The US Department of?Education has fined a?university $37.7?million (?31?million) after it?¡°lied¡± to?7,500 former and current students about the costs of?its doctoral programmes.

Grand Canyon University (GCU), a?for-profit Christian university based in?Arizona, falsely advertised course costs that were lower than what 98?per cent of?students on?certain doctoral programmes ended?up paying, an?investigation by?the department¡¯s Federal Student Aid (FSA) office found.

¡°GCU lied about the cost of its doctoral programs to attract students to enrol,¡± said Richard Cordray, FSA¡¯s chief operating officer. ¡°FSA takes its oversight responsibilities seriously. GCU¡¯s lies harmed students, broke their trust, and led to unexpectedly high levels of student debt.¡±

GCU, which has more than 100,000 students, disbursed more federal student aid than any other participating institution over the past four years, the FSA said.

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Its investigation found that while GCU stated that its doctoral programmes cost between $40,000 and $49,000, these calculations did?not include ¡°continuation courses¡± that were required for the majority of students to complete their dissertation requirement.

Some 78?per cent of students had to pay an additional $10,000 to $12,000 in tuition fees ¨C roughly a 25?per cent increase, depending on the programme, over and above the advertised cost.

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While GCU ¡°pointed to a series of fine print disclosures¡±, these were ¡°insufficient to cure the substantial misrepresentations regarding cost¡±, said the FSA, which described the clarifications as being ¡°buried in dense documents and are much less prominent than the misrepresentations¡±.

The FSA added new conditions to GCU¡¯s federal student aid participation agreement, requiring it to tell prospective and current students the average total fees paid by graduates, and to engage a monitor to oversee its compliance with this demand.

In a lengthy statement, GCU said it ¡°categorically denies every accusation in the Department of Education¡¯s statement and will take all measures necessary to defend itself from these false accusations¡±, claiming that they were ¡°further evidence of the coordinated and unjust actions the federal government is taking against the largest Christian university in the country¡±.

¡°Contrary to the department¡¯s assertion that these are ¡®fine print¡¯ disclosures, GCU makes clear in the most prominent place it provides financial disclosures for academic programmes ¨C its Degree Programme Calculator ¨C that there can be continuation courses, and the costs associated with those, in doctoral programmes in order to complete the dissertation process,¡± the university said.

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chris.havergal@timeshighereducation.com