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OT: College Admission Scandal – AKA Operation Varsity Blues
posted by FormerlyKnownAsSTAFFMOD on March 20, 2019 at 2:25 PM
Surprised we haven’t mentioned this before, considering that the guys work at a university.
This is probably one of the ugliest maladies that can strike a white-glove school. That is, the notion that your elite standards only reach as high as a stack of 
. Yes, I know the schools are not being faulted directly, but you never know where splatter is going to land.
Anyway, this particular scam had been going on for (reportedly) 11 years. The diploma of every one of these “privileged” graduates who benefitted from such deceptions should be revoked. And, while I can’t quite advocate sending the students to jail; think the parents and everyone else involved in the scam (going back to year one) should be given some quality time in an orange jumpsuit, as well as some hot-seat time with the IRS.
What say you?
ON ANOTHER NOTE: You know, if you listen to this guy Singer's sales pitch, you’d just about be ready to propose him for sainthood. I guess ‘they’ are right about the number one asset of a great con man is believability.
Reply by znexyish
on March 20, 2019 at 6:33 PM
Well the late night hosts have all gotten in the action
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2019/mar/13/trevor-noah-college-admissions-fraud-scandal-felicity-huffman-lori-loughlin
To me getting into big name schools has always been a shifty proposition. Get good grades, do all the required extra curricular activities, write a b.s. ego driven sob story admissions essay, click the right boxes. etc. etc. I always though that if colleges choose kids at random it wouldn't make a bit of difference.
Reply by bratface
on March 21, 2019 at 12:29 AM
What I don't understand is if these kids are really 'dunderheads' wouldn't it become obvious in the first year of classes? Unless they also hired someone to sit in on all of their classes & take their finals?
Reply by FormerlyKnownAs
on March 21, 2019 at 1:00 PM
Prestige and endowments (not necessarily in that order
).
Also...
Thanks for the link; but, especially for this gem from Trevor Noah's comments:
Indeed, the college scandal did nothing to staunch the partisan news pouring out of Washington on Tuesday, such as House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s assertion to reporters that she’s opposed to impeaching Donald Trump because it “divides the country” and “he’s just not worth it”.
“Wow, he’s just not worth it?” Noah admired. “Either Nancy Pelosi has gone soft or this is brilliant reverse psychology. Because you know Trump is going to hear that and be like: ‘How dare you, I’m totally worth impeaching!’
Reply by FormerlyKnownAs
on March 21, 2019 at 1:47 PM
Wondering the same thing.
Yeah, even if not the first year, you'd still expect that somewhere along the line—as the course material got weightier—their dunderheadness surely would have derailed them. Parental dollars could buy them only so much ‘assistance’: someone to do assignments/write papers/do research/take on line courses/etc.; but what about, say, finals? /internships? etc.?.
Of course, if they “bought” a few choice professors here and there, that would have helped. (NOTE: I only include this for the sake of covering all bases.)
Anyway; will be interesting to hear how they pulled it off. All in all, what I’d really like to see is a where-are-they-now exposé.
Reply by FormerlyKnownAs
on April 19, 2019 at 1:27 PM
Something a little less weighty...
(Ben Stiller on "Ellen")
In an interview on Ellen, Ben Stiller shared that his daughter (sitting in the audience) was there to look at Southern California colleges. When asked how the search was going, he said: “It’s great. She is going to go to Yale on a full football scholarship. And she’s going to major in Photoshopping,….”
While, not a knee-slapper, it certainly elicits a
.
Reply by Knixon
on April 19, 2019 at 6:56 PM
I doubt any of the kids involved were actually so dumb that they couldn't do the work. But the problem is that universities especially the prestigious ones, don't admit just on academics. There's a lot of game-playing going on, with various preferences for race and many other things that have nothing to do with how well they're likely to do at the actual work.
Yes, it's still "Cheating." But if someone could explain to me how being a FAKE athlete is any less valuable to university admission than being a REAL athlete would be, I'll listen.
Reply by Knixon
on April 19, 2019 at 6:57 PM
Of course the other side is the same way. When Trump says "America will never be a socialist country," they're thinking - if not saying - "Oh yes it will!"