JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A school administrator at Florida State College at Jacksonville is speaking out about problems with the school.
The administrator, former local TV anchor Celine McArthur, was suspended without pay earlier this week.
FSCJ President Steven Wallace said she violated eight school policies, including making false claims against the school in a letter to the governor.
McArthur, associate vice president of strategic communications, said FSCJ is the one with the issues.
She said FSCJ's nursing program is not accredited, unbeknown to many of its students.
A spokesperson for FSCJ told Channel 4 that's not the case. "The Associate Degree Nursing Program is accredited and has been so for many years. The BSN was a candidate for accredidation. It did not pass the first time, but remained a candidate. The BSN program was fully accredited on the second try," said Tracy Pierce.
McArthur said the school was hiding the fact that more than 900 students will have to repay $2.8 million in Pell Grants they're no longer qualified for.
So McArthur wrote a letter to the District Board of Trustees, Wallace and a cabinet member. She also sent a copy to the Gov. Rick Scott.
"The president of the college hired me to be the CEO of storytelling. I did not know he meant fiction," McArthur said. "I came to the college for two reasons: to build the journalism program and to build content, educational programming that is college focused, that is based on ethics and integrity and education, and they don't jive."
Wallace said the issue isn't about McArthur writing the letter, but it's what was in the letter that was the problem. He said the information was false, and that's not OK.
Wallace has denied all of McArthur's allegations and says the information about the Pell Grants has been available to the public all along.
"Any allegations of concealment of information are absurd because this is all managed by the auditor general of the state of Florida and has always been completely public," Wallace said. "In addition, we have had conversations in our public board meetings about the audit itself and about our efforts to accommodate students to minimize the impact of this audit finding on them."
"When I see wasteful spending, when I see a lack of transparency, when I see unethical and illegal behavior, when I see gross mismanagement, I have a conscience," McArthur said. "I didn't envision this, but I know it's the right thing."
At Tuesday's board meeting, Wallace asked that McArthur be fired, but a public hearing would have to be held first.
"The fact that they would go to great lengths to fire me when my contract would end June 30 is retaliation. There's no other way to look at it," McArthur said.