OAN Staff Cory Hawkins and Brooke Mallory
5:57 PM – Thursday, January 8, 2026
The Quality Learning Center in Minneapolis, widely known for its misspelled sign as “Quality Learing Center” — and for being prominently featured in independent journalist Nick Shirley’s viral video showcasing widespread fraud in state child care programs — has now permanently closed.
Official Minnesota Department of Human Services licensing records show the center’s license status as closed as of Tuesday, January 6th. The closure was allegedly voluntary, at the provider’s request, and the facility cannot reopen without reapplying for a new license.
The daycare, which gained notoriety for a notable misspelling on its signage, reportedly corrected the error last month following national ridicule. The scrutiny came amid a broader investigation into widespread fraud within Minnesota’s daycare system. To date, officials have not released a formal reason for the facility’s closure.
“Quality Learning Center requested closure of their license and it was closed effective Jan. 6, 2026,” a Minnesota Department of Youth, Children, and Families spokesperson told Fox News Digital. “The provider is unable to reopen without reapplying for a license.”
State records show the facility requested a licensing review in June 2025 following several citations. However, “no evidence of fraud” was found at that time at least, Minnesota officials claim.
The center later drew significant public scrutiny when independent journalist Nick Shirley featured it in an exposé, which highlighted numerous daycares receiving public funds despite having no children on-site. During Shirley’s visit, the center appeared inactive despite having received $1.9 million in state childcare assistance.
The exposé was subsequently praised by the Trump administration, sparking a federal fraud investigation into numerous Minneapolis businesses. The facility and its manager, Ibrahim Ali, have vehemently denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
Although it was most recently operating as the Quality Learning Center, the facility was formerly named the “Salama Child Care Center.”
The Salama Child Care Center had a documented history of legal issues dating back to President Barack Obama’s administration. In May 2015, following over a year of surveillance, the FBI raided the site on charges of defrauding Minnesota’s childcare assistance program by billing for hundreds of thousands of dollars in services for absent children.
The owner at the time, Fozia Sheik Ali, was indicted in January 2017 on four counts of wire fraud and one count of theft of public money. Ali pleaded guilty in 2017 to one felony count of theft of public money, was sentenced in January 2018 to 24 months in federal prison, plus supervised release, and ordered to pay $1.45 million in restitution.
The facility’s most recent manager, Ibrahim Ali, has since claimed that Shirley visited the facility “outside of its operating hours,” which he says are Monday through Thursday, 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. Although the exact timing of Shirley’s initial visit has been disputed, the journalist later returned to the area to reinforce his claims, again reporting that no children were present and asserting that the centers appeared inactive.
“Are you trying to record that we’re doing fraud, or are you trying to put the Somali name and the fraud in the same sentence?” he said of Shirley. “That’s what really hurt us the last couple of days.”
Ali also claims that the original incorrect spelling on the facility’s sign is the fault of the installer.
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