For Darrin Reinertsen, seven years at the post office was enough.

“I wanted to get a computer programmer-type job, which wasn’t going to happen there,” he said. “So I quit. I took the $8,000 I had in savings and went to Pinnacle Career Institute. They said if I finished this course, they’d me get a $50,000-a-year job — more if I was willing to work in Kansas City.”

In January, he agreed to come up with the nine-month course’s tuition: $14,500.

Now, he wants his money back.

“They ripped me off, bad,” he said. “The classes there were worthless. The teachers there were nice people, but they weren’t qualified. I quit going. I wasn’t learning anything.”

Other former and current students have approached the Journal-World with similar complaints about the school formerly known as Lawrence Career College.

“We had a substitute teacher in Algebra I — she couldn’t add fractions,” said Jennifer Duran, 21, who quit going to class late last month. “We ended up showing her how to do it.”

Chansi Long, 20, filed a three-page complaint Tuesday with the Kansas Board of Regents, which licenses trade schools in the state.

“The teachers there are awful,” Long said. “They’re inept. They don’t teach you anything. They just tell you read the assignment and then, half the time, they leave the room to go do other stuff.”

Complaints not new

Students at Pinnacle Career Institute, formerly the Lawrence Career College, have renewed complaints about the school's coursework, prompting a surprise visit Tuesday from the Kansas Board of Regents. Chansi Long, 20, Lawrence is one of the students who has a complaint against the college.

Pinnacle Career Institute co-owner Jeff Freeman denied the students had reasons to complain.

“There are always going to be some students who are unhappy,” he said, noting that all but a handful of the school’s students are satisfied with both the curriculum and instruction.

Asked whether teachers ever left their students unattended, Freeman replied: “There has never been a time when an instructor has not been in a class. We had an emergency situation come up once and the teacher had to leave, but our director of education stepped into take her place. That’s the only time that I’m aware of.”

Like most trade schools, Pinnacle Career College helps students — young, single mothers, mostly — apply for federal loans and grants designed to help them land better-paying jobs. The school offers courses for students following career paths in accounting, executive assistants, medical office assistants, computer programming technology and massage therapy, according to the schools Web site.

The grants and loans are used to pay the school’s tuition; the students, in turn, agree to pay back the loans.

Freeman said a Board of Regents representative inspected the school last month and approved a one-year extension of its license.

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“Everything we do is regulated,” he said. “We’ve got people looking over our shoulder all the time.”

But student complaints are not new. Three years ago, five students filed a lawsuit, claiming they were expelled after filing grievances with state and federal officials. The case was settled out of court.

“I wished I’d never gone there,” said Ann Barone, one the students in the lawsuit. “I went there because I thought it would help me, but it ended up hindering me.”

After the lawsuit was filed, a spokesman for then-Kansas Atty. Gen. Carla Stovall’s office confirmed receiving 18 complaints from students attending Lawrence Career College, then at 4824 Quail Crest Place.

A subsequent investigation proved inconclusive.

New name, address

Earlier this year, Freeman moved Lawrence Career College’s operations to 1601 W. 23rd St. and changed its name to Pinnacle Career Institute.

Freeman, who also owns another Pinnacle Career Institute in Kansas City, Mo., formerly known as Electronic Institute, said he changed the names to make the schools’ advertising campaign more efficient.

“We have two schools, each with its own advertising budgets,” he said. “Whatever ads we ran were good for one school wouldn’t be good for the other, so by changing the names we’re getting twice the bang for the buck.”

Freeman denied the name change stemmed from the bad publicity generated by the lawsuit.

At the regents office, spokesman Kip Peterson confirmed receipt of Long’s complaint.

“A phone call was received and after listening to the caller’s concerns, contact was made with the school,” Peterson said. “It’s our understanding that the caller’s concerns have been addressed.”

Freeman and Long each said that after the regents called the school agreed to excuse Long’s tuition bill.

“I’m so glad,” Long said. “I just want to get out of that place.”