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Apollo Group, Inc. Business Information, Profile, and History

4615 E. Elwood Street
Phoenix, Arizona 85040
U.S.A.

Company Perspectives:

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.

History of Apollo Group, Inc.

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.

Founded for Working Adults: The 1970s

Apollo Group, Inc. was founded in 1973 in response to a gradual shift in higher education demographics from a student population dominated by youth to one in which approximately half the students are adults and over 80 percent of whom work full-time.

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.

Sperling received his first contract from the University of San Francisco and signed up 500 students in 1973, his first year of operation. By his third year, he had added two more colleges and 2,000 students, earning over $200,000 on revenues of nearly $2 million. The existing education bureaucracy was apparently put out by the competition. The Western Association of Schools and Colleges was outraged that a for-profit entity was so successfully cutting into the markets of competing colleges and universities. Shortly thereafter, the accrediting association told Sperling's three schools that they could either end their contracts with him or lose their accreditation and suddenly Sperling was without clients.

Fed up with the political maintenance of dealing with other schools, Sperling leased office space in downtown Phoenix, Arizona, in 1976 and decided to start his own university. The North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, Arizona's regional accreditor, inspected Sperling's operation and accredited the program. UOP opened in 1976 with a class of eight students and celebrated its 20th anniversary in 1996 with an enrollment of more than 38,000 students. By then it was boasting a net income estimated at $30 million on revenues of $282 million; was the second largest regionally accredited private institution of higher education in the United States; had one of the nation's largest business schools; offered bachelor's and master's degree programs in business, management, computer information systems, education, and health care; and had 51 campuses and learning centers located in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii, Louisiana, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Puerto Rico.

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.

Shift Towards Off-Campus Learning, 1990s

While most students utilize the classroom setting for their educational experience, the demand and need for flexibility and alternatives in educational delivery exists so, in 1989, the company began distance learning modality by offering its educational programs throughout the world via UOP's Distance and Online Education and CPEInternet, their computerized educational delivery system, joining the growing trend of distance learning. As late as 1993, less than 93 "cyberschools" existed. However, by 1997, according to an Arizona-based company called InterEd, there were some 762 cyberschools and approximately half of the over 2,000 four-year colleges and universities in the United States had online classes available, including Washington State University, Pullman; California State University, Dominguez Hills, and Duke University's Fuqua School of Business's Global Executive M.B.A. Program, and vocational schools such as National Technological University (Fort Collins, Colorado); New York Institute of Technology's On-Line Campus (Central Islip, New York), and New School for Social Research (New York, New York). Also in 1997, it was estimated that over one million students took classes online, compared to 13 million who attended on-campus classes and that this number would triple in the next few years. The University of Phoenix Center for Distance Education (CDE) is able to deliver degree programs to students anywhere in the world if they have access to phone, fax, or postal communications through Directed Study. Course work is completed through independent study while interacting with the instructor via fax, phone, e-mail, or their fax/voice messaging.

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 Arizona and London; a large portion of their students came from more than 40 different countries to learn English as a Second Language and continue on to pursue a degree in higher education. WIU's mission was to provide the educational foundation needed to prepare its students to achieve their full potential in a dynamic and complex global marketplace; the university offered undergraduate and graduate degree programs at four campuses and learning centers in Phoenix, Fort Huachuca, and Douglas, Arizona; and London, England.

Starting with 68 campuses and learning centers in August 1995, Apollo Group grew to 85 one year later and enrollment more than doubled from 21,163 to 46,935, with campuses from San Diego to New Orleans, Honolulu to Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. The Institute for Professional Development increased the number of contracts it held with private universities from 15 to 18, with 83 percent of these contracts extending beyond the year 2000.

1997 and Beyond

By mid-1997, the company opened nine new UOP learning centers in Los Alamos, New Mexico; Phoenix; the 32nd Street Naval Base in San Diego; Rancho Bernardo, Stockton, Ontario, Pleasanton, and Pasadena, California; and Las Vegas; IPD opened a new learning center for Albertus Magnus College in Stanford, Connecticut; and the company had plans to open several additional campuses and learning centers and to expand its product offerings to address increased market demands.

