Complaint Review: Grand Canyon University/Brian Mueller CEO - Phoenix Arizona

 Grand Canyon University offers Merit based scholarships to only 20.3% of their students. Merit based scholarships are given as acknowledgment of above average academic achievement. But only the few students who attend their campus location are eligible for these scholarships. Even though their online students provide well over 80% of the schools revenue.

     I am one of their approximately 58,000 online students and I am finishing up my sixth class - with great determination and a lot of hard work I have managed to receive an 100 to 92 in each class. This was and is no easy feat - the course work is very comprehensive and challenging. Each class is worth 4 credits each and when a campus based student manages to make the same kind of grades i have made then after 12 credits (3 classes) they are automatically put on a dean's list and a scholarship is automatically applied to their student account. I have yet to even recieve an 'atta a girl' pat on the back let alone monetary compensation for my successes. 

    So one has to ask 'Why the favoritism? Aren't my accomplishments as worthy as a campus based students? Is the level of the education they receive superior to mine? is it because as an online student am I not as important as a campus based student? Am I not as valuable? Are my accomplishments of lesser quality then theirs? Shouldn't all students be given the same opportunities? From a business point of view (after all GCU is a proprietary institution) is it a good business practice to offer specials and incentives to your least revenue producing customers?

    Any student who performs above and beyond the average should be acknowledged for their achievements regardless of their choice of educational delivery system. I recently sent a letter (my 2nd correspondence with the man) to Brian Mueller, GCU's CEO and I have been completely ignored. The reason I contacted him in the first place was because I wanted to deal with the person that had the authority to actually do something about it and I was told how much he cares and approachable he is by my advisors, Julia and Courtney. Instead I should have heeded the words from GCU's former students who universally claimed that when they had an issue with GCU they were ignored.      

    As I previously stated, the majority of GCU's revenue comes from their online students (customers) so basically it is the online students that pay for the campus based scholarships that the campus based students receive. But to add insult to injury GCU has spent $600 million on upgrades and improvements to their campus location with an additional $100 million earmarked for each year for more campus upgrades and improvements through 2020. It's bad enough to be treated as the red-headed stepchild but it is this red-headed stepchild that has made all of that possible. The improvements and expansions only benefit 20.3% of their students which according to the Downtown Devil a Phoenix publication for the school year 2014-2015 1964 students lived on campus and 183 lived off campus in campus sponsored accommodations. So we are talking about 2147 students out of 58,000. From GCU's SEC filings the campus based student population increased by 15% by the end of 2015.

  This includes all students who attend the campus based school - by doing the math the number of students who live on campus at the end of 2015 is approximately 2470 students out of 58,000; this accounts for only 0.042% of their entire student body. Not even 1%. The improvements for this .042% includes things like: a bowling alley, 4 new dormitories, a movie theater, and 4 full size new swimming pools. Upgrades and expansions that will benefit all campus based students, the 20.3% of the student body, include things like a golf course, 2 parking garages, 2 additional campus eateries, a basketball arena, a soccer stadium, a performing arts building equipped with a full size studio and full size theater, and even their own hotel named after the school, The Grand Canyon University Hotel. This list is far from inclusive; it is just to show you how much money GCU spends on their favored child - the campus based students - yet they can't even acknowledge their online students whose revenue made all of the things listed above and more possible. 

    Currently, according to yahoo financial GCU's revenue as of the end of Dec. 2015 was $778,200,000 with an operating profit of $210,361,000. So obviously from the above expenditures and the yahoo information GCU could afford to acknowledge when we excel academically and give us online students the merit based scholarships we so rightfully deserve. Don't you agree?