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U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos announced a change to an Obama-era rule Thursday that borrower advocates say will put students at risk of being preyed on by schools that are supposed to prepare students for careers.

If the Department of Education decides career-training programs dont adequately prepare their students for employment, those programs can now dispute the agencys findings with their own data with no baseline requirements as to the size of the sample as long as DeVos deems them to be reliable metrics. The announcement is the latest step taken by the Trump administration that slows implementation of the gainful employment rule, which aims to measure whether job training programs are delivering on promises to prepare students adequately for a career.

We really needed this rule to be able to say, At least theres something ensuring our taxpayer dollars are being spent at programs that actually help students, said Jennifer Wang, the director of the D.C. office for the Institute of College Access and Success, a nonprofit that promotes college access. We cant be wasting taxpayer dollars on overpriced ineffective programs that dont prepare students for employment if thats the purpose of the program, Wang added.

Under the rule, developed by the Obama administration, career-training programs, many of which are at for-profit colleges, would be required to prove that their graduates loan payments dont exceed 20% of their discretionary income or 8% of their total earnings. Programs that failed to meet these metrics for multiple years could lose access to federal financial aid a lifeblood for many colleges. The Obama-era Department of Education found earlier this year that more than 800 programs were failing to meet the rules requirements.

The for-profit college industry has come under fire in recent years after two large for-profit college chains collapsed amid accusations that they were misleading students. The gainful employment rule was one of several efforts by officials to crack down on the industry. Borrower advocates have expressed concern for months that DeVoss Department would challenge those rules.

How the Departments new requirements will work

Under the original rule, if schools wanted to use their own surveys of graduates, the surveys had to include at least 50% of the programs graduates. They could also use state data as long as it accounted for at least 30% of graduates.

Earlier this year, DeVoss Department also announced it would give colleges a one-year reprieve in complying with the rules requirements and that it plans to re-litigate the rule itself. On Thursday, the Department also announced it would give colleges an extra 50 days to indicate they intend to appeal the agencys findings about their programs. One of the regulations requirements: Failing programs must provide warnings to students. But if the programs appeal the findings they dont have to provide a warning until the appeal is resolved.

By drawing out the appeal process, the Department is putting more students at risk of signing up for programs with questionable outcomes, Wang said. It will lead to schools reinstating their worst programs and practices because now if youre a failing program you can enroll students without warning them.

Colleges and the Obama administration fought over the rule

The rule has been a battleground for consumer advocates and for-profit college executives since its inception. The Obama administration first began developing it in 2009 and faced multiple court challenges from the industry over its requirements, though the administration ultimately prevailed.

The Department cited the latest legal challenge to the rule from the American Association of Cosmetology Schools as justification for the latest delay in implementation in its announcement. A Department spokeswoman pointed to the discussion of the court order in the announcement when asked about the reasoning behind the change. A judge in that case told the Department it needed to give those schools more time to appeal the debt-to-earnings ratios calculated by the agency.

Borrower advocates say the Department is using that narrow ruling as an excuse to undermine the rule. The DeVos Department of Education is listening to the industry much more than they are students and their families, said Maggie Thompson, the executive director of Generation Progress, the youth advocacy arm of the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning think tank, said of the latest developments.

The details of the rule were developed through a process known as negotiated rulemaking, which gathers stakeholders to hammer out specifics. It was slated to be implemented on July 1 of this year. Instead, officials plan to convene a new negotiated rulemaking process. Advocates like Thompson have charged that these procedural hold ups are an extra-legal attack on a rule that was developed through the proper channels.

This is a simple rule that I think most people would agree with and thats why theyre trying to attack it in quiet and procedural way, Thompson said.

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DeVos throws lifeline to 800 college programs Obama found questionable - MarketWatch