Hundreds of students, teachers and tutors are devastated at the news that Empower Training has shut its doors in Kilkenny leaving only a note on the door as an explanation as to what has happened at the troubled educational facility
Proprietor of the State-approved training centre Stephen Doran and his wife Vivienne Hinton are understood to have left the country and fled to Cyprus, following the controversy that erupted and cast a shadow on the authenticity of the courses being run at the facility.
Empower catered for up to 1,000 students many of whom are now wondering whether or not they are to receive certificates for courses they have undertaken and paid for, or in other cases whether they will get to finish courses that they have begun and receive their accreditation.
A war of words has begun on the social networking site Facebook where students and teachers have been conversing with the couple and voicing their anger at what has happend.
One writer says, “I cant believe what you and Stephen have done!! I will never get the money you owe me not to mention the money you took from students?? You both left a big mess behind ye, I dont know how ye both can live with yourselves after what ye have done. I hope it all catches up with ye and ye never have a moments peace...”
Another writer says, “ I am absolutely disgusted at what has happened. I trusted you. Why couldn’t you just have cancelled the course and let us all go our ways. Your company has left a trail of devastation behind, values and ethics are obviously out the window. Funny how we were learning about values....”
Empower only ceased trading this week although it had continued to advertise its courses as recently as last week.
Steven Doran in an email to the Kilkenny Advertiser denied any wrong doing at the centre and promised to contact all those affected by the closure of Empower Training.
He said in his statement, “any person funded through Skillnet whose name was submitted to them for funding purposes as agreed with indivuldual networks did training with the company”..... “it is important that the message gets out there, that protection for leaners exists through FETAC for helping people continue their course or have assigments corrected depending at what stage of their course they are at,” he said in his statement.
He also offered an apology to learners saying, “we will be contacting all the learners we can, bearing in mind we have no staff, as quickly as possible advising them of what they can do to continue or wrap
up their course...We would like to aplogise to all learners who have been inconvenienced by the collapse of the company.”
The offices of Empower in Newtown House on New Orchard Road on the outskirts of the city displayed a notice on the door saying the company has ceased trading earlier this week sparking an outcry from students and staff.
Two weeks ago, the Kilkenny Advertiser reported allegations into misconduct at the centre when FETAC — the statutory Further Education and Training Awards Council confirmed that an investigation was ongoing into the agency.
Students and tutors have since come out and said that they had informed the State accreditation body that they had grave concerns about whether standards were being adhered to at the training company, however, they had been assured by the body that their fears were unfounded and all was above board at the centre.
However, FETAC has since undertaken an investigation into the centre and the authenticity of the courses run there and a report is due to be completed next week. They finally suspeneded the company from enroling any more students on October 7, last.
Empower has administered hundreds of education courses for the public and private sectors across the country employing 10 staff and at least 12 tutors.
Stephen Doran was in receipt of more than €1m from State agencies FÁS and Skillnets since 2002 for the courses which included childcare healthcare, business and more.
Tutors from the centre spoke to Joe Duffy this week claiming that they had not received wages and students were also concerned about where they stood in relation to accreditation and fees to date.
A spokesperson for FETAC said 500 students were assessed in August and a further 500-600 are still on courses that were being provided by Empower.
FETAC suspended Empower's access to the council's certificates pending an investigation and a director of corporate affairs Ultan Tuite told the Kilkenny Advertiser that the investigation would continue into the centre for at least one more week.
Founded in 2002, Empower Training achieved FETAC Quality Assurance Registration in 2006.
