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State commands school to close
BY SARAH BLASKOVICH, Community Editor
A nursing vocational school in Carrollton has been ordered to close immediately, after the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) discovered it did not have proper state licensing.
The students taking courses at Merit Excellence Institute — located on Interstate 35 —have paid for classes that will not lead to proper nursing certification, said Bruce Holter, information specialist at the Texas Board of Nursing.
“It’s basically a fraudulent program,” Holter said.
Frank Mbah, a program coordinator at Merit, said the school is running according to state law.
“I believe there are a group of people that are trying to sabotage the school operations,” he said of Merit, which opened in September 2007. “We are not doing anything wrong.”
Certified orders for a “cease and desist” were sent Thursday from the TWC headquarters in Austin to Merit and three other Dallas-area schools, said Ann Hatchitt, spokesperson for the TWC. Mbah said the letter hasn’t arrived at the school yet.
The school is in violation of two TWC policies, Hatchitt said. First, she said the school doesn’t have an active TWC license, which can be obtained by submitting an application and paying a fee. Second, the school hasn’t been approved by the Texas Board of Nursing, she said.
Schools are required to receive licensing before they begin collecting tuition and before opening the doors to students, Hatchitt said. Mbah said the group received licensing paperwork in September 2007 — the month the school opened — but returned it to the TWC in January 2008.
“We have qualified instructors, we have doctors,” Mbah said. “We are running this school legally.”
The paperwork sent to TWC on Jan. 31 is still being processed, Hatchitt said. She called the 18-page document a “partial application,” because signatures, explanations and attachments are missing. According to TWC records filed Tuesday, the owner didn’t prove his name or address on the form. Other problems include missing course descriptions, no explanation of directors or staff and absent financial statements, the record shows.
The school currently offers classes for 4 hours at time, twice a week, Mbah said. He couldn’t estimate how many students were enrolled in the school.
The TWC and Texas Board of Nursing began to look into the school when they received complaints from students, Holter said.
Holter said “a few months ago” — which was a month or two after the school’s doors opened — he personally received phone calls from complaining students. The calls were also forwarded to employees at the TWC, he said.
“They’re collecting money from students for curricula that will never benefit students,” Hatchitt said. “We want to put a stop to this right away.”
Contact Community Editor Sarah Blaskovich at 972-628-4074 or SBlaskovich@acnpapers.com.
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