Midwestern Career College: Student Discipline, Dismissal & Federal Court

How do student discipline and dismissal cases work at Midwestern Career College?

Midwestern Career College is a private, for-profit career college with its main campus at 203 North LaSalle Street in the Loop, in Cook County, Illinois extension sites on South Wacker Drive, in Evergreen Park and in Naperville — all within the Northern District’s Eastern Division — and affiliate campuses in Ohio. The Council on Occupational Education accredits it, and the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation approves its Licensed Practical Nursing program. Its rules sit in a 2026–2027 Academic Catalog, an LPN Student Handbook and a Clinical Externship Handbook. For LPN students the rule that ends the most enrollments is about attendance, not grades: a second clinical absence fails the course, and arriving ten minutes late counts as an absence — while a second failed attempt at the same course ends your place in the program unless a five-business-day appeal succeeds.

Midwestern Career College is a private institution. There is no state action, so there is no constitutional due process claim, and arguing one wastes an appeal. The theory is contract: Illinois holds that a college and its students have a contractual relationship whose terms come from the catalog and the handbook — Raethz v. Aurora University, 346 Ill. App. 3d 728 (2004), restated by the Fourth District in Urso v. Bradley University, 2023 IL App (4th) 230165 — while adding that the relationship “is unique and cannot be strictly categorized or characterized in purely contractual terms.”

The limit is the standard of review, and it decides most of these cases before anyone reaches the facts. A student has a remedy for an adverse academic decision only if it was made arbitrarily, capriciously, or in bad faith. Frederick v. Northwestern University Dental School, 247 Ill. App. 3d 464 (1993), puts it bluntly — courts have been loath to review, much less overturn, academic dismissals — and Bosch v. NorthShore University Health System, 2019 IL App (1st) 190070, holds that a school which departs somewhat from its handbook still wins unless the departure was material. The federal courts in Chicago apply the same test: in Doe v. Columbia College Chicago, 933 F.3d 849 (7th Cir. 2019), the Seventh Circuit affirmed dismissal of a student’s contract claim where the college had investigated and reasoned its way to a decision, and in Gash v. Rosalind Franklin University, 117 F.4th 957 (7th Cir. 2024), it held that calling a process arbitrary or predetermined, without specific facts, is not enough. What survives is specific: in Liu v. Northwestern University, 78 F. Supp. 3d 839 (N.D. Ill. 2015), a former law student’s claim went forward where the school imposed what amounted to an integrity charge while denying her the handbook procedure for contesting one. Federal law does not care that the school is private: Title IX, Title VI and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act apply because it takes federal funds, and the ADA applies to it as a place of public accommodation.

A federal claim arising at Midwestern Career College is filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois — Cook County sits in its Eastern Division under 28 U.S.C. § 93(a), and the statute fixes the places of holding court for that division at Chicago and Wheaton. I am a member of the general bar of that court, admitted on my Florida license under its Local Rule 83.10, which opens the general bar to an attorney in good standing before the highest court of any state. That means a Title IX, Section 504 or ADA complaint for a Midwestern Career College student is one I file and litigate under my own name, with no pro hac vice motion. The Northern District abrogated its local-counsel designation rule in July 2023, so a member of its bar with no office in the district no longer has to designate local counsel. One limit, stated plainly: the court keeps a separate trial bar, and under Local Rule 83.12 a general-bar member who is not on it — that is me — appears alone in everything except testimonial proceedings, meaning evidentiary hearings and trial, where a trial-bar member must sit as advisor unless the judge grants the rule’s narrow waiver.

The LPN program: 78 percent, two clinical absences, two attempts

The LPN Student Handbook sets the passing grade at a C, defined as 78 percent, with “no rounding and no extra credit,” and the lab and clinical portions must be passed separately. Dosage calculation carries a 90 percent requirement and two attempts; failing it “will be considered a course fail, and the student will be academically withdrawn from the program.” At exams, a student who arrives five minutes late may not start with the group, and a device in use means a zero.

Clinical attendance is stricter still. “Tardiness of 10 minutes or more will constitute a clinical absence.” A first absence must be made up as a whole day; on a second, “No other absences will be allowed. The student will fail the clinical portion of the course” — and failing clinical fails the course. Each course may be attempted twice “during all periods of enrollment,” and a student who fails the second attempt “will be academically withdrawn from the program and will not be eligible for re-entry into the LPN program.” See nursing school dismissal.

Read that against the handbook’s own Academic Dismissal section, which says a student who fails two nursing or medical foundation courses, or the same one twice, “will be subject to dismissal” — and then provides a way back: a written appeal to the Licensed Practical Nursing Program Committee within five (5) business days of the dismissal notice, documenting extenuating circumstances, with a written decision within ten business days that is final. The two sections do not fit together, and a student facing either should file the appeal. Readmission is otherwise allowed once, within a year, and never after a dismissal for “unsafe practice, unprofessional conduct, or academic dishonesty.” A HIPAA violation means “immediate dismissal from the program.”

