ITT Tech schools to close due to federal sanctions

ITT Technical Institute has announced it is closing all of its campuses, which includes two in the Bay Area - Oakland and Concord. The closure impacts over 3,500 students, 8,000 employees and 14 campuses in California.

RELATED: 7 On Your Side: What happens to ITT Technical Institute students after closures?

This comes less than two weeks after the Department of Education banned the school from enrolling new students, who use federal financial aid. The company released a statement saying it will discontinue academic operation.

"With what we believe is a complete disregard by the U.S. Department of Education for due process to the company, hundreds of thousands of current students and alumni and more than 8,000 employees will be negatively affected," the statement read.

The school's website has a banner on its home page that says: "We are currently not enrolling new students."

Like many other for-profit college operators, ITT has faced federal and state investigations of its recruiting and accounting practices.

U.S. Education Secretary John B. King Jr. said Tuesday that his agency did not take its action lightly and that federal officials were committed to helping ITT's students.

READ: ITT Tech's statement about closure following federal actions

"The school's decisions have put its students and millions of dollars in taxpayer-funded federal student aid at risk," King said in a blog post.

"We made a difficult choice to pursue additional oversight in order to protect you, other students and taxpayers from potentially worse educational and financial damage in the future if ITT was allowed to continue operating without increased oversight and assurances to better serve students," he said.

LINK: Message from the Secretary of Education to ITT Students

King said current or recently enrolled students could be eligible to have their student loan debt forgiven and might be able to transfer ITT credits to another school.

The for profit chain school is based Indiana it has been in debt to the government for some time and recently was ordered to pay $152 million.

The company has operated vocational schools on more than 130 campuses in 38 states, often under the ITT Technical Institute name. Last year, it enrolled 45,000 students and reported $850 million in revenue.