All-Out War

About 19 million students attend U.S. higher educationinstitutions. Institutions with a for-profit tax status educate 2 million of thesestudents. Since the election of President Barack Obama in November 2008, mediaportrayals of for-profits have seen violent swings among neutral, positive, and evenintensely negative views. Two sets of forces have been at work behind the scenes. Firstis the U.S. government, including the U.S. Senate, the U.S. Department of Education, andthe U.S. Government Accountability Office. Second are the for-profit institutionsthemselves. This case study explores how these forces drove dramatic media coverageshifts in the first two years of the Obama administration