Argosy University Closes Amid Financial Aid Violations

DENVER (CBS4)- A national career college chain that operated in Denver has folded. More than 200 students had attended Argosy University located in the Tamarac area of southeast Denver.

Argosy has operated around the country, first as a "for profit" then as a "non-profit" educational institution. The college closed its doors at a building in Denver last year, leaving students like Alexandra Schmidt-Beuchat in a lurch.

"This has been devastating to say the least it's affected me, my peers, students all over the country," she said.

Schmidt-Beuchat managed to continue her education online, but matters went from bad to worse. The U.S. Department of Education gave the university $13 million for student aid, but then found the money had been misspent. A letter from the department stated, "Violations are serious and the potential harm to students and taxpayers is severe."

Nicole Harrison, a marriage and family counseling masters degree student told CBS4's Rick Sallinger, "We have a lot of people across the country that are hurting including faculty. I feel that we deserve better than this as students who put in a lot of effort to secure our degrees."

Argosy University is under the same umbrella ownership as the Art Institute of Colorado, which has also shut down. The Dream Center Education Holdings has been the most recent owner.

The list of private career colleges that have closed in Colorado also includes Westwood College, ITT Technical Institute, Heritage College and Echotech Institute.

Ken Adler was an Argosy student in forensic psychology, "It's sad, this was a good school. The curriculum part of this was excellent."

The Colorado Department of Higher Education is helping the students to transfer to other schools, get their diplomas, and resolve other issues.