When I taught website skills, one UOP group of students used the Dean Wormer graphic on their version. We had a lot of fun in those face-to-face classes.
UOP Could Not Sell to U of Arkansas, So UOP Is Selling Itself to the University of Idaho.
So this afternoon, the University of Idaho announced that it will acquire the University of Phoenix.
OK.
The University of Idaho says its aim is “increasing access to all learners, improving capacity for supporting all learners and helping all learners achieve their higher education goals.”
The purchase price is $550 million. The school’s current owner is private equity giant Apollo Global Management, which paid $1.1 billion to acquire it in 2017. Idaho says the new deal will “be financed through non-taxable and taxable bonds. This money is separate from any U of I budgets or funding lines.” Apollo is also, according to U of I, “providing $200 million in cash that will transfer to the not-for-profit corporation.”
According to the University of Idaho, the actual buyer of Phoenix would be a non-profit organization associated with the school, which was also how the proposed Arkansas deal was structured. The Idaho deal would be closed by early 2024.
The Idaho State Board of Education is convening a special board meeting in Boise at 1 pm MDT Thursday to “to consider a proposal by the University of Idaho to create a not-for-profit entity to acquire the University of Phoenix.” The livestream will be here.
According to the board, “After regulatory and accreditation approvals are attained, University of Phoenix will move from a for-profit institution to a public non-for-profit institution.”
On its new new FAQ page, the school explains why it never told the school community about the negotiations for a deal that it now says needs to be approved in the next two days:
Why are U of I employees and student just now learning about this?
Because of the sensitive nature of such a transaction, a very limited number of members of U of I leadership, supported by outside advisors who specialize in the nuances of such acquisitions, worked on the transaction pursuant to a seller-required non-disclosure agreement.
So, I guess, nuances that the U of I community wouldn’t understand.
The president of the University of Arkansas System told his trustees and the public that acquiring Phoenix would generate $20 million in annual revenue for the state’s universities. Now the University of Idaho is claiming, “The initial benefit is $10 million in supplemental education funding to U of I. We expect that amount will grow over time.”
It’s understandable that the University of Phoenix’s private equity owners would be eager to unload an operation, currently with some 80,000 students studying online, that has seen falling enrollments and revenues for years; that has abysmal graduations rates; that has repeatedly been investigated and penalized by law enforcement agencies and the Pentagon for deceiving veterans, single mothers, and other students; and that faces potential billions in liability for cancelled loans from ripped-off students.
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GJ - The establishment universities and colleges everywhere were always in a rage against UOP. The founder was a greedy Marxist, but he found out early that a vast number of adults could not finish their degrees while working full-time.
Typically, the faculties forced all the rules. For instance, I could not take computer courses at Glendale Community College until I passed a math course. I pleaded previous graduate education. The pickle-faced manager in the math department said "Where?" snottily. I said, "Yale masters, Notre Dame PhD." I put myself in a different computer science department and was soon teaching there.
GCC is where I learned about UOP, from my Unix professor.
I taught 5,000 students at UOP and was nominated twice in the Education department for Teacher of the Year.
By nationalizing online education UOP made it possible for people to complete degrees without moving or changing jobs. That was a revolution, and I remember watching it happen. Over-priced schools were furious that their MBA students were finishing at UOP for a fraction of the cost.
All of higher education moved into online education. I am quite sure the seminary numbers in ELCA, WELS, and LCMS are grossly exaggerated because 1 student taking 1 course at a time bloats the number of "total seminary students."
I also taught Marine officers at Yuma, driving 188 miles each way to teach a 4-hour night class. The Tucson students were closer, mostly nursing students - the best category of all those I taught: eager to learn and improve, always twice as good as expected. They helped out when a student had a kidney stone attack during class.
UOP grew because the traditional schools would not accommodate working mothers, full-time workers, and the handicapped. UOP changed from face-to-face only to online only because the technology and cost of computers went down so fast.
