Possible deception by education giant NCOI
The Education Inspectorate is investigating whether private educational institution NCOI has provided incorrect information about the value of its diplomas for higher education. The Inspectorate received 'signals' about this.
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The question is whether NCOI misleads potential students by using terms such as college degree and college level for non-accredited courses. This can lead to confusion and is not desirable.
NCOI states in (online) training brochures that students for short programs 'at higher professional education level' receive a 'higher professional education diploma from Hogeschool NCOI', while this is not an officially accredited higher professional education diploma. The fact that terms such as 'higher professional education diploma' are not legally protected leads to undesirable situations and a 'grey area' in which students can be misled, according to the Inspectorate. "This requires clarification in the law, so that no discussion can arise about, for example, the concepts of higher vocational education and higher professional education diploma," said a spokesman for the inspectorate.
Adult education
The inspectorate is responding to inquiries from research platform Investico about possible deception by the education giant NCOI, by far the largest provider of adult education. Investico spoke to more than fifty students, teachers and former employees for the research for Trouw, De Groene Amsterdammer and the Education Magazine. According to them, the institute charges students high contingencies, teachers are often unauthorized freelancers and confusion is created about the value of diplomas.
NCOI says that texts it places on its website about unrecognized diplomas have been coordinated with the Education Inspectorate. "Moreover, I cannot imagine that people think that a one-year HBO program is equivalent to a full HBO bachelor's degree," responds Eric Verduyn, Director of Education at NCOI. However, the Education Inspectorate denies that NCOI coordinates all formulations with them. In previous investigations, the Inspectorate did look at those texts, "but information from NCOI can change regularly and we do not look at every new formulation".
Working conditions
NCOI earns a lot of money from students who do not pass everything at once, students and teachers say. Additional thesis supervision must be purchased, six hours costing almost a thousand euros. Teachers complain about working conditions and remuneration. Last spring, for example, the fees for distance education were reduced by 20 percent. After all, because of corona, teachers no longer had to travel, NCOI reasoned. Virtually none of the teachers has a teaching qualification. This is also not a legal requirement, the Education Inspectorate confirms.
Private training institutions expect to benefit significantly from retraining subsidies
In 2019, NCOI made a profit of 30 million euros on a turnover of 250 million euros. In the field of adult education, the institute is now almost a monopolist. Over the past ten years, it took over nearly twenty competitors. Last summer, the competition watchdog, the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets, gave permission to take over retransmitter LOI, the largest competitor until then.
Out of stock
Private training institutions expect to benefit greatly from subsidies to retrain the unemployed after the corona crisis. Minister Koolmees of Social Affairs and Employment allocated 2020 million euros in subsidy for 95 alone for short educational programs that public educators can hardly offer. The three thousand training places that NCOI offered with this subsidy were sold out in five days.
Read in the next Education Magazine AObmembers an extensive article on NCOI. You can find information on the Investico website, platform for Investigative Journalism extensive research results.