Conduct: progressive in principle, immediate in practice

The catalog’s Standards of Student Conduct reach campus, college events and off-campus behavior, including online, that affects “the mission or reputation of the college,” and they treat externship violations and dismissal from a clinical site as offenses. Corrective action runs from an oral warning to a written warning, probation — during which another violation means dismissal — and dismissal, each delivered in a meeting with the Academic Manager. MCC describes itself as “committed to a progressive approach” but reserves “immediate dismissal” for some infractions. A conduct dismissal may be appealed by letter, delivered in person or by email to the Academic Manager, within fourteen (14) calendar days; the Academic Council reviews it within five business days, and its decision is final. No standard of proof or advisor rule is published. The general grievance procedure ends in a Grievance Committee hearing at which “all persons directly involved, or their representatives must be present.” See conduct code charges.

Academic dishonesty and AI

The catalog lists “Using AI tools to complete your coursework” as plagiarism, and the LPN handbook adds content “generated by AI tools such as ChatGPT.” Sanctions climb by offense. A first offense on an assignment brings a warning and a resubmission with the grade cut by 20 percent; on an exam or quiz, a zero with no resubmission. A second brings a zero on either. A third means the student “will be automatically withdrawn from the course with a failing grade” and faces administrative action, and the catalog allows escalation “up to and including immediate dismissal from the program.” No appeal route is published for integrity findings, though the grievance procedure covers “any nontrivial complaint.” See AI academic integrity accusations.

Externships, progress and grade appeals

Under the Clinical Externship Handbook, “3-4 unexcused absences” typically end a placement; a student on a Plan of Action who violates it again must find a new placement “not affiliated with MCC”; and a student whose externship is terminated is withdrawn from the course and, absent other courses, from the program. A termination for conduct or attendance means the student “will not be eligible for re-enrollment.” Requests to change sites are decided within five business days and “cannot be appealed.” See clinical rotation removal.

On satisfactory academic progress, a first miss brings automatic warning and a second an academic suspension that must be appealed to the SAP Committee “by the fifth business day of a term immediately following the suspension,” or the student is academically dismissed. And MCC’s grade appeal policy uses the same words as the Illinois standard of review above: an appeal is “appropriate only when there is alleged capricious and arbitrary behavior on the part of the instructor,” and it is due within 30 calendar days of the course end date. See grade appeals.

Sexual misconduct and accommodations

For sexual misconduct, the federal rule is the 2020 Title IX regulation: the 2024 rule was vacated nationwide on January 9, 2025, in Tennessee v. Cardona, and on September 29, 2026 the Department of Education formally repealed it and restored the pre-2024 text (91 Fed. Reg. 61,308). And as MCC’s own policy reflects, the 2020 regulation requires postsecondary institutions to hold a live hearing at which each party’s advisor conducts cross-examination. Its 2026–2027 Title IX Sexual Misconduct Policy for the Illinois campuses provides a live hearing, virtual on request, at which each party’s advisor — who “may be, but need not be, an attorney” — conducts cross-examination; MCC provides an advisor if you have none. The standard is preponderance of the evidence, and an appeal goes to the CEO “within ten (10) calendar days” of receiving the decision. Accommodation requests are due at least one week before a term starts and must be resubmitted before each term unless approved otherwise — a rule that quietly lapses accommodations for students who do not renew them.

What a student defense lawyer can do here

Most of the value is early and quiet. It is reading Midwestern Career College’s policy against what the school actually did and finding the gap; writing the response or the appeal so it argues the grounds the policy recognizes rather than the ones that feel most unfair; preserving the federal issues — Title IX, Section 504 and the ADA, FERPA — so they are in the record if the case ever leaves campus; and identifying comparators, because a sanction far outside what similar cases drew is one of the few arguments that reliably moves a decision-maker.

At MCC two moves are specific. First, in an LPN dismissal, file the five-business-day appeal to the LPN Program Committee even if you were told re-entry is closed: the handbook’s Academic Dismissal section provides it, and the conflict with the retake section is itself an argument. Second, frame a grade appeal in the catalog’s own terms — arbitrary means “no sound academic reason,” capricious means a grade “not resulting from a reasonable and announced grading policy” — and point to the syllabus, the no-rounding rule and the remediation cap as the announced policy the grade had to follow.

What a lawyer cannot do is turn a campus process into a trial. The rules of evidence do not apply, there is no discovery, and the school decides its own case at first instance. That is exactly why the written record built during the campus process is the whole ballgame: by the time a court looks at it, the record is closed.

The one Illinois statute that gives you procedure

Illinois has no general statute setting notice periods, hearing formats, standards of proof or appeal rights for college students. The Illinois School Code, 105 ILCS 5, has a detailed suspension and expulsion scheme, and it applies to elementary and secondary schools, not here. The exception is the Preventing Sexual Violence in Higher Education Act, 110 ILCS 155, and it is a real one. It reaches every higher education institution in the state — public universities, community colleges, and private not-for-profit and for-profit institutions alike — and it requires timely written notice of the allegations to all parties, an investigation that is adequate, reliable and impartial, written notice of the outcome, and appeal rights. It requires the school to make confidential advisors available, trained to a statutory standard and kept separate from the people deciding the case. Both parties are entitled to an advisor of their choice, and that advisor may be an attorney — although the institution may limit how far an attorney-advisor participates in a hearing, which is why Midwestern Career College’s own rule on that, set out above, still governs what your lawyer may do in the room. The standard of proof is preponderance of the evidence, applied the same way to both sides.

