The issues were really all about money - not the students

Nursing Students Indiana (ISU)

Published

The partnership program in California between ISU and SSU started with a contract between ISU and SSU in 2007. Accordnng to the testinomy at the Sept 27th CA BRN, the assistant to the Calif State Univ Chancelor, Christine Mallon, stated:

"ORIGINALLY THIS YEAR, ON JAN 18, 2012 THE ORIGINAL MOU [aka the agreement between ISU and SSU] EXPIRED." In January 2012 the 2007-2012 contract expired and within that contract, there was no provision for current students. To operate in Calif, the CA BRN in 2007 required ISU be connected to SSU. As of Jan 2012, the program was now illegal in California. Yet, ISU never communicated the issues to their students. It did, however, continued to admit new students and take tuition from current Calif students for what is now an illegal nursing program.

Someone went to the CA BRN to implore BRN to step in and help the now illegal nursing program. The CA BRN contacted SSU and somehow got a temporary 6 month interim contract. Whether there were continued talks to renew the contract is unknown and still there no provision to protect the current Calif students.

The temporary 6 month interim contract expired June 2012 without a new MOU entered into and still no provision for current students. ISU continues to make plans to admit new students in Fall 2012. The CA BRN got SSU to enter into a yet another temporary interim contract for another 6 months (this is temp contract #2) which would expire Dec 2012.

ISU knew there was no contract but contued to admitted Fall 2012 new students with e 3 months remaining on the tempoary interim contract. Still there is no new MOU or any protections for Calif students. Sept 25, 2012 the CSU Chancellor decides not to enter into a MOU with ISU. The 2nd temporary 6-month MOU/contract expires Dec 2012 without any provision to help the present students.

Left with egg on its face, ISU contended that they were under the "impression" that there would be a new MOU and SSU and the CSU Chancellor had mislead them. The truth is the original contract died and there was no new contract. There was nothing in writing that indicated any of the parties had any indication that they would enter into a new contract.

ISU has failed to communicate the issues to its students about when negotiations for a new contract was started before the MOU/contract ended January 2012. One would have thought that it happened long before 2012, but no one is talking. A member of the CA BRN specifically asked how the Board could have admitted new students when there was 3 months left on the 2nd tempoary 6-month MOU/contact and there was no new contract or any provision to assist present students?

The bottomline is this: ISU failed to negotiate a new MOU/contract with SSU before the Jan 2012 MOU/contract expired. Why would Calif not renew the contract. It all comes down to money. SSU got 6% and ISU 94% of monies collected from CA students.

SSU is paid $200 for each student enrolled in a clinial and there are 6 clinicals. If we use the 52 students who graduated between 2007-2012, these students would represent an income to SSU of $62,400 (52 students x 6 clinials x $200) $62,400. However, those same students would provide ISU with $1,040,000. [minimum tuition $20,000 x 52 students]. Those 52 graduated students were worth a million dollars to ISU but SSU got 6% of the profits from that partnership.

Presently, there are 141 admitted students in California. Should they graduate, that would me an additional $169,200 to SSU (141 students x $200 each for 6 clinicals). Those same 141 students are worth to SSU $2,820,000.00 [total tuition $20,000 x 141 = $2,820,000].

If you were SSU and the Calif State Chancellor, would you entere again into such a lopsided parthership in which you only got 6% of the profits and your patner raked in 94%? According to Christine Mallon, assist to the Calif State University Chancellor. Found on the UTube transcript of the meeting located at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZADwJ0WCIk\\

Ms. Mallon's testinomy can be found at 2:52:50 "Thank, you, uh, the CSU has 23 campuses; SSU is one of them, and um, the relationship, in terms of the relationship is what I would like to talk about the MOU itself. So, we -- the Chancellor has decided after much consultation with the ISU officials that on 12/31 of this year the MOU will be allowed to eexpire as it was previously planned for.

2:53:23 "Originally this year on January 18th, the MOU expired for a short period of time (I take it). Based on advice from the BRN, it was extended to June and then it was extended to December. So, it was extended twice, from what I understand, based on the input fromthe BRN, but we cannot continue this any further. It will be allowed to expire."

At no time did ISU ever consider its golden goose, the California students. The original contract never provided student protection about what ISU would do with the students when the January 2012 MOU/contract would expired. That provision was somehow left out of the original contract. The original MOU/contract provided SSU 6% of the profits and did not protect the golden goose.

How could this have happened? Poor management, poor contract, and a preditory distant learning nursing program, who was more interested in their profits than developing a contract that was fair to all. When the contract expired with no new contract, this left ISU with no California program. It is now scrambling to locate a new partner to protect its golden egg. As one student said to ISU, SSU, and CSU, "How can you sleep at night!"

It was actually my husband that made that comment at the meeting, on behalf of me, the student. It was directed at SSU entirely, Not ISU. I think people need to keep an open mind on this situaion and not post things that they assume to know

Keeping an open mind means just that--being open to the truth. The November 2012 Board Meeting discussed the ISU LVN to BSN program. The Board found that ISU was operating an UNAUTHORIZED LVN to BSN nursing program in California. To be authorized, ISU had to partner with an authrized California nursing school. What ISU did was partner with a SSU extension program--which does not qualify as a Califonia nursing school parthership. Since 2007, ISU was operating an UNAUTHORIZED NURSING SCHOOL IN CALIFORNIA. When the Memorandum of Agreement ran it course in 18 Jan 2012, ISU continued to operate as usual. However, it has no MOA (MOU) and should have closed it doors in California. It did not. What it did scam the Board by stating it had an amendment to the expired MOA. ISU failed to mention that once a MOA (MOU) is expired, there can be no amendments to a expired agreemennt--unless it is an approved nunc pro tunc amendment. Yet, somehow ISU got the SSUpurchasing manager to sign the amendments (despite the requirement that a co-sigature of the SSU nursing dept was required and the statement from the CSU Chancellor's office that he would have never signed the original MOA/MOU or any amendments). Plus, there are no signature dates on the amendments and there is no effective date either. All in all, the Amendments and the MOA/MOU were void.

The ISU story in California is continuing to unravel. The original program was NEVER AUTHORIZED by the Calif BRN--per the Board's legal counsel and the program ISU was offering the California students should have stopped in 2007--if not 18 Jan 2012--but ISU continues to operate the program as if it is business as usual. For the next 12 months, ISU continued to offer classes to California students and collect tuition from those California students for a nursing program that does not exist.

These are the facts, which is based on the Nursing Practice Act (California) and the Caif professional code.

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