Ashford University Preventing me from completing my education and ruining my life financially Clinton Iowa

Ashford Univeristy caused sever financial hardship upon myself and my mother.  I was enrolled as a dependant student... at some point there was a shortfall in my financial aid, so the school forced my unemployed mother to apply for parent plus loans a minimum of 3 times... why three times?  Because the employees of the financial aid department each time we applied and submitted the loan neglected to accept the loan on AU's behalf, causing my mother to have to apply again.  Finally I filed a formal complaint, received a settlement, and I though I was all set.  I even emailed one of their employees, first name Payem, when I received a collections notice and asked her if I was all set.  Her response, "Yes you are all set, have you discussed re-enrolling with your advisor?".  I told her I was set to re-enroll after my wedding and asked her to contact the collections person and tell them my account was all set.  End of problem... or so I thought.  

Months later I get a notice from the collections department again... again I forwarded to Payem, school was closed for break at the time, so I waited.  When Payem finally responds to me, low and behold, I have a $5K balance that they have forwarded to a collections agency and I have to pay in full prior to being able to re-enroll.  Well, not sure about most of you, but I don't have an extra $5K just laying around... I have bill due each month.  Payem tried to say that what she meant when she told me I was "All Set" was that I was all set but have a balance due to AU.  However because she never said that, I never took any action, which resulted in a *40* point drop in my credit score as well as an inability to enroll and complete my education.  So I filed another complaint, which, shockingly, was denied by Payem's co-workers, and also denied by the CEO Dr. Pattenaude, who stated that I misinterpreted Payem's email stating I was all set, to mean that I was all set.  He also states I was sufficiently notified of the balance (The first email, which Payem responded, your all set, and the second email which I forwarded to her and she told me I had a balance *after* they had already forwarded me to collections).  

So where do we stand now, I can either pay in full or be screwed for the last two years of schooling.  I have asked AU over 10 times to bring my debt back in house, allow me use financial aid to cover it, which I was told by Sharon C. was possible, and to have the collections agency report that it was a mistake to the credit agencies so that my score can go back up.  The school has denied each request for this to happen... why?  Just because. No explanation was given, and each time I asked it was ignored.  Each time I asked for proof that I was informed and acknowledged the debt prior to it being forwarded to a collections department (causing severe damage to my report) it was ignored.  Ashford University is a scam... at this point unless I pull $5K out of thin air, I have essentially lost the last two years of education and money spent already at that school due to the administrations incompetance.