Lone Star College advisers available for ITT students

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- On Tuesday, ITT Technical Institutes stated that they would "cease operations" after federal sanctions. The school says 8,000 employees will lose their jobs.

All ITT campuses closed Tuesday nationwide, including those in the Houston-area. Students, some with only one semester left to complete their degree, are trying to transfer to new schools.

Lone Star College announced that its college advisors will be available to assist ITT students. Those advisors will be available at 9am Wednesday to answer questions. If you need assistance, contact Lone Star's advisors at ITThelp@lonestar.edu or (281)362-7827.

The Department of Education has left open the possibility of discharging student loans, but is urging students to explore all of their educational options to see what makes sense.

Helpful links:

Information about ITT concerning federal aid

How can you find a new school? The Department of Education says it might help to use this scorecard

The school issued a statement that said, in part:

"It is with profound regret that we must report that ITT Educational Services, Inc. will discontinue academic operations at all of its ITT Technical Institutes permanently after approximately 50 years of continuous service. With what we believe is a complete disregard by the U.S. Department of Education for due process to the company, hundreds of thousands of current students and alumni and more than 8,000 employees will be negatively affected."

"...This action of our federal regulator to increase our surety requirement to 40 percent of our Title IV federal funding and place our schools under 'Heightened Cash Monitoring Level 2,' forced us to conclude that we can no longer continue to operate our ITT Tech campuses and provide our students with the quality education they expect and deserve. ... We believe the government's action was inappropriate and unconstitutional, however, with the ITT Technical Institutes ceasing operations, it will now likely rest on other parties to understand these reprehensible actions and to take action to attempt to prevent this from happening again."

The Wall Street Journal is reporting a laid-off teacher and an office staffer at ITT Educational Services filed a lawsuit Tuesday. They're looking to gain class-action status for the thousands of employees caught up in the closure. The lawsuit looks to crack down on the school for failing to give the 60-days notice required under federal law for when large numbers of employees are terminated together.