Schools use courts to get around closure order–CHEd

The Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) has decried the “enrollment by injunction” some schools that had been ordered to shut down their substandard courses have resorted to.

CHEd Legal Services Director Carmelita Yadao-Sison said these schools continued to defy the commission and accept students to their banned programs by turning to the trial courts.

Sison said a court injunction defeats the CHEd’s efforts to weed out college programs that do not deliver quality education but only make money from their students.

In October last year, the CHEd ordered closed all course programs of the International Academy of Management and Economics (IAME) in Makati City; two maritime courses of PMI Colleges on its Manila and Quezon City campuses; and five baccalaureate programs and a master’s program of Harvardian College in San Fernando City.

Sison said IAME accepted foreign students and continued to operate even after the Supreme Court and the Office of the President dismissed early this year an appeal to continue operating made by IAME president Emmanuel Santos.

“They (IAME) still exist because they said they are now a ’virtual’ university. It’s the foreign students who are on the losing end,” Sison said.

She said IAME continued to fight the CHEd’s closure order in the courts and recently haled her and other CHEd officials before the Ombudsman over their supposed failure to file their statements of assets, liabilities and net worth.

PMI meanwhile continues to offer its BS Marine Transportation and BS Marine Engineering (BSMarE) programs while its appeal is pending in the Court of Appeals, Sison said.

She said the appellate court had dismissed the appeal of Harvardian College although that legal battle is apparently not over.