Sanford-Brown to Close White Plains Campus

Students who enrolled at Sanford-Brown Institute’s White Plains Campus this year and planned to begin classes this week will have to continue their post-secondary studies somewhere else. 

The institute, which is run by the Illinois-based Career Education Corporation, plans to close its doors in 2015, allowing all current students the opportunity to complete their programs of study.

The institute, which is run by the Illinois-based Career Education Corporation, is closing its door in 2015. Incoming students aren’t being allowed to start classes.

“Sanford-Brown Institute in White Plains announced to faculty staff and students on Monday that it would no longer enroll new students in its programs and will begin a gradual process of discontinuing operations —what’s called a ‘teach-out’,” said Mark Spencer, a spokesman for the Career Education Corportaion. “Our team made this difficult decision after evaluating a number of factors, including current enrollment levels and the expiring lease for the campus.”

Spencer declined to say how much enrollment on the White Plains campus has decreased during the past few years.

Sanford-Brown’s announcement followed an earlier made the same day by State Attorney General Eric  Schneiderman that the Career Education Corporation has agreed to pay a settlement of $10.25 million for inflating job placement figures from  2009 through the spring of 2011. Officials will use  $9.25 million of the settlement to make  restitution to students and  $1 million will be paid as a penalty.

CEC showed annual placement rates for its New York campuses ranging from 54.9 percent  to 80.2 percent, when the correct placement rates ranged from 24.1 percent  to 64.1 percent in order to lure students into its program.

Some of the methods used to manipulate the data included counting graduates’ employment at single one-day health fairs, some of which were held at the request of CEC, and mischaracterizing graduates’ job duties in order to improperly count such students as employed in the field in which the student trained or a related field. For example, certain CEC Career Service employees improperly counted graduates of Criminal Justice programs who were employed in retail sales positions as having obtained “in field” placements.

The Career Education Corporation currently operates Sanford-Brown Institute campuses in Garden City, Melville, White Plains and New York City; and Briarcliffe campuses in Bethpage, Patchogue, and New York City. CEC also operates several on-line schools, including American InterContinental University and Colorado Technical University. CEC currently enrolls 75,000 students worldwide.