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Wednesday, April 29, 2015
Corinthian Colleges students must forgo credits to have loans discharged
WASHINGTON --
A top education official said Wednesday that the 16,000 former Corinthian Colleges students who saw their campuses abruptly close this week will automatically have their federal student loans discharged - but only if they agree to forgo any credits they earned at the schools.Ted Mitchell, Education Department undersecretary, said the department is bound by statute and regulation on how it handles such a case when a student's school closes.
"You can have the credits you paid for or you can relinquish the credits if you want the money back .... Students can have one or the other, but not both," Mitchell told The Associated Press.
Corinthian, a large chain of for-profit colleges that nearly collapsed last summer amid fraud allegations, shuttered its 28 remaining ground campuses this week, about two weeks after the Education Department announced it was fining it $30 million for misrepresentation.
The closures left students at campuses in California and a few other states struggling to decide whether to have the credits they've already earned transferred to another school or to try to get their federal loans forgiven. Already, some other for-profit schools have sought to recruit these students, and Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., has criticized the department for making a list of areas schools available that included some for-profit schools that face investigations.
If all the thousands of students file a claim related to the closures, the cost to taxpayers would be about $215 million, Mitchell said.
Ultimately, though the potential cost to taxpayers related to the collapse of Corinthian could reach the billions. Many former students have filed "defense to repayment" claims with the department, using a previously little- known part of the law that allows students to have their loans forgiven if they were the victim of fraud.
That's the path being taken by a group of former Corinthian students, who have gone on a student loan strike and say they will not repay the debt. Many of these students attended a Corinthian school years earlier or studied on campuses that were sold instead of closed. As a result, they don't qualify for student loan relief under the federal closed-school provisions.
They say they feel like the degree they earned is worthless, and the Education Department should have done a better job protecting them.
Mitchell said the department is committed to reviewing the "defense to repayment" claims to set up a system to handle those that meet the criteria spelled out in the law, such as showing that a state law was violated in connection to their education. The department hasn't said what parameters would be used to determine who would qualify, but Mitchell said the department plans to make its intentions available next week.
"We want to make sure that borrowers who can successfully make their claims get their discharge," Mitchell said.
Mitchell said the department won't make value judgments on other schools as it seeks to help the former Corinthian students make new arrangements. It provided the students with a list of other programs, including community colleges, within a 25-mile radius that had similar programs. He said the California community college system has also stepped in to offer assistance, which the department has encouraged.
"From the beginning, we have done everything that we have done with students foremost in our minds and students' ability to pursue a high quality education that helps them move on in their lives academically and economically," Mitchell said.
In a blog post, Noah Black, vice president of public affairs for the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities, said the idea that the former Corinthian students affected by closures this week should give up their credits they've earned "reflects a separation from reality."
"To start back at zero is an insult to their hard work and shows a lack of understanding of the opportunity cost borne by these students, many of whom are working, raising a family, and going to school," Black said.
At one time, Corinthian, based in Santa Ana, California, was one of the country's largest for-profit chains, operating Everest College, HealdCollege and WyoTech, online and physical campuses. About 72,000 students attended last summer.
The Education Department has said Corinthian failed to provide adequate paperwork and comply with requests to address concerns about company practices, including allegations of falsifying job placement data in marketing and altering grades and attendance records. The schools also faced action by attorneys general in several states.
The Legend of Rosario Sainz, OC's Last Desperado
It wasn't enough for Rosario "Zarco" Sainz to break out of the Orange County Jail, beat up legendary Sheriff Theo Lacy, toss a female Bible-study teacher against a wall, lock them both in a cell, steal a rifle and revolver, then make a run for the border. He also wanted a hat.
Sainz was in for first-degree murder, for shooting a man just for the hell of it. He had done four months for the killing after nearly half a year on the lam, a seemingly ignoble end to a criminal career that included smuggling Chinese immigrants into the United States, assaults, brawls, at least five murders for which he never faced punishment, and more nights in the drunk tank than law enforcement in both OC and Baja California cared to remember. A trip to the gallows seemed certain--and Sainz didn't give a damn.
The local press couldn't get enough of Sainz's devil-may-care exploits, gunmetal-blue eyes and charming personality; the Los Angeles Times gushed he was of "unconquerable disposition." And Zarco called upon those wiles on Oct. 9, 1910, as he sat for a Sunday noontime jailhouse church service.
After an hour of hearing a female missionary offer the Word, the 30-year-old got up and offered to escort her out of the felons' ward. Sainz tapped a steel-grated door to let Lacy know she was ready to leave--a signal done multiple times by other inmates over the years without incident. But Sainz had never done it before, and he'd never do it again.
Lacy unlocked the inward-swinging door and let the missionary out. As he began pulling the heavy door shut, another inmate grabbed onto a handle on the other side and began a tug-of-war with the sheriff. Sainz reached through the resulting gap to break off the key. He somehow managed to knock down Lacy, who lost his grip and let the door swing open.
Inmates rushed to stop Sainz, but it was too late. He grabbed the Sunday-school teacher and threw her inside the cell, then punched Lacy in the face and shoved him in as well. He quickly shut the door, then ran off with a partner. And in the middle of all this chaos, Sainz looked at an inmate imprisoned for trying to kill a brother-in-law and took his hat. Just like that. The hat was black.
