Fail State

Dan Rather served as executive producer (and makes a cameo) for this exposé on hucksterism in higher education, which targets for-profit colleges (ITT Technical Institute being one infamous example) that waste the money of students (who are often solicited by recruiters from the most impoverished and desperate demographics) on inadequate degrees that are virtually worthless in terms of potential employment. Easily obtained student loans—a well-intended government program gone awry—spawned a rash of such cash-grabbing operations in the pre-Internet 1970s and '80s, outfits that often sold diplomas by mail-order, with no brick-and-mortar classrooms. Good grades are awarded to the usually pro-business Reagan/Bush administrations and Secretary of Education William Bennett for fighting scam schools via regulations. But as Wall Street hedge funds and sophisticated big-businessmen entered the field, for-profit colleges gained lobbyists who bought off Democratic and Republican administrations alike, allowing new generations of would-be graduates to be mired in unpayable debt. Community colleges and even Ivy League universities are not considered totally innocent here, accused of failing to recognize a changed tuition marketplace and helping to accredit dubious institutions. The election of Donald Trump—of Trump University infamy—does not bode well for reform (Trump nemesis Maxine Waters is prominent among the interviewees here). An important social-justice documentary about a continuing blight on higher education, this is highly recommended. Aud: C, P. (C. Cassady)