Higher Education Policy

Massachusetts regulators propose efforts to protect students from unexpected college closures

Inside Higher Ed: The Massachusetts Board of Higher Education on Tuesday advanced a plan intended to protect students from unexpected college closures, voting to start working on recommendations including screening all private nonprofit colleges’ finances and warning students 18 months before a college is at risk of closing its doors.

State regulators hope to have a new system in place for the start of the semester in the fall of 2019. But the working group’s recommendations left several key details to be determined, including which entity would be responsible for the work of annually screening colleges’ financial condition, what score on a new financial metric would trigger closer state monitoring and how, specifically, the 18-month warning would be tripped.

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