The American Association of Cosmetology Schools sued Education Secretary Betsy DeVos claiming that a gainful-employment rule implemented by the Obama administration shouldn’t be applied to beauty schools.
The lawsuit, filed Friday in federal court in Washington, seeks an order barring the rule that threatens career schools’ access to federal student aid if they saddle their graduates with too much debt relative to their earnings. The trade group said the rule is harmful when applied to beauty schools, whose graduates typically underreport income from cash tips.
The U.S. Department of Education has tightened standards on for-profit education institutions, forcing the schools to demonstrate that graduates have found gainful employment that will allow them to pay off their student debt. If they don’t meet certain requirements, the schools risk not being eligible to participate in the government-student-loan program.
“A provision that is supposed to protect our students in fact hurts them badly,” Adam Nelson, executive director of the association, said in a statement. “We trust that the Department of Education did not mean to create this crisis and we hope that under new leadership, they will remedy this flaw, or that the court will address our grievance.”