increased demand for postsecondary institutions to provide current and continuing education to accommodate the rapidly advancing technology in America's work force. Jones asserts that this demand is creating increased competition between the community colleges and the proprietary institutions, and in answer to this competition, community colleges must adapt by continuing to increase their technical training programs.

Certainly, conflict between proprietary schools and community college has occurred in several distinct arenas. In addition to the more self-evident types of competition mentioned by Zeiss and Jones, these types of schools have clashed in less public ways as well. For example, Lederman (1998) writes of the "feud" between community colleges and proprietary schools over federal funding for vocational programs. Further, Selingo (1999) writes of struggles between proprietary schools and traditional schools for state financial aid funds.

In some cases, the worst fears of Zeiss and others seem to have been realized. In what could be interpreted as an extreme instance of competition between proprietary and traditional education, a few traditional schools have been purchased by proprietary entities (see, for example, Mangan's 1999 story on the purchase of John Marshall Law School by the Argosy Education Group). However, such outright takeovers seem to be rare.

Despite the rhetoric concerning the possible threat posed by proprietary schools, despite the squabbling over sometimes quite substantial sums of funding and aid dollars, and even despite the occasional takeover of a traditional school by a for-profit entity, the literature does not seem to support the notion that community colleges are in anything approaching immediate danger from proprietary schools. As Bailey and Badway (2001) make clear, the absolute number of students in proprietary schools remains very low relative to those in traditional community colleges.

While the 173,489 students enrolled in proprietary schools are by no means insignificant, Bailey and Badway (2001) assert that the proprietary sector is still "only a minority player among the two-year institutions" (p. 14). They note further that enrollments in proprietary schools actually fell from 1992-93 to 1997-98, giving proprietary schools a smaller proportion of enrollments at the end of the period than at the beginning. The growth in all public four- and two-year colleges and universities in this period (600,000 students) was greater than the total enrollment in all proprietary schools (366,000 students). Nonetheless, Bailey and Badway admit that "'the growth rate of the for-profits, especially the four-year for-profits, does give the impression that the for-profits present a serious and growing competitive threat" (p. 14)

Bailey and Badway (2001) note further that proprietary schools have much higher tuitions than do community colleges, a difference that is likely to continue to provide a "buffer" against domination by the proprietary schools. In addition, while proprietary schools are highly focused, this very specificity of mission is likely to exclude them from consideration by large segments of the community college student population. Bailey and Badway conclude by acknowledging that, even though they seem to do a much better job with some functions, such as student services, proprietary schools continue to pursue a niche market within education, and so the relationship between proprietary schools and community colleges is best characterized as a "division of labor with a few areas of overlap" (p. 47).

In a 1997 study, Baldwin attempts to find some possible patterns of overlap and competition between proprietary and community college programs offered in the Dade County, Florida, area. Although the results are based on a rough scanning of the data, Baldwin concludes that while a few of the programs offered are in competition with each other, each type of institution offers other programs that do not compete with the other type.

Hawthorne (1995), in the conclusion to Community Colleges and Proprietary Schools: Conflict or Covergence?, takes a similarly balanced view. She notes that students might in fact be deprived of legitimate educational choices if proprietary schools and community colleges converge too much, or if one side or another prevails in the putative competition between them. For Hawthorne. there remains a role for each type of institution. As she says, "Good public policy will foster differences among postsecondary educational services to allow for greater access to education by more segments of society through the provision of diverse services for multiple purposes'" (p. 97).

Summary

With the stringent federal regulations imposed on proprietary schools in the early 1990s, proprietary institutions have indeed become more similar to traditional post-secondary institutions, including community colleges. Not only have they begun to offer some general education, but their student support services often surpass those of traditional community colleges, especially in regard to retention and career placement (Bailey & Badway, 2001). As they have adjusted to meet accreditation regulations, they have recently gained more and more respect from governmental agencies as well as from students (Farrell, December 12, 2002; Prager, 1995). Indeed, many authors conclude that the trend towards their convergence with community colleges is apparent (Cheng & Levin, 1995; Clowes, 1995; Hittman, 1995).

However, other authors argue that a marked difference remains between proprietary institutions and community colleges. These differences are most striking when comparing the missions and curricula of the institutions. While proprietary schools are often much more focused toward training for specific occupations, the community colleges often offer a broader mission of student development and education (Bailey & Badway, 2001; Farrell, May 30, 2003). One author concludes that despite the many areas of apparent convergence, the community college and proprietary institutions will continue to be vastly different beneath the surface (e.g., size, cost. governance) (Moore, 1995).

Some evidence indicates that proprietary institutions may be a threat to community colleges due to the increasing student demand for specific occupational training in the United States (Jones, 1996; Zeiss, 1998). According to those who place credence in this evidence, the rapid growth of proprietary institutions is already indicative of their threat to community colleges (Zeiss, 1998), In contrast, others have argued that rapid growth aside, the number of students in proprietary schools remains very low in absolute terms (Bailey & Badway, 2001). However, much of the literature reveals that while proprietary schools may be a competitor for postsecondary students, the community colleges continue to offer unique programs at relatively low prices, therefore continuing to give them a specific attractiveness toward much of the student population (Bailey & Badway 2001, Baldwin, 1997: Hawthorne, 1995).

Bailey and Badway (2001) call for further analysis of available national data "to better understand the educational and economic benefits of for-profit versus non-profit public and private institutions" (p. 56). However, they urge researchers to undertake more case studies as well and to allow for the consideration of possible collaborative relationships between proprietary schools and community colleges.

Proprietary schools are an increasingly significant feature of the postsecondary educational landscape in the United States, and it would behoove all with an interest in both two- and tour-year collegiate education to understand them better, and to put aside many of the myths (both positive and negative) that obscure their true role in the educational system and in their students" lives.

(1) Unless otherwise noted, "proprietary school" in this chapter will mean "post-secondary institutions that are run for profit."

References

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Charles L. Outcalt is the Chief Program Officer in Student and Campus Life at UCLA. [e-mail]

James E. Schirmer graduated from UCLA in 2003 with a BA in psychology. [e-mail]