“Ghost students” are reportedly stealing millions and millions of dollars in financial aid in the nation's higher education institutions, namely in California community colleges, reports The College Fix.
Matt Lamb is an associate editor of The College Fix.
"The 'ghost students' would appear to be like bots, or AI-generated bots, or people overseas who steal someone's identity or create fake accounts. And, essentially, what they do is they sign up for classes, qualify for federal financial aid, take the money, and then drop out," explains Lamb.
He said that this has been a problem going on now for several years.
"There's a criminal justice professor in California who has been warning about this — Kim Rich. She points out that, in just one of her classes, she identified that half of the students were fake. These are obviously online classes," states Lamb.
He says that the losses amount to many millions of dollars, but he added that the Secretary of Education believes it's more.
"Linda McMahon suggested that the total cost is a billion dollars," says Lamb.
When asked for solutions, Lamb said there are some pretty simples fixes.
"For example, even if a class is online, there could be an element that is Zoom or Google Meet, or perhaps the professor schedules a once-month check in with individual students,” suggests Lamb.
He says that would probably be the easiest way in order to catch these “ghost students.”
“Some sort of upfront verification that this is an actual person, and maybe that's just when someone signs up for a class. They have to have a brief chat with an admissions counselor at the school," states Lamb.
He adds further that the more students they have enrolled, the more money a college gets.
"They don't actually lose any financial aid because we, the taxpayers, pay for it," says Lamb.