In April 1998 the company authorized a three-for-two split of its common stock. Two months later, Apollo announced that it would open--through its University of Phoenix subsidiary--two new campuses in Oklahoma as well as one in Vancouver, British Columbia. In addition, the company gained state licensure in Maryland and was pursuing approval from the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools prior to opening a location in that state. Such expansion augured well for Apollo, which by then was serving some 66,000 degree-seeking students and continually positioning itself as a leading provider of higher education for working adults.

Principal Subsidiaries: Institute for Professional Development (IPD); University of Phoenix (UOP); Western International University (WIU); College for Financial Planning.

Related information about Apollo

otheruses
In Greek and Roman mythology, Apollo (Ancient Greek , Ap坦ll?n;

As the patron of Delphi ("Pythian Apollo") Apollo is an oracular god; in Classical times he took the place of Helios as god of the sun. Apollo was also considered to have dominion over colonists, over medicine, mediated through his son Asclepius, and was the patron defender of herds and flocks.

Apollo was the son of Zeus and Leto, and the twin brother of the chaste huntress Artemis, who took the place of Selene as goddess of the moon. As the prophetic deity of the Delphic oracle, Apollo was one of the most important and many-sided of the Olympian deities. In Roman mythology he is known as Apollo and increasingly, especially during the third century BC, as Apollo Helios he became identified with Sol, the Sun.In Hellenistic times, Apollo became conflated with Helios, god of the sun, and his sister similarly equated with Selene, goddess of the moon. 42.

Cult sites

Unusual among the Olympic deities, Apollo had two cult sites that had widespread influence: Delos and Delphi. 143. Theophoric names such as Apollodorus or Apollonios and cities named Apollonia are met with throughout the Greek world. Apollo's cult was already fully established when written sources commence, ca 700 BCE.

Oracular shrines

Apollo had a famous oracle in Delphi, and other notable ones in Clarus and Branchidae. His oracular shrine at Abai, in Phocis, was important enough to be consulted by Croesus (Herodotus, 1.46).
Looking at the ancient oracular shrines to Apollo from the oldest to the youngest we find

In Didyma, an oracle on the coast of Anatolia, south west of Lydian (Luwian) Sardis, in which priests from the lineage of the Branchidae received inspiration by drinking from a healing spring located in the temple.
In Hieropolis, Asia Minor, priests breathed in vapours that for small animals were highly poisonous. Prophecy was by movements of an archaic aniconic wooden xoanon of Apollo.
In Delos, there was an oracle to the Delian Apollo, during summer. The Heiron (Sanctuary) of Apollo adjacent to the Sacred Lake, was the place where the god was born.
In Corinth, the Oracle of Corinth came from the town of Tenea, from prisoners supposedly taken in the Trojan War
In Bassae in the Peloponnese
In Abae, near Delphi
In Delphi, the Pythia became filled with the pneuma of Apollo, said to come from a spring inside the Adyton. Apollo took this temple from Gaia.
At Patara, in Lycia, there was a seasonal winter oracle of Apollo, said to have been the place where the god went from Delos. As at Delphi the oracle at Patara was a woman.
At Clarus, on the west coast of Asia Minor; as at Delphi a holy spring which gave off a pneuma, from which the priests drank.
In Segesta in Sicily, the latest of the series, another oracle of Apollo was seized originally from Gaia.

Oracles were also given by sons of Apollo.

In Oropus, north of Athens, the oracle Amphiaraus, was said to be the son of Apollo; Oropus also had a sacred spring.
in Labadea, 20 miles east of Delphi, Trophonius, another son of Apollo, killed his brother and fled to the cave where he was also afterwards consulted as an oracle.

Festivals

The chief Apollonian festivals were the Carneia, Carpiae, Daphnephoria, Delia, Hyacinthia, Pyanepsia, Pythia and Thargelia. Other attributes of his included the kithara (an advanced version of the common lyre) and plectrum. The Pythian Games were held in Apollo's honor every four years at Delphi. Animals sacred to Apollo included wolves, dolphins and roe, swans and grasshoppers (symbolizing music and song), hawks, ravens, crows and snakes (referencing Apollo's function as the god of prophecy), mice, and griffins, mythical eagle-lion hybrids of Eastern origin.

