National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators

Final Rule: Program Integrity - Gainful Employment-Debt Measures

The Department of Education has a particularly strong interest in ensuring that institutions that are heavily reliant on Federal funding promote student academic and career opportunities. These final gainful employment regulations are designed to (1) provide institutions with better metrics and more time to assess their program outcomes and thereby a greater opportunity to improve the performance of their gainful employment programs before those programs lose eligibility for Federal student aid funds, and (2) identify accurately the worst performing gainful employment programs. At the same time, the final regulations require that these federally funded programs meet minimal standards because students and taxpayers have too much at stake to allow otherwise.