137 For-Profit Colleges Lose Eligibility for California Scholarship Program

About 80 percent of the for-profit colleges that participate in California’s Cal Grant student-aid program have been declared ineligible to receive the scholarship funds in the 2012-13 fiscal year, the Associated Press reported. The California Student Aid Commission released on Tuesday a list of institutions that meet tough new eligibility standards that the state adopted as part of a budget deal this year. Of 154 institutions that failed to meet the standards, 137 were for-profits. A spokesman for the University of Phoenix, one of those listed as ineligible, said the change would disproportionately hurt working adults. The state’s public universities and most nonprofit, private colleges met the new eligibility standards, which are based on graduation and student-loan-default rates. Still, all Cal Grant recipients will feel a pinch this fall, when a 5-percent, across-the-board cut in financial aid kicks in. That will reduce the top Cal Grant award by about $500, to $9,223.