The protesting is due to people finally organizing online and petitions that have been circulating and so forth. Many people were not aware of the systemic fraud that was present in the schools until they heard about the Corinthian situation and looked into the history of their own school, stories from fellow ex students.
then they see the marketing attempts like #aiuncontainable and the open house invitations (which look like invites to Hogwarts) that are being marketed to tweens. They know the facts now. They know the college scorecard stats from the gov which clearly show that there are better options for higher ed.
So that is why the protests are happening now.
The final days of the physical schools are at hand. Most likely, they will move toward the online only presence within the year, where it is harder for protesters to hold them accountable. Then they just have to get Anonymous involved to crash the site on a regular basis.
Time for the greedy corporate vampires to step into the sunlight of accountability