As god of colonization, Apollo gave oracular guidance on colonies, especially during the height of colonization, 750?550 BC. According to Greek tradition, he helped Cretan or Arcadian colonists found the city of Troy. However, this story may reflect a cultural influence which had the reverse direction: Hittite cuneiform texts mention a Minor Asian god called Appaliunas or Apalunas in connection with the city of Wilusa, which is now regarded as being identical with the Greek Illios by most scholars. In this interpretation, Apollo?s title of Lykegenes can simply be read as "born in Lycia", which effectively severs the god's supposed link with wolves (possibly a folk etymology).

In literary contexts Apollo represents harmony, order, and reasons窶把haracteristics contrasted with those of Dionysus, god of wine, who represents ecstasy and disorder. However, the Greeks thought of the two qualities as complementary: the two gods are brothers, and when Apollo at winter left for Hyperborea, he would leave the Delphi Oracle to Dionysus. There is a tradition that the Delphic oracle was consulted as early as the period of the kings of Rome during the reign of Tarquinius Superbus. During the Second Punic War in 212, the Ludi Apollinares ("Apollonian Games") were instituted in his honor. In the time of Augustus, who considered himself under the special protection of Apollo and was even said to be his son, his worship developed and he became one of the chief gods of Rome. After the battle of Actium, Augustus enlarged his old temple, dedicated a portion of the spoils to him, and instituted quinquennial games in his honour. He also erected a new temple on the Palatine hill and transferred the secular games, for which Horace composed his Carmen Saeculare, to Apollo and Diana.

Modern cult

The worship of Apollo has returned with the rise of revivalist Hellenic polytheism, and the contemporary Pagan movement.

Origins of the cult of Apollo

It appears that both Greek and Etruscan Apollos came to the Aegean during the Archaic Period (from 1,100 BCE till 800 BCE) from Anatolia. Homer pictures him on the side of the Trojans, not the Achaeans, in the Trojan War and he has close affiliations with Luwian Apaliuna, who in turn seems to have travelled west from further east. Late Bronze Age (from 1,700 BCE - 1,200 BCE) Hittite and Hurrian "Aplu", like Homeric Apollo, was a God of the Plague, and resembles the mouse god Apollo Smintheus. Here we have an apotropaic situation, where a god originally bringing the plague was invoked to end illness, merging over time through fusion with the Mycenaean "doctor" god Paieon (PA-JA-WO in Linear B); It was believed to refer to the ancient association between the healing craft and the singing of spells, but here we see a shift from the concerns to the original sense of "healer" gradually giving way to that of "hymn," from the phrase ?? ?????.fact
Such songs were originally addressed to Apollo, and afterwards to other gods, Dionysus, Helios, Asclepius, gods associated with Apollo. hence it became the Roman custom for a paean to be sung by an army on the march and before entering into battle, when a fleet left the harbour, and also after a victory had been won.

Hurrian Aplu itself seems to be derived from the Babylonian "Aplu" meaning a "son of"窶蚤 title that was given to the Babylonian plague god, Nergal (son of Enlil). In the late second century floor mosaic from El Djem, Roman Thysdrus, (illustration, right), he is identifiable as Apollo Helios by his effulgent halo, though now even a god's divine nakedness is concealed by his cloak, a mark of increasing conventions of modesty in the later Empire. The conventions of this representation, head tilted, lips slightly parted, large-eyed, curling hair cut in locks grazing the neck, were developed in the 3rd century BCE to depict Alexander the Great (Bieber 1964, Yalouris 1980). Mythographers agree that Artemis was born first and then assisted with the birth of Apollo, or that Artemis was born one day before Apollo, on the island of Ortygia and that she helped Leto cross the sea to Delos the next day to give birth to Apollo.

Youth

In his youth, Apollo killed the chthonic dragon Python, which lived in Delphi beside the Castalian Spring because Python had attempted to rape Leto while she was pregnant with Apollo and Artemis. Apollo killed Python but had to be punished for it, since Python was a child of Gaia.

