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Chairwoman Hightman said, “No, it is here. I think the real question is, is there an issue that we
have a concern about that has not been clearly stated regarding any of the approvals that you are
recommending we make today?”
Dr. Alexander said, “No, not from our perspective.”
Dr. Murphy said, “No, not from our perspective.”
Chairwoman Hightman said, “So, there is no issue for any of these today, but this is a general
issue that is out there that we need to be aware of going forward?”
Dr. Alexander said, “It is a significant issue that the staff is constantly working with, yes.”
Ms. Erwin said, “The North Central Accrediting Association, I think Alice Hayes is one of the
accreditors that goes on these accreditation visits, we have met with them. This is a national issue,
although it is uneven in the states. For that reason, the Midwest Higher Education Compact, while I am
looking to them for assistance, like do we have the funds to hire forensic accountants for the institutions
that we might get, it is hard to know the issues that these now for-profit corporations really present to us.
So, I was looking to try and share some resources in the Midwest. It turns out they are looking to us to
tell them how to help Indiana, Michigan. So, now we have gone to my counterparts in the other 49 states,
and we are going to work with the State Higher Education Executive Officers in the other states to buy
the expertise where we need it. It may be a particular legal expertise. We did, in Dr. Washington’s
committee, bring in one of the top experts in the country, Mike Goldstein, who has done a lot of work in
the proprietary world. He came and spoke to Dr. Washington’s committee on this. This is an ongoing
issue that we hope to keep the Board apprised of.”
Chairwoman Hightman said, “I think that is great. It sounds like we are doing the right thing, and
I think the concern is that you are looking through an application and you feel like you do not have the
expertise, so you are unclear. Then you would not let us know or let them know.”
Dr. Alexander said, “We would not bring it to the Board. One of the issues with, it is a perennial
discussion, is that we bring nothing to this Board that we do not feel that we are not satisfied that meets
the criteria. If there are issues like that, and we have had them, we simply do not bring it to you.”
Chairwoman Hightman said, “I had asked, and you gave us data last time, about the number of
applications you looked at that did not get to the point of coming before the Board. I still think that for
every Board meeting, you should let us know how many you looked at that are not even on the agenda.
That will help explain to everybody, or at least make clear, the scope of work that the Board staff does
and that there are other issues out there. It is not that everyone gets approved; there is a lot more work
behind this and a lot of applications that do not get approval recommendations.”
Dr. Alexander said, “We are beginning to track on a monthly basis.”
Dr. Murphy said, “Between April and May, we had 31 inquiries for application resulting in 25
notices of intent. We had 16 withdrawn applications. So, those were folks we managed to discourage or
they looked at the criteria and said no. Notices of intent that we have with no application received right
now is 25. We have 107 active applications right now -- public, we have 24 programs representing seven
institutions, and independent, we have 83 programs representing 25 institutions.”
Ms. Erwin said, “One of the issues that Dr. Washington’s committee discussed is a web-based
tracking system so that you can look up and see who has applied for what and where that application is,
