Cambridge College of Healthcare & Technology Student Defense Lawyer

Three campuses, and two of them are not in the city they are named after

Cambridge College of Healthcare & Technology runs three Florida campuses, and the naming is a genuine trap worth clearing up first because it decides which federal court would hear a claim.

  • Delray Beach — in Delray Beach, Palm Beach County. Associate degree in nursing plus allied health.
  • The “Orlando” campus — physically in Altamonte Springs, which is in Seminole County, not Orange County. Associate degree in nursing and practical nursing.
  • The “Miami” campus — physically in Miami Gardens, in Miami-Dade County. Associate degree in nursing.

The Miami Gardens naming is harmless for venue, since Miami Gardens and Miami are both Miami-Dade and both in the Miami Division. The Altamonte Springs one is not harmless in the same way: a student who assumes an “Orlando campus” means Orange County has the county wrong, and county is what 28 U.S.C. section 89 assigns districts by. Seminole County is in the Middle District, Orlando Division, so the answer happens to land in the same courthouse — but the reasoning has to run through the right county, and the same mistake at a different school would put a filing in the wrong place.

The practical version of that point: establish which physical campus you were enrolled at and in which county, in writing, before anyone relies on a marketing name for anything procedural.

This is a private institution, so it is not a state actor: the Fourteenth Amendment does not reach it, and Fla. Stat. section 1006.60(3) — which gives students at Florida’s public colleges and state universities a legal representative who may question witnesses — does not apply. What governs is the school’s own published policy, enforced as a contract, and in Florida Sharick v. Southeastern University of the Health Sciences makes that contract carry real damages where an institution departs from its own procedures.

Both PN and ADN in one operation, and they carry different risk

Because the Altamonte Springs campus runs both practical nursing and the associate degree, the same institution is handling two quite different kinds of case.

A practical nursing programme is short and tightly sequenced. There is little room to absorb a failure, remediation windows are compressed, and a student dismissed late has paid nearly the full cost with nothing transferable. The Sharick damages measure applies proportionately just as it would to a longer degree.

An associate degree programme adds standardised progression testing and a longer clinical sequence, which brings the two failure modes that dominate ADN dismissals: a benchmark examination treated as dispositive when the published policy may not make it so, and a clinical site’s judgement converting into a course failure and then a progression bar.

Which programme you were in therefore changes both what to argue and what the loss is worth.

Under Fla. Stat. section 464.019(5)(a)1 a Florida nursing programme’s first-time NCLEX passage rate must stay within 10 percentage points of the national average for comparable programmes; two consecutive years below that floor puts approval at risk, and section 464.019(5)(c) obliges a programme on probation to disclose that status to students in writing. The full picture is in the 2025 pass rates for every Florida programme below the benchmark.

The first written request

Before responding substantively, ask in writing for the specific provision alleged, a complete copy of the catalog or handbook containing it in the edition applicable to your cohort, the material the school is relying on, and the deadline by which you must respond. Catalogs are cohort-specific, and a school applying a later edition to an earlier cohort has departed from its own contract. Keep the request and the reply.

Add a fifth question here, given the three-campus structure: which campus administration is deciding your matter. It is not always the campus you attended.

Three routes stay open whatever the catalog says: the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights on Section 504, ADA, Title IX, Title VI or retaliation; the institution’s accreditor, which cares whether a school follows its own published policy; and the Florida Commission for Independent Education, which licenses independent postsecondary institutions here. For an approved nursing programme, the Board of Nursing is a fourth.

What can a student defense lawyer do here?

  • Establishing the physical campus, county and catalog edition that actually govern, rather than the marketing name
  • Testing whether a progression examination score is dispositive under the published policy or only in practice
  • Challenging a withdrawal recharacterised as a failure to trigger a progression bar
  • Enforcing remediation the catalog offered but the programme did not deliver
  • Building Section 504 and ADA claims where an accommodation was delayed, diluted or refused
  • Establishing whether clinical concerns were documented contemporaneously or after the decision
  • Handling nursing school dismissal and clinical removal
  • Assessing Sharick damages, which matter proportionately as much in a short practical nursing programme

Which court covers which campus

  • Delray Beach — Palm Beach County, Southern District of Florida, West Palm Beach Division
  • “Miami” campus, Miami Gardens — Miami-Dade County, Southern District of Florida, Miami Division
  • “Orlando” campus, Altamonte Springs — Seminole County, Middle District of Florida, Orlando Division

Assignments are under 28 U.S.C. section 89, and I am admitted to the bar of all three Florida districts. See the guide to federal districts by campus and the Florida nursing programs page.

The other Florida nursing and health-sciences schools

Florida’s standalone nursing and health-sciences colleges differ sharply in what their own paperwork permits. Some bar a lawyer from the room entirely, some compel arbitration in another state, and some publish no appeal deadline for the student at all while binding themselves to one. Those provisions, not the school’s reputation, decide how a dismissal case runs.

Before anything else, check where your programme sits against the statutory floor: the 82 Florida nursing programmes below the Fla. Stat. section 464.019 benchmark in 2025, including the written-disclosure duty a programme on probation owes its students. The Florida nursing programs page covers how these cases run, and nursing programmes inside the public colleges and universities are on those institutions’ own pages in the Florida schools index — where students get the Fla. Stat. section 1006.60(3) rights that private-school students do not.

Common questions about Cambridge College of Healthcare & Technology cases

Where is the Cambridge College Orlando campus actually located?

In Altamonte Springs, which is in Seminole County rather than Orange County. Establish the physical campus and its county in writing, because county is what decides the federal district under 28 U.S.C. 89, and a marketing name is not a reliable guide to it.

Is the Miami campus in Miami?

It is in Miami Gardens, which is still Miami-Dade County and still the Miami Division, so nothing turns on it for venue. It is worth knowing for accuracy in any filing or correspondence.

Do I have due process rights here?

Not constitutional ones. It is a private institution, so it is not a state actor and Fla. Stat. 1006.60(3) does not reach it. Your protections come from the catalog enforced as a contract, and in Florida Sharick gives that real teeth where the school departs from its own procedures.

I was dismissed near the end of a practical nursing programme. Is it worth pursuing?

Often yes. A short programme means you have paid nearly the full cost with nothing transferable, and Florida’s Sharick measure — the lost value of the credential — applies proportionately just as it would to a longer degree.

Can one exam score end my associate programme?

That depends on the words of the published policy, which is often less clear than how it is applied. Whether the score is dispositive, and whether accommodations were properly provided for it, are documentary questions worth pressing.

Who decides my appeal?

Ask in writing. With a three-campus operation the deciding administration is not always the campus you attended, and knowing which one is handling the matter changes who you are dealing with.