It means colleges can continue bilking students and the government, making the rate ineffective. Changing the rules (by questionable means) is a handout to colleges getting rich on the federal governments dime and the backs of veterans. public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2025-12554.pdf

Today, without going through rulemaking, the Department nullified the consensus agreement and claims the language closing other loopholes is not valid. The 16 colleges that failed the new measure and the 34 that are on the verge of failure can recalculate their rates and will likely no longer fail

Regulations in 2022 closed the loophole by measuring all federal aid. It closed other loopholes too so that colleges couldn't create random programs without guardrails as a means of boosting other revenue. The regs resulted in consensus based on agreement between veterans and for-profit negotiators

The 90/10 rule is a market test requiring for-profit colleges to demonstrate they are able to attract students paying their own funds and not entirely subsidized by federal aid. But because it only measured student grants and loans, it led to heavy recruiting of veteran students using GI bill funds