Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healy

The for-profit education company Career Education Corp. has agreed to stop collecting more than $11 million in debt from nearly 3,000 students in Massachusetts and will reform its practices following allegations of misleading prospective students and predatory enrollment tactics.

As part of a settlement filed by 49 state attorneys general, CEC will provide over $493.7 million in debt relief to more than 179,000 students nationally. The average individual debt relief nationally will be about $2,750 per student.

Under the terms of the agreement, CEC will pay $5 million to the states, including $50,000 to Massachusetts. CEC has also agreed to independent monitoring and will record all online chats and phone calls with prospective students to ensure compliance.

“Education programs must make proper disclosures to students so they can make informed decisions about their education,” Attorney General Maura Healey said in a statement. “This settlement will provide significant relief to students who didn’t get crucial information about the schools they were pressured to enrolled in.”

CEC is based in Schaumburg, Illinois and currently offers primarily online courses through American InterContinental University and Colorado Technical University.

Its brands have included Le Cordon Bleu, Briarcliffe College, Brooks Institute, Brown College, Harrington College of Design, International Academy of Design & Technology, Missouri College and Sanford-Brown. Over the past 10 years, CEC has closed or phased out many of its schools.

An investigation into CEC was launched in January 2014 after receiving several complaints from students and a critical report on for-profit education by the U.S. Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

The attorneys general alleged that CEC pressured its employees to enroll students, made misleading statements and failed to disclose information to prospective students on total costs, transferability of credits, program offerings and job placement rates.

As a result of the settlement, CEC has agreed to not make misrepresentations concerning accreditation, selectivity, graduation rates, placement rates, transferability of credit, financial aid, veterans’ benefits or licensure requirements.

It will also no longer enroll students in programs that do not lead to state licensure when required for employment, or that – due to their lack of accreditation – will not prepare graduates for jobs in their field.

CEC from now on must provide students with accurate disclosures about the total cost of their education, completion rates, expected debt burden post-graduation and post-graduation employment outcomes.