I-Team: Teachers Told to Lie?
A big I-Team investigation: Teachers told to lie.
That new accusation from an instructor at ITT Technical College.
The I-Team already showed you students getting easy 'A's, so the school could get a government check.
Remember, you pay for most students' $40,000 tuition at ITT Tech -- millions in grants and loans backed by your tax dollars.
That financial aid keeps the for-profit school running. Students have to keep their grades up to get it, and some accused teachers of inflating their grades to keep your money flowing.
After our story ran, the phone calls and emails came pouring in to the I-Team and our Call 4 Action volunteers. This time, from teachers at ITT Tech, including one with a startling accusation who asked that the I-Team keep her identity a secret.
Reporter: "You're cheating taxpayers out of money."
Teacher: "Myself personally. Exactly."
The teacher said she has cheated you at the school's Greenfield campus every week for two years. She calls it a secret policy -- how to handle students who don't show up for class.
"I was told by my chair, as well as another chair, that if a student were to call me before class starts, or even email me before class starts, I'm to mark them present on the hard copy roster," recalled the instructor.
She tells the I-Team other teachers do it, too.
Reporter: "They're basically asking you to lie for them."
Teacher: "Correct."
Reporter: "Why do it?"
Teacher: "Instructors, such as myself, we receive a bonus based on student attendance."
Teachers at ITT Tech get cash bonuses, up to $400, for each quarter they hit the school's attendance targets -- even teachers who lie!
Reporter: "If you were not to lie and fudge these attendance reports, would you be getting your bonus?"
Teacher: "No. I would not get my bonus. No."))
Why should taxpayers care about faked attendance reports?
"It raises really serious questions about the quality of the education, and the price and value of what students are paying for and ultimately what taxpayers are backing," said Lauren Asher, president of Project on Student Debt, a national education watchdog group.
But why give bonuses for attendance numbers at all? To qualify for student aid programs, your tax dollars, colleges have to show the Feds they have policies in place to help students make what's called, "satisfactory academic progress." One policy ITT Tech has: attendance. Students who miss about three classes in a row are administratively dropped from a course. So, for ITT Tech, attendance is key to keeping your money flowing to the school.
Reporter: "The [campus] director, Jarvis Racine, is he aware of this policy?"
Teacher: "Yes, he's been in the meetings."
Reporter: "And it's your understanding that this is condoned by the school?"
Teacher] "Correct."
We had no problem getting an interview with Jarvis Racine for our last story about easy A's at ITT Tech.
"I would tell you that we work very hard at academic integrity here at ITT Tech," Racine said in a January interview.
However, after our last story, teachers gave us a staff memo Racine wrote accusing TODAY'S TMJ4 of "misrepresenting the good work being done."
But with this new allegation from a teacher who got that memo, we went looking for Racine again. He refused another interview, but instead referred us to a PR person at national headquarters. Racine said that spokesperson could "resolve any issues."
Reporter: "But you don't know what the issues are, yet. Racine: "Whatever those may be." Nearly two weeks later, we got an email from an ITT spokeswoman denying the teacher's claim. "Our policy states a student must be in class to be counted as present," wrote Communications Manager Lauren Littlefield. "ITT Technical Institute in Greenfield has a very stringent attendance verification procedure in place that is not at all what this alleged instructor shared with you." Still, the school can't deny the numbers we dug up. Eighty-five percent of students at ITT Tech's Greenfield campus get student loans from taxpayers. However, within three years, one out of every four of them can't pay you back -- that's 25%. Compare that to the big public colleges: MATC's default rate is 16%. UWM's rate is about 6%, and UW-Madison has a default rate of 1.5%. "Students' lives are often ruined forever," said Asher. "They cannot only see their credit ruined, but they'll potentially have their Social Security garnished until the day they die if they can't pay off those loans." While taxpayers pick up the rest of the tab. Responding to the Greenfield Campus' default rate, Littlefield sent us a study by an online publisher showing how for-profit colleges serve high risk of students. We tried for two weeks to set up an interview with anyone at ITT Tech's headquarters in Indiana. They even said no to a phone interview, but the I-Team's offer still stands.
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