Westwood College, which serves about 4,000 students in several states, including a new Aurora campus which opened just last year, is no longer accepting new students.
Westwood College’s Colorado campuses were placed on probation in 2010 by state officials who said the school had unresolved problems with national accreditors regarding recruitment tactics and student achievement .In March 2011 the school was removed from probation.
The for-profit college, which paid $4.5 million in 2012 to reach a settlement with the Colorado Attorney General’s Office, has not yet made a decision on whether to go out of business, said Gil Rudawsky, of GroundFloor Media, on behalf of the college.
A decision to completely shut down has not been made, Rudawsky said.
“There may be some other options,” he said.
Possible options to keep the school going could include new ownership, additional partners or additional lines of credit or funding.
On Wednesday, the college announced the decision on freezing student enrollment and released a statement:
“We are proud of our tradition dating back to 1953 of helping nearly 40,000 graduates reach their education and career goals. Westwood College has been through an extended period of declining enrollments due to market shifts and changes in the regulatory environment. Now Westwood College has made the difficult decision to discontinue all new student enrollments as of today.”
Westwood will continue to to run its current program for about 4,000 students across the country. The school has campuses in California, Illinois, Virginia and Georgia. It serves students in Colorado in Aurora and north Denver. It also offers online programs.
Degrees are offered in Technology, Design, Healthcare, Justice, Business and Automotive Technology.
About 480 students attend Westwood in Colorado.
Faculty, staff and students were notified of the change Wednesday.
“We are working diligently to continue to provide a quality academic experience for our current students at each of our campuses and our online school,” the Westwood statement said. “Campus services will continue to be available to students and graduates throughout this process.”
The 34,000-square-foot Aurora campus opened last year in the Aurora Town Center with 250 students enrolled there.
Kieran Nicholson: 303-954-1822, knicholson@denverpost.com or @kierannicholson
