An appeals panel has upheld a decision by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools’ Commission on Colleges to terminate the accreditation of St. Andrews Presbyterian College, a small liberal-arts institution in Laurinburg, N.C., according to a news release posted today on the regional accrediting commission’s Web site.

The college has been on probation since June 2006 because the accreditor felt it had too much debt, and the commission voted to revoke its membership in June. St. Andrews has called the decision a difference of opinion over the college’s growth plan. On Monday, two days before the appeals committee met, the college announced that it had secured $4.1-million in donations this month in an effort to demonstrate its financial stability.

The appeals committee concluded that “the decision regarding the college’s ongoing membership was neither arbitrary nor unreasonable,” according to the news release.

St. Andrews is filing a federal lawsuit seeking to overturn the decision, and is asking a judge for an injunction that would allow the college to remain accredited until a court decision is made, according to Paul Baldasare, the college’s president. —Matt Petrie