Lacy recovered to lead the largest search in Orange County history up to that time, deputizing anyone and everyone who might find the fugitives. But he never found Sainz. It was Sainz who turned himself in, who got Lacy tossed out of office, who made a mockery out of OC law enforcement, and embarrassed the establishment again and again. His saga, long-forgotten, never featured any of the revolutionary undertones of infamous California Latino gunslingers of yore such as Joaquin Murrieta or Tiburcio Vasquez and lacked the nationwide notoriety of Willie Boy, the Chemehuevi Indian whose kidnapping of his lover and subsequent trek through the Mojave Desert in 1909 is considered the West's last manhunt.
Nope, Zarco Sainz was a bad hombre, plain and simple. And the Orange County public loved every moment of it.
Japan PM offers condolences for WWII dead in historic speech
WASHINGTON --
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe offered condolences Wednesday for Americans killed in World War II in the first address by a Japanese leader to a joint meeting of Congress, but stopped short of apologizing for wartime atrocities.Abe came to Capitol Hill after a morning visit to a Washington memorial to more than 400,000 American service members who died in the conflict. His remarks to a packed chamber a day after meeting President Barack Obama were warmly received by lawmakers.
"My dear friends, on behalf of Japan and the Japanese people, I offer with profound respect my eternal condolences to the souls of all American people that were lost during World War II," he said, prompting his audience to rise in applause.
But he skirted another issue that some U.S. lawmakers had also been urging him to address in what is the 70th anniversary year of the end of war - the sexual slavery of tens of thousands of Asian women by Japan's military, which remains a sore point with another staunch U.S. ally, South Korea. One of the few dozen surviving Korean victims, Yong Soo-lee, 87, was in the gallery to watch Abe's address, seated in a wheelchair.
Instead, the Japanese prime minister expressed "feelings of deep remorse over the war." He acknowledged that "our actions brought suffering to the peoples in Asian countries, we must not avert our eyes from that." That won't satisfy his critics, who want Abe to do more than "uphold" the apologies for wartime abuses made by his predecessors.
Democratic Rep. Mike Honda, who invited Yong to attend, said it was "shocking and shameful" that Abe was evading his government's responsibility over atrocities committed by the Imperial Army against so-called "comfort" women.
Since winning election in December 2012, Abe has been strong advocate of closer ties with the U.S., a message he hammered home Wednesday. He vowed to enact legislation by this summer to facilitate closer cooperation with the U.S. military, in support of new U.S.-Japan defense guidelines endorsed by the two leaders on Tuesday.
Abe said the U.S. and Japan "must take the lead" in completing a 12-nation trans-Pacific trade pact. That got a lukewarm response from Democrats but warm applause from Republicans - reflecting the division in Congress on the issue.
Abe has arrived amid a bruising battle in Washington over legislation that would give Obama the authority to negotiate the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, a cornerstone of his second-term agenda. In a reversal of politics-as-usual, it's Obama's own Democratic base that opposes him, and Republicans who support the deal.
"The TPP goes far beyond just economic benefits. It is also about our security. Long-term, its strategic value is awesome. We should never forget that," Abe said.
The Japanese leader is a firm supporter of a stronger U.S. presence in the region, both militarily and economically, as China, which in recent years has eclipsed Japan as the world's second-largest economy, asserts itself as a global power.
He's taken some political hits at home for pushing the trade pact and for loosening the restrictions of Japan's pacifist constitution to open the way for Japan's military to take a more active supporting role to the United States, which has nearly 50,000 troops based there.
Dozens of Japanese leaders have visited the U.S. since the war, but Abe's invitation to speak to Congress sets him apart from his predecessors. While past Japanese prime ministers - including Abe's own grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, in 1957 - have addressed the House, it was the first time for a leader of the East Asian nation to speak to both chambers.
Republican Sen. John McCain said the speech was "a historic recognition of two peoples reconciled with their shared history." He expressed gratitude for Abe's recognition of American sacrifices in World War II.
But Jan Thompson, president of the American Defenders of Bataan & Corregidor Memorial Society, which represents U.S. veterans who fought in the Philippines and were forced into slave labor in Japan, expressed disappointment.
She said it was "deeply disturbing" that Abe had offered sympathy to victims of a war that Japan started, but did not acknowledge responsibility. Noting that Abe told lawmakers that "history is harsh," she said she agreed, but added: "history is ultimately harsher on those that deny it."
Calvin Peete, winner of 12 PGA Tour events, dies at 71
ATLANTA --
Calvin Peete, who taught himself how to play golf at 24 and became the most successful black player on the PGA Tour before the arrival of Tiger Woods, died Wednesday morning, the PGA Tour said. He was 71.The tour did not have a cause of death. Murray Brothers Funeral Home confirmed it was handling the arrangements but did not release additional information.
Peete won 12 times on the PGA Tour, mainly on the strength of his uncanny accuracy off the tee. Peete led the PGA Tour in driving accuracy for 10 straight years starting in 1981, and he captured the Vardon Trophy over Jack Nicklaus in 1984. He also played on two Ryder Cup teams.
More impressive than his record, however, was the journey to compete - and beat - the best in golf.
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