Pima Community College’s accreditor heard conflicting views about the quality of the school’s leadership during a visit to Tucson last week, including a critique from a high-profile former insider.

A team from the Chicago-based Higher Learning Commission spent two days talking mainly to employees and Governing Board members about whether the school deserves a clean bill of health after four years under accreditation sanctions.

The sanctions were imposed starting in 2013 because the college either didn’t meet, or barely met, some of the accreditor’s standards for the proper operation of an educational institution.

Chancellor Lee Lambert, hired to clean up a decade of mismanagement by a former CEO, told employees Wednesday after the review team left town that he thinks the school passed muster.

“We showed that PCC is well on its way to providing the best possible service to students and the community,” he said in an email, and predicted the school’s current sanction will be lifted next year.

The college refused to let the Arizona Daily Star attend what PCC described on its website as a “general community forum” with the accreditor. The forum was an invitation-only event.