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"It is true that they could close one day and reopen the next, and the board would not have the grounds to deny them unless there is something wrong with their proposal," Scheidt explains.

In the months after Latisha and Arlisa Tally graduated, the sisters returned to the campus, trying to avail themselves of placement services they were promised.

They never found a job, but on one visit, the sisters noticed some big changes at the school. "They were painting rooms and putting in new carpet," Arlisa says.

Before a scheduled visit by the Accrediting Bureau of Health Education Schools (ABHES) in the fall of 2002, both campuses got a facelift, plus thousands of dollars worth of new medical laboratory equipment. The college also borrowed $70,000 to buy new computers, according to Uniform Commercial Code records filed with the Missouri Secretary of State's office.

"We did buy -- right before ABHES came -- a bunch of new equipment: new microscopes, new centrifuges, new incubators," says a school employee.

Despite that, the ABHES visit "was a total disaster," the employee says. "We got a huge report back on all the things that were screwed up."

ABHES is a national organization that gives its seal of approval to more than 200 vocational-health schools that meet its standards. Executive director Carol Moneymaker confirms that her organization placed the school on conditional approval in 2002 but refuses to discuss any details of the on-site visit.

"It's not public information," Moneymaker explains. "The institution would have to approve the release of that information."

But according to one employee, the accreditation team found fault with the school's internship practices, among other things. ABHES requires allied health students to intern at a medical facility such as a doctor's office or a hospital.

Each student's internship file should have included the dates and hours a student worked and a supervisor's signature. But on many of the work logs, the hours were incomplete and there were no signatures, even though the students graduated, the employee says.

"We used a lot of the same clinical sites, so we'd pull a [student] file from the same site where [there was a supervisor's signature]," the employee says. "We had to go back and do a lot of cutting and pasting of signatures."

Former student Lynn Mareschal says that when she and her classmates interned at a nursing home, the instructor told students to lie about their hours. "[The teacher] would tell you to just go home. We'd leave at noon or one o' clock, and we'd sign out and say we left at three," she says. "They wanted it to appear we had done all the clinical hours we were required to do, but we weren't doing them."

Finding internship sites for students was difficult because of the school's reputation, says instructor Worth. Another former employee says that when she tried to set up clinical opportunities for students, employers said, "Your school is nothing more than a diploma pusher."

After nearly a year of scrutiny by ABHES, the organization finally granted accreditation to the college in July 2003. But one former college director says ABHES is letting the school off too easy.

"The accreditors are allowing them to meet the minimum requirements," the administrator says. "They get a slap on the wrist and a write-up. They need to be shut down."

Frustrated by her futile job search and living in public housing with a new baby, an exasperated Latisha Tally sent a letter to the Missouri Department of Higher Education a year ago outlining the school's shortcomings.

Latisha was shocked and angry when a response arrived from the state's proprietary-school certification program. "The department has determined that the school acted in accordance with certification standards and school policy, and no further action is required," wrote Leroy Wade, director of the office that oversees proprietary schools.

The department is supposed to verify that for-profit schools in the state meet minimum educational, safety and financial standards. In the last three years, the office received three other complaints about the St. Louis College of Health Careers.

Wade concedes that the allegations raised by Latisha Tally and others could violate state standards. But with a staff of two people to regulate more than 140 for-profit schools around the state, Wade says, the department's ability to investigate complaints is limited.

"We contact the school and ask for their response, then we review and make a determination about whether a standard has been violated," he explains. "The problem is verifying what actually occurred. Even if we don't like what was done, there's nothing more we can do if we see they have not violated the letter of the requirements."

But Wade concedes, "The kind of questions that are coming up point to the need for [an investigation]."

Latisha and Arlisa Tally couldn't agree more. On a recent afternoon, Latisha -- dressed smartly in a brilliant pink shirt and black slacks -- holds her sleeping son after returning home from another job interview. Arlisa styles a friend's hair and watches a Lifetime movie.

Thumbing through student loan papers, they wonder if they will ever find jobs or be able to repay their college debts, which total $15,000 between them.

"We thought we were going to be working somewhere," says Latisha. "Months went by. Then years went by. Now we're in debt, and we still don't have a job."

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