Care Hope College Student Defense Lawyer | Jupiter, Florida

Care Hope College, at 10094 W Indiantown Road in Jupiter, reported one of the lowest first-time NCLEX pass rates of any Florida nursing programme in 2025. A student dismissed from a programme performing at that level is in a materially different position from one dismissed by a programme that is doing its job, and the difference is worth putting in writing.

19.44% of 36 first-time candidates

The associate-degree programme passed 19.44% of 36 first-time candidates in 2025 against a statutory floor of 76.05% — seven passes and twenty-nine failures. That is not a marginal shortfall. It is a programme roughly 57 percentage points below what Florida law sets as the minimum. The college’s practical-nursing programme also finished below its floor, at 60.00% of 10 first-time candidates against 77.17%, though ten candidates is too small a cohort to carry much weight on its own.

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 — in 2025 that floor was 76.05% for associate-degree programmes and 77.17% for practical-nursing programmes. Section 464.019(5)(a)2 puts a programme two consecutive years below the floor at risk of probation and loss of approval, and section 464.019(5)(c) then obliges the programme to disclose that probationary status in writing to its students and applicants — a failure to give that notice is an independent, statute-based misrepresentation theory against a school that enrolled a student while on probation. A single year below the floor is not probation, and the Board of Nursing publishes no probation roster, so probationary status must be established from board minutes and orders rather than inferred. Every Florida programme is tabulated on the Florida nursing programme pass-rate page.

Why that matters to a dismissal: when a programme fails four candidates in five, a dismissal framed as reflecting the student’s inability to meet the standard becomes considerably harder for the school to sustain. The plainer inference is that the programme was not preparing anybody adequately, and that removing students before they sat the examination is one of the few levers a programme in that position has. That is a case about what the school promised and delivered, not about the student.

A private school, so the statute students rely on does not apply

Most writing about Florida student dismissal assumes a public college, where Fla. Stat. section 1006.60(3) supplies notice, a hearing, the right to be accompanied by counsel and a burden that rests on the institution. This is a private institution. None of that section reaches it.

What governs instead is the enrolment agreement, the catalogue and the student and programme handbooks, read as a contract. Sharick v. Southeastern University of the Health Sciences establishes that a Florida student dismissed in breach of the school’s own contractual undertakings has a claim, and that damages can extend to lost future earning capacity rather than a refund of tuition. So the work is documentary: identify the exact promises the school made about process, and show which it did not keep.

Two further things matter at schools of this kind. Many enrolment agreements contain an arbitration clause, and whether it binds a student depends on the version signed, how broadly it is drafted, whether its cost terms are unconscionable and whether the school has waived it — that question comes first, because it decides whether there is a courtroom at all. And where a school is licensed by the Florida Commission for Independent Education rather than regionally accredited, the CIE complaint route exists alongside any civil claim and is often the faster pressure point.

Where a Care Hope case is filed

Jupiter is in Palm Beach County, which 28 U.S.C. section 89(c) places in the Southern District of Florida, West Palm Beach Division. I am based in Boca Raton, in the same county, and appear in that district regularly. The college moved to its Jupiter campus in July 2022; if the events in question predate the move, confirm which site they occurred at before settling venue.

What can a student defense lawyer do here?

  • Resolve the arbitration question first, from the agreement the student actually signed.
  • Assemble the enrolment agreement, catalogue and programme handbook for the correct edition, and pin down the promises about process.
  • Test the progression arithmetic — withdrawals, repeats and clinical failures are often counted in ways the handbook does not authorise.
  • Use the Commission for Independent Education complaint route where the school is CIE-licensed, in parallel with the civil claim.
  • Press on the wording of the decision letter, which follows the student into every future licensure and transfer application.

How Florida student dismissal cases work generally, and what the first steps are, is set out on the Florida student defence page.

Other Florida colleges

Every school writes its own dismissal, appeal and conduct rules, and the filing deadlines are rarely the same from one campus to the next. These pages set out the procedure at other Florida colleges:

Common questions about Care Hope College cases

What was Care Hope College’s NCLEX pass rate?

In 2025 the programme passed 19.44% of 36 first-time candidates — seven passes and twenty-nine failures — against a statutory floor of 76.05%.

Does a very low pass rate help my case?

It can matter a great deal. Where a programme fails four candidates in five, a dismissal framed as the student failing to meet the standard is much harder for the school to sustain, and the case shifts toward what the school promised and delivered.

Am I protected by Florida’s student discipline statute?

No. Fla. Stat. section 1006.60(3) applies to Florida public colleges. Care Hope is private, so the enrolment agreement, catalogue and handbooks govern as a contract, under Sharick v. Southeastern University of the Health Sciences.

Which court covers Care Hope College?

The Southern District of Florida, West Palm Beach Division. Jupiter is in Palm Beach County, which is in the Southern District under 28 U.S.C. section 89(c).