HUGE Student-Athlete Academic Scandal at UNC

The real hero in this UNC scandal is the whistleblower, Mary Willingham. Despite death threats from UNC supporters and an unresponsive administration, she stayed true to the mission of William Friday.

I had hoped that it was clear that I know it's a problem at many other schools, but I guess not. I should have said that the attitude prevalent in all of the power conferences. It also exists in the FCS unfortunately. And absolutely, the NCAA as an organization is the biggest problem. They'll sanctimoniously punish UNC after enjoying the benefits of UNC's cheating. Then they'll continue to enjoy the benefits of everybody else cheating until another school gets caught by somebody other than the NCAA. They'll ignore it until they can't.

Because: A) It would be career suicide.B) The whistle blowers always take the hardest fall.Audit some of the transcripts at your own university. See how many athletes have (leadership development) courses or similar titles that somehow count toward degree credit for most majors but are only prevalent on athletic transcripts.

Shameful wrote:

Why don't you come forward?

It's people like you who let things like this continue. Shame on you.

I really think you are just blowing smoke though.

Not unique wrote:

I have first hand knowledge of at least six with similar situations. They didn't need to have the set up at home 10 years ago because everyone knew you just needed to pay for correspondence courses at BYU, but since that is now regulated after a scandal more and more schools have set ups like these. Very unfortunate, but it comes down to the almighty dollar. If there were ever a class action lawsuit where athletes could get paid for leaking info you'd see cases like this come out of the woodwork.

Not unique wrote:

Because:

A) It would be career suicide.

B) The whistle blowers always take the hardest fall.

Audit some of the transcripts at your own university. See how many athletes have (leadership development) courses or similar titles that somehow count toward degree credit for most majors but are only prevalent on athletic transcripts.

Shameful wrote:

Why don't you come forward?

It's people like you who let things like this continue. Shame on you.

I really think you are just blowing smoke though.

Not to mention that most firsthand knowledge would be dismissed as anecdotal bullsh-t. That is how this stuff continues to happen.

Shameful, you are either a total moron or you just hate UNC to the point that you want to believe that they are the only ones doing this. I am kind of glad to see UNC take a hit because I think the academic powers will put an end to it. There has always been an unfriendly rivalry between the academic and athletic departments, which is one of the reasons these fake classes had to exist, I presume.

Kipkete hr_Pumpkin_Eater wrote:

Nudge nudge