What to do first

1. Diary the clock. LPN dismissal appeal: five business days. Conduct dismissal: fourteen calendar days. SAP suspension: the fifth business day of the next term. Grade appeal: 30 calendar days. Title IX: ten calendar days.
2. Get your clinical attendance and time-punch records and check every absence against the ten-minute rule.
3. Save the catalog, the LPN Student Handbook and the Externship Handbook as dated PDFs; the LPN handbook can be changed at the Program Director’s discretion.
4. Ask in writing which provision the decision rests on — the retake rule or the Academic Dismissal section — and file the appeal either way.
5. Renew any accommodation before each term. See Section 504 and ADA accommodations and the Illinois student defense hub.

One honest caveat about geography. Illinois has three federal districts. I am admitted to two of them, the Northern and the Southern. A federal claim arising at a school in Springfield, Peoria, Champaign-Urbana or the Quad Cities falls in the Central District; I am not a member of that bar, and those matters I handle with local counsel in that district or by pro hac vice admission. Appeals from the Northern District go to the Seventh Circuit, which keeps its own bar; my appellate admission is in the Eleventh. I say so before a retainer rather than after.

Where I am licensed. I am licensed to practice law in Florida. I am admitted to the bars of the U.S. District Courts for the Southern, Middle and Northern Districts of Florida, the District of Colorado, the Northern and Southern Districts of Illinois, the District of Nebraska, the District of New Mexico, and the Western District of Wisconsin, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Federal court admission is not a license to practice the law of the state in which the court sits. I am not licensed in Illinois and do not advise on Illinois state law or appear in Illinois state court.

The federal money on the line at Midwestern Career College

Midwestern Career College students and families took on $4.3 million in federal Direct Loans in the 2025–26 award year.

Every dollar of it rides on academic standing. A dismissal, a failed Satisfactory Academic Progress evaluation, or a mid-term withdrawal sets off federal rules that decide whether aid continues, whether money already disbursed has to go back, and — under the borrowing caps in effect since July 1, 2026 — whether a student who leaves can still finance a return. The academic fight and the financial aid fight are the same fight, and the windows are short. How those rules work: SAP appeals and academic dismissal.

On the Department’s financial responsibility test, Midwestern Career College’s most recent published composite score is 2.5 (fiscal year 2022–23) — a passing score on the –1.0-to-3.0 scale, where 1.5 and above passes. How to read that number: the federal warning signs guide.

Source: U.S. Department of Education, Federal Student Aid Data Center, Direct Loan volume by school, award year 2025–26 (cumulative through June 30, 2026). Institution-wide federal Direct Loan totals.

Other schools in the Northern District of Illinois

Every school writes its own dismissal, appeal and conduct rules, and the deadlines are rarely the same from one campus to the next. These pages set out the procedure at other schools in the Northern District of Illinois:

• Midwestern University-Downers Grove
• Moody Bible Institute
• Morrison Institute of Technology
• National Louis University
• National University of Health Sciences
• North Central College

Common questions about Midwestern Career College student cases

How many clinical absences are allowed in the Midwestern Career College LPN program?

One, and it must be made up as a whole clinical day. On a second absence the student fails the clinical portion of the course, and failing clinical fails the course. Tardiness of ten minutes or more counts as an absence, and leaving before the end of the shift does too unless the site asked you to leave.

How long do I have to appeal an LPN dismissal at Midwestern Career College?

Five business days from the dismissal notice. The written appeal goes to the Licensed Practical Nursing Program Committee and must explain the extenuating circumstances, attach documentation and describe your plan. The Committee may ask to meet, decides within ten business days, and its decision is final. File it even if the notice cites the rule that a failed second attempt bars re-entry.

How long do I have to appeal a conduct dismissal at Midwestern Career College?

Fourteen calendar days from the dismissal. The appeal letter goes to the Academic Manager, in person or by email. The Academic Council reviews it within five business days, and its decision is final and cannot be appealed further. Because there is no published hearing, the letter and its attachments are the whole record.

Can I appeal a grade at Midwestern Career College?

Yes, within 30 calendar days of the course end date, on a Grade Appeal form filed with the Registrar. But the appeal is “appropriate only” where the instructor acted arbitrarily — with no sound academic reason — or capriciously, outside a reasonable and announced grading policy. A clerical or calculation error is handled separately and can be corrected until the end of the following term.

Can I bring a lawyer to a Midwestern Career College hearing?

In a Title IX case, yes: your advisor may be an attorney and conducts cross-examination at the live hearing. The grievance procedure’s committee hearing requires the persons involved “or their representatives” to be present. Conduct and LPN dismissals are decided on written appeals, so there a lawyer’s work is the appeal letter itself.