Apollo Group

Apollo Group is uniquely positioned to meet the significant market opportunity created as more occupations become education-intensive, and as members of the workforce capitalize on the income premium available to them with higher levels of education. Augmenting its current offerings with future strategic growth into larger state markets, Apollo Group will solidify its position as one of the nation's largest providers of higher education. Apollo Group, Inc. is one of the largest providers of higher education programs for working adults in the United States. Through its wholly owned subsidiaries the University of Phoenix, the Institute for Professional Development, and Western International University, the Apollo Group teaching/learning model by 1998 had been successfully replicated at 110 campuses and learning centers in 32 states, Puerto Rico, and London. The company cooperates and interacts with businesses and governmental agencies in offering programs designed to meet their specific needs either by modifying existing programs or, in some cases, by developing customized programs which are held at the employers' offices or on-site at military bases. Some education partnerships have included companies such as AT&T and Ingram Micro. The University of Phoenix (UOP) was founded in 1976 by Dr. John G. Sperling, now chairman and CEO of Apollo Group, as the first accredited for-profit university in the United States with the sole mission of identifying and meeting the educational needs of working adult students. The idea for UOP started earlier than that though. Sperling received his undergraduate degree from Reed College and a doctorate in economic history from Kings College at Cambridge University before becoming a fully tenured humanities professor at San Jose State University in the early 1970s with a grant to study a means by which to deal with delinquency rates in one of San Jose's rougher neighborhoods. In his interactions with the police department and other public officials, Sperling discovered that they wanted educational programs which would help them do their jobs better, improve their skills, and give them new skills for advancement. He approached his university, San Jose State, with a request to support an adult degree program. When they refused, he quit to start his own for-profit business offering adult, degree-granting programs at colleges and universities. Established in 1973, the Institute for Professional Development (IPD) assists colleges and universities in the design, development, implementation, and continuing administration of higher education programs designed specifically for working adults. IPD's higher education management consulting services enable traditional colleges to establish viable and profitable programs serving working adults. Nineteen ninety-six saw more than 12,000 students enrolled in IPD-assisted programs at 18 regionally accredited private colleges and universities throughout the United States at 38 campuses and learning centers in 20 states from Texas to Massachusetts and was primarily in the Midwest, South, and East, including a new opening in Stamford, Connecticut, in 1997. From September 1991 through August 1996, UOP opened 26 campuses and learning centers and IPD established 13 campuses and learning centers with its client institutions. The company also adopted a plan in March 1992 to discontinue the operations of its technical training schools and these operations were phased out from March 1992 through 1993. In September 1995, Apollo Group acquired certain assets of Western International University. Western International University was created as a private nonprofit educational institution and was accredited by The North Central Association of Colleges and Schools and was also incorporated in 1978. Apollo Group created a new wholly owned subsidiary called Western International University (WIU). By 1996, WIU had 1,200 working adult students at campuses and learning centers in Ari