Who Is A College Teacher, Anyway? Audit Of Online University Raises Questions
The Department of Education's Inspector General wants Western Governors University to give back $713 million in federal student aid. But are the rules the school is accused of breaking outdated?
Who, exactly, is a university teacher? What defines teaching? And how should the profession evolve in an age of rising tuition, worldwide connectivity, and fast-changing job markets?
Surprisingly, a recent federal audit of Western Governors University raises these questions.
The school was founded 20 years ago by a consortium of states; it's a nonprofit, online-only institution that has racked up accolades, becoming a national role model for its innovative and low-cost focus on working adults.
But the inspector general of the Department of Education Rather than innovative, they say, WGU is more like a correspondence school of yore.
