You should read this very long news story about University of Phoenix mastermind John Sperling. He believes President Obama is unjustly targeting U of Phoenix.

Defying the education establishment, he expanded such programs into the for-profit University of Phoenix, now largely online and the biggest U.S. university, with almost 500,000 students. Sperling and his proteges transformed a backwater of mom-and-pop trade schools into a $30 billion industry attracting Washington Post Co. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. as investors. For-profit colleges enroll 12 percent of U.S. undergraduates and consume 24 percent of U.S. Pell grants for low-income students.

Now those colleges, after flourishing under loosened regulations during George W. Bush’s presidency, are under attack from President Barack Obama’s administration, which wants to tighten the rules. Stock prices for the parent companies of for- profit colleges have plunged.

The colleges use deceptive practices to lure homeless people, veterans and individuals who aren’t prepared for college into unsuitable courses in order to obtain tuition funded by grants and also by federal loans that students have trouble repaying, according to advocates for the homeless, veterans’ groups and current and former students. Almost 90 percent of Phoenix’s students use federal grants or loans to pay tuition.