Apollo has his ominous aspects, too.

Apollo and Admetus

When Zeus struck down Apollo's son, Asclepius, with a lightning bolt for resurrecting the dead (transgressing Themis by stealing Hades's subjects), Apollo in revenge killed the Cyclops, who had fashioned the bolt for Zeus. Apollo would have been banished to Tartarus forever, but was instead sentenced to one year of hard labour as punishment, thanks to the intercession of his mother, Leto. During this time he served as shepherd for King Admetus of Pherae in Thessaly. Admetus treated Apollo well, and, in return, the god conferred great benefits on Admetus.

Apollo helped Admetus win Alcestis, the daughter of King Pelias and later convinced the Fates to let Admetus live past his time, if another took his place. Instead, Alcestis took his place, but Heracles managed to "persuade" Thanatos, the god of death, to return her to the world of the living.

Apollo during the Trojan War

Apollo shot arrows infected with the plague into the Greek encampment during the Trojan War in retribution for Agamemnon's insult to Chryses, a priest of Apollo whose daughter Chryseis had been captured.

When Diomedes injured Aeneas, (Iliad), Apollo rescued him. Aeneas was then enveloped in a cloud by Apollo, who took him to Pergamos, a sacred spot in Troy.

Apollo aided Paris in the killing of Achilles by guiding the arrow of his bow into Achilles' heel. One interpretation of his motive is that it was in revenge for Achilles' sacrilege in murdering Troilus, the god's own son by Hecuba, on the very altar of the god's own temple.

Niobe

A queen of Thebes and wife of Amphion, Niobe boasted of her superiority to Leto because she had fourteen children (Niobids), seven male and seven female, while Leto had only two. Apollo and Artemis used poisoned arrows to kill them, though according to some versions of the myth, a number of the Niobids were spared (Chloris, usually).

Apollo's consorts and children

Female lovers

Apollo chased the nymph Daphne, daughter of Peneus, who had scorned him. Following a spirited chase by Apollo, Daphne prayed to Mother Earth, or, alternatively, her father - a river god - to help her and he changed her into a Laurel tree, which became sacred to Apollo.

Apollo had an affair with a human princess named Leucothea, daughter of Orchamus and sister of Clytia. Apollo changed her into an incense plant, either heliotrope or sunflower, which follows the sun every day.

Marpessa was kidnapped by Idas but was loved by Apollo as well. Zeus made her choose between them, and she chose Idas on the grounds that Apollo, being immortal, would tire of her when she grew old.

Castalia was a nymph whom Apollo loved. it was used to clean the Delphian temples and inspire poets.

By Cyrene, Apollo had a son named Aristaeus, who became the patron god of cattle, fruit trees, hunting, husbandry and bee-keeping. He was also a culture-hero and taught humanity dairy skills and the use of nets and traps in hunting, as well as how to cultivate olives.

With Hecuba, wife of King Priam of Troy, Apollo had a son named Troilius. He and his sister, Polyxena were ambushed and killed by Achilles.

Apollo also fell in love with Cassandra, daughter of Hecuba and Priam, and Troilius' half-sister. Enraged, Apollo indeed gifted her with the ability to know the future, with a curse that no one would ever believe her.

Coronis, daughter of Phlegyas, King of the Lapiths, was another of Apollo's liaisons. Pregnant with Asclepius, Coronis fell in love with Ischys, son of Elatus. Apollo rescued the baby and gave it to the centaur Chiron to raise. Apollo then killed him for what he did.

In Euripides' play Ion, Apollo fathered Ion by Creusa, wife of Xuthus. Creusa left Ion to die in the wild, but Apollo asked Hermes to save the child and bring him to the oracle at Delphi, where he was raised by a priestess.

Male lovers

Apollo, the eternal beardless kouros himself, had the most male lovers of all the Greek gods. That was to be expected from a god who was god of the palaestra, the athletic gathering place for youth who all competed in the nude, a god said to represent the ideal educator and therefore the ideal erastes, or lover of a boy (Sergent, p.102). The pair were practicing throwing the discus when Hyacinthus was struck in the head by a discus blown off course by Zephyrus, who was jealous of Apollo and loved Hyacinthus as well. The Festival of Hyacinthus was a celebration of Sparta.

