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When Christina Johnston, 26, first enrolled in the University of Phoenix, a for-profit university wholly owned by Apollo Group Inc., back in 2010, she did not expect that her nursing degree would give her the chance to provide her two young daughters with opportunities she never dreamed possible.
“As a single mother, everyone told me it would be next to impossible to provide my children with the life we live now,” stated Johnston, feeding both of her children with plastic sporks at her local soup kitchen, as a nearby heroin addict stabbed violently at his food. “There is truly no feeling like being able to feed your kids with your own government-subsidized food stamps, because I got those food stamps with my own hard-earned, insurmountable debt to the University of Phoenix. There is absolutely no feeling like it in the world.”
Johnston, originally a high-school dropout, knew that if she worked hard and enrolled in the correct educational institution, she would someday get a job with high enough wages not to be able to dig herself out of the overwhelming poverty her student loans would create.
“Without the University of Phoenix, I would not have been able to buy my own house where I could raise my kids,” stated Johnston, gripping her two daughters as a government employee planted a “Foreclosure” sign into her front lawn. “And without the University of Phoenix, I wouldn’t be able to watch my kids grow up about 20 years too early as their house was seized by the government due to my newfound, excessive debt that I did not expect or understand.”
Johnston, however, is not alone in her feelings of never-ending indebted gratitude toward the for-profit university. Before Megan Ross, 28, enrolled in the University of Phoenix accelerated business program, she was working the night shift at McDonalds. Now she is making steady wages at the same night shift at the same McDonalds with hundreds of thousands of dollars of accumulating debt. She owes all of her success to the University of Phoenix.
“I’ll admit it, I was chasing the American dream,” stated Johnston. “I wanted to be able to pull myself out of my lower-middle-class social standing through sweat and hard work, so I could ultimately default on my loans and live in a one-bedroom apartment with a rat infestation problem. I could not thank University of Phoenix more for allowing me to accomplish this. I’m sure thousands of single mothers will join me in thanking them.”
