Email Exchange: Hi Annie, From the day soid i had zero financial interest in the schooi. That titie i had was a "transitional" titie as was heiping them through a change of ownership transition. That position ended in 2013 with regard to their composite score, i peiieye during the change of ownership they took on some debt they needed to compiete the saie and that iswhat threw their composite score iower. That is not unusuai. Any DOE restrictions they were on were specific to the change of ownership and not uncommon. That is mostiy a guess as it was not my schooi at that time and you wouid need to talk to them for a more accurate answer John From: Annie Waldman Sent: Friday, February 12, 2016 6:27 pm To: John Euliano--Subject: s: ProPublica inquiry - Accreditation Hi John, Thanks so much for all this information. I greatly appreciate it. I have two brief follow-up questions that I hope you will be able to answer: 1) I realize that you Southern Technical College around October 2012, and at this time, it appears that you stepped down as President. Did you have no involvement with the school, financial or professional, after the sale? According to the ACICS site and your own linkedin pag you were Senior VP of Institutional Development at Southern Technical College until at least October 2013. Can you confirm this? Do you have any financial link to the school now? Do you have any professional link to the school now? 2) According to ED data from 2012-2013 on the financial responsibilig composite score, Southen-i Technical College had a score of -1. According to the ED website, a school with a composite score less than 1.0 is "considered not financially responsible. However, a school with a score less than 1.0 may continue to participate in the Title IV programs under provisional certification. In addition, this lower score typically requires that the school be subject to cash monitoring requirements and post a letter of credit (equal to a minimum of 10 percent of the Title IV aid it received in the institution's most recent fiscal year)." Did any of these actions come up during that time? Thanks again for assisting me with understanding this. If you could get back to me before EOD Tuesday, that would be great. Best, Annie From: John Euliano-- Sent: Thursday, February 11, 2016 6:20 PM To: Annie Waldman Subject: RE: ProPublica Inquiry - Accreditation Annie, with regard to Southern Technical College, after a very intensive review of multiple years of processing the Department found some issues, as they usually do after an audit ofthat magnitude. We did not agree with all oftheir findings. Keep in mind, ED program reviews can happen at any time. Vou can usually count on them once every 7 years. In the 10 years of existence that was the first and only one for Southern Technical College. This review was not out ofthe ordinary. if you also read that report you linked in your email you will see the amount of liabilities were small compared to the amount of aid processed and you will also realize that our past 3 years default rates listed on that report were in a very good range. Our student outcomes at STC during that time were outstanding. The company was in the process ofa change of ownership pefore and during the program review. The company was actually sold prior to the final determination letter being received. it was decided that we would NOT appeal the final liapilities pecause Al we no longer owned the company and had limited access to our records and B) we did not want to burden the new owners with a appeal. We paid everything the Department asked for and closed the program review. Had we appealed those liapilities we were confident they would have been significantly reduced as it was our opinion the Department erred in some of their calculations. Our campuses were never under Heightened Cash Monitoring or any other restriction from ED the entire time I owned the schools. with regard to the cwa we feel that they are over>>reaching their authority and are challenging the CID in court. The oral arguments were yesterday and it is now up to the iudge. At this point, there really is nothing else to provide on that issue. Now I've made more than one statement. llhink that means you are winning. John From: Annie Waldman Sent: Thursday, February 11, 2015 2:11 PM To: John Euliano --Subject: Re: ProPublica Inquiry - Accreditation Hi John, Thanks so much for your email. I appreciate you getting backto me with your comment. As these issues are important given recent public attention toward accreditation and specifically toward ACICS lie the CFPB CID letter and the Senate investigations subcommittee inquiry), I encourage you to speak with me. I have already reached out to Tony and have arranged a time to speak with him and Al. I also have a few clarification questions directly related to Southern Technical. Specifically, I was hoping that you might be able to tell me about the 2012 Qrogram review and the campuses on HCM. My schedule is relatively flexible, so let me know if you have some time tomorrow to speak. Thanks again for getting backto me. Best, Annie Annie Waldman Reporterl PrcPubllca d: 917-512-0244 c' 347-549-0332 annie.waldmanQQrogublicaorg I @AnnleWaldman From: John Euliana -- Date: Thursday, February 11, 2016 at 1:01 PM To: Annie Waldman Subject: RE: ProPublica Inquiry - Accreditation Hi Annie, i understand you have well. After you have already written the some negative articles it is obvious that your mind is made up. My comments would add nothing to your reporting because when you find out they are positive you will ignore them. To accept my defense of ACICS and accreditation in general would he to discredit the stance you have already taken. My only comment is this. Ahyinsinuatioh that there is any "home cooking" or that our peer review process is somehow "the fox running the hen house" (it seems like that is where you are goingi is absolutely 100% false. Not even close to the truth. I have been on the Council many years and have neverONCE seen anything that would make me question the integrity ofthe process. Nobody is perfect and we pride ourselves on continuous improvement in our member institutions as well as our own internal process. We are all improving. Any other phone calls should be to the home office. Either Al Gray or Tony Eieda would be your pest chance for a comment. Good luck to you. John Euliano From: Annie Waldman org] Sent Tuesday, February 9, 2016 6:20 PM To: John Euliano -- Subject: Re: ProPublica Inquiry - Accreditation Hi John, My name is Annie Waldman and I'm a journalist with ProPuhlica working on a story related to accreditation. I would love to speak with you about your experience on council. Would it be possible to set up a phone call tomorrow or on Thursday? Best, Annie Waldman - Annie Waldman | Reporter | ProPublica d: 917-512-0244 | c: 347-549-0332 annie.waldman@propublica.org | @AnnieWaldman