One of his other liaisons was with Acantha, the spirit of the acanthus tree. Upon his death, he was transformed into a sun-loving herb by Apollo, and his bereaved sister, Acanthis, was turned into a thistle finch by the other gods.

Another male lover was Cyparissus, a descendant of Heracles.

Apollo and the birth of Hermes

Hermes was born on Mount Cyllene in Arcadia. The story is told in the Homeric Hymn to Hermes. His mother, Maia, had been secretly impregnated by Zeus, in a secret affair. Hence, Apollo became a master of the lyre and Hermes invented a kind of pipes-instrument called a syrinx.

Later, Apollo exchanged a caduceus for a syrinx from Hermes.

Epithets and cult titles

Apollo, like other Greek deities, had a number of epithets applied to him, reflecting the variety of roles, duties, and aspects ascribed to the god. However, while Apollo has a great number of appellations in Greek myth, only a few occur in Latin literature, chief among them Phoebus ("shining one"), which was very commonly used by both the Greeks and Romans in Apollo's role as the god of light.

In Apollo's role as healer, his appellations included Akesios and Iatros, meaning "healer". In his healing aspect, the Romans referred to Apollo as Medicus ("the Physician"), and a temple was dedicated to Apollo Medicus at Rome, probably next to the temple of Bellona.

As a god of archery, Apollo was known as Aphetoros ("god of the bow") and Argurotoxos ("with the silver bow"). An aitiology in the Homeric hymns connects the epitheton to dolphins. He was also known as Lyceios or Lykegenes, which either meant "wolfish" or "of Lycia", Lycia being the place where some postulate that his cult originated.

Specifically as god of prophecy, Apollo was known as Loxias ("the obscure"). Apollo was attributed the epithet Musagetes as the leader of the muses, and Nymphegetes as "nymph-leader".

Acesius was a surname of Apollo, under which he was worshipped in Elis, where he had a temple in the agora. In addition, Apollo's dispelling aspect made him associated with:

city walls and doorways, which served as bulwarks to guard against trespassers;
disembarkations and expatriations to colonies, which served to carry people away;
like his son Asclepius, healing, which dispelled disease and illness;
shepherds tending their flocks, who warded off pests and predators;
music and the arts, which dispelled dischord and barbarism;
fit and skilled young men, with their highly important ability to dispel intruders and invading armies;
the ability of foresight into the future.

An explanation given by Plutarch in Moralia is that Apollon signified unity, since pollon meant "many", and the prefix a- was a negative. Apollo was consequently associated with the monad.

Hesychius connects the name Apollo with the Doric ??????, which means assembly, so that Apollo would be the god of political life, and he also gives the explanation ????? Thamyris et Musae

In popular culture

In the 1960s, NASA named its Apollo Lunar program after Apollo, because he was considered the god of all wisdom. they were actually Saturn V rockets, on top of which sat the Apollo spacecraft.

Apollo is the subject of Percy Bysshe Shelley's poem of 1820 the "Hymn of Apollo"

William Rimmer's artistic depiction of Apollo was used as the symbol of the band Led Zeppelin's record label Swan Song Records.

References

Pre-World War I

D. Apollo (1896)
Gaston Colin, Le Culte d'Apollon pythien à Athènes (1905)
Daremberg and Saglio Dictionnaire des antiquités
Louis Dyer, Studies of the Gods in Greece (1891)
L. Marquardt, Römische Staalsverwaltung, iii.
Arthur Milchhoefer, Über den attischen Apollon (Munich, 1873)
Pauly-Wissowa, Realencyclopädie der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft: II, "Apollon". Schönborn, Über das Wesen Apollons (Berlin, 1854)
Theodor Schreiber, Apollon Pythoktonos (Leipzig, 1879)
William Smith (lexicographer), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, 1870, article on Apollo, www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-bio/0239.html
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