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Members of a special team at the Education Department that had been investigating widespread abuses by for-profit colleges have been marginalized, reassigned or instructed to focus on other matters, according to current and former employees. The investigative team had been created in 2016 after the collapse of the for-profit Corinthian Colleges, which set off a wave of complaints from students about predatory activities at for-profit schools. The institutions had been accused of widespread fraud that involved misrepresenting enrolment benefits, job placement rates and program offerings, which could leave students with huge debts and no degrees.

Hackers attempted to change grades at a Fairfax County high school, using a cunning attack that began with an email from a school panel charged with upholding honor and integrity, according to a search warrant. Oakton High School in Vienna, Va., is just the latest in a string of secondary schools, colleges and universities nationwide to be targeted — often by meddling students — in attempts to turn F’s into A’s in virtual grade books.

Elite universities in the United States and the United Kingdom have been investing endowment funds offshore in order to pay little or no tax, according to details revealed in the so-called Paradise Papers. According to the student run Fossil Free Pitt Coalition “We are concerned about the lack of transparency, as two-thirds of the endowment is just a mystery to us. We are suspicious about where that huge segment of the endowment is going.” An emeritus professor in accounting at the University of Essex, told the newspaper that UK universities should be more transparent about their investment decisions, since they are public institutions that receive public money, including from the European Union.

Immediately after the President was elected, borrower advocates and lawmakers expressed concern about what would happen to the current regulations aimed at holding for-profit colleges accountable. On Tuesday, their concerns were validated. The Education Department announced that it would delay and renegotiate two of the previous administration’s signature regulations: the first aims to penalize programs whose graduates’ loan payments exceed a set percentage of their earnings, while the second simplifies the process for borrowers who say they have been defrauded by their colleges.

A major Chinese education company has paid thousands of dollars in perks or cash to admissions officers at top U.S. universities to help students apply to American schools. According to eight former employees the company’s services didn’t end there. Employees engaged in practices such as writing application essays for students, altering recommendation letters and modifying grades on high school transcripts. The company’s success in gaining access to leading American colleges underscores how people on both sides of the Pacific are hungry to capitalize on Chinese students’ desire to study in the United States.

In 2013, New York’s attorney general, sued the ‘Trump University’ for-profit company, asserting it had intentionally misled over 5,000 students into paying up to $35,000 for seminars and mentorship programs. The fraud lawsuit resurfaced this week, when a state appeals court unanimously denied a bid by the university’s owner to throw out the litigation. Two former Trump University students have also filed two separate class-action civil lawsuits in California.

The Department of Homeland Security arrested 21 people Tuesday on charges that they had recruited thousands of students through the promise of fraudulently obtained visas. At the center of the arrests was the University of Northern New Jersey, the brainchild of federal agents who masqueraded as representatives of a for-profit university to ensnare the recruiters.

Twenty-one people have been arrested after US authorities set up a fake university to expose immigration fraud. Officials said the accused knew that the University of Northern New Jersey did not exist, but they were unaware it was a ruse run by immigration agents. The defendants acted as brokers for more than 1,000 foreigners who sought to maintain student and work visas, prosecutors said. Most foreign nationals involved in the scheme came from China and India.

The Obama administration is highlighting growing concern over soaring United States student debt by forming a new enforcement unit to crack down on illegal behaviour by higher education institutions. The Department of Education said that it would create the unit, having taken action recently against several colleges for profiting illegally from students with deceptive marketing and inappropriate federal loans.