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The Long Runway to the Unexpected Takeoff
Signs that the TPS expansion is intentional and not just sloppy language
Phil Hill
March 07, 2023
This week I plan to shift some of the coverage towards the OPM-related review of the bundled services exception - essentially the 2011 guidance that underpins tuition revenue sharing agreements in US higher education. But first, I’d like to highlight some information showing how the advocates behind the TPS expansion have been conflating OPMs and much of the remaining EdTech industry for years.
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On to the update.
In one view, the US Department of Education (ED) surprised almost everyone with the expansion of their guidance on which organizations are third-party servicers (TPS). Indeed, ED itself has admitted that there was no public comment period or negotiated rulemaking, or any notice, before it released the February 15th guidance. After pushback, particularly from the American Council of Education (ACE), ED delayed the effective date of the guidance to September 1, 2023, but that was under pressure and didn’t change the guidance itself.
By looking at publicly-available documents, however, it is apparent that the advocacy groups behind this TPS expansion (primarily Arnold Ventures and The Century Foundation along with personnel now at CAP and New America) have been conflating OPMs and much of EdTech for years. Why is this important? If ED’s new guidance was just sloppy writing, there would be a reasonable chance that it would clean up the language in late spring and eliminate provisions that pull in almost all of EdTech. But, if this is intentional, then it is less likely for ED to pull back on the guidance. I believe the latter is more likely.
The Pattern
Everyone in EdTech circles likely knows that the campaign of ED and advocacy groups planning to rein in OPM revenue sharing agreements has grown in recent years, but there is a common misperception that this scope is reasonably narrow in scope. To get a sense of the history, start with The Century Foundation (TCF) 2017 report analyzing over 100 EdTech contracts, titled “The Private Side of Public Higher Education.”