This study investigates how organizations overcome stigmatization attributed to their disapproved activities and amplified by negative events. Through a comparative case study of two out of ten sanctioned colleges in Montreal, and, by comparing the ongoing trajectories of both these colleges in managing their stigmas, I’ve investigated the strategies they adopted in response to their main audiences in order to survive. Using various data sources, including press articles, government publications, public company information, and interviews, this study shows that colleges followed different strategies according to their stigma intensity. The college with high stigmatization intensity followed a stigma containment strategy, focusing on actions to strengthen relationships with their allies, the students and partner-employers, creating a virtuous cycle within this group. The college with low stigmatization intensity followed a destigmatization strategy, focusing on collective action with other colleges through the provincial and national private college associations. This was achieved by actions that were mainly political, aiming to change the stigmatizer's perspective, the government, in their favor. This work contributes to the literature on organizational stigma, as well as discussions on legitimacy and reputation. It explores how different intensities of stigmas demand different strategies for similar institutions and proposes understanding how core and event stigmas interact, intensifying or reducing each other. The study also contributes to managerial practice by explicating strategies that stigmatized organizations can use.