second cease and desist letter to Almeda and referred the issue to the Connecticut Attorney General for possible legal action. Florida: In 2003, the Florida Department of Education entered into an agreement with Almeda requiring the institution to cease operating in the state. While Floridians could still get a degree from the online university, Almeda warned customers that its degrees might be invalid for public employment in Florida. Texas: Almeda was listed on the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board list of "Institutions Whose Degrees are Illegal to Use in Texas." Other states: Almeda's website indicated that its degrees also might not be valid for public employment in Illinois, Oregon, New Jersey, North Dakota, Washington and Idaho. The Better Business Bureau additionally advised that residents of these states should potentially "consider the Almeda degree as a novelty item only". In January 2013, the city of Fraser, Michigan, sued Almeda and 99 other "John Doe" defendants alleging violations of the Michigan Authentic Credentials in Education Act. In January 2016, the Michigan Court of Appeals upheld one of these claims (barring the others due to the statute of limitations). Reception Almeda's academic standards have been criticized by a variety of education organizations. According to Bears' Guide to Earning Degrees by Distance Learning, Almeda College and University was a web-only university offering degrees based on an assessment of a candidate's "life experience". Bear noted that Almeda stated it was accredited by the Association for Online Academic Excellence, but that association itself was also unrecognized. In 2011 the U.S. News University Directory, operated by U.S. News & World Report, published an article about online education that favorably mentioned Almeda's master's degree program in psychology. Inside Higher Ed reported in June 2011 that the U.S. News website had removed the posting after being alerted that Almeda was not "recognized as an accredited degree-granting university by the U.S. Department of Education or any mainstream accrediting agency". Website editors stated their commitment to "focus on accredited colleges and universities" and blamed an "editorial oversight" for the site's use of an Almeda press release. In a 2017 CBC Marketplace episode investigating diploma mills, it was discovered that several people from across Canada had purchased degrees from Almeda and then passed them off as accredited degrees. Incidents In 2004 a CBS affiliate in Albany, New York, reported that one of their reporters filed an Almeda application for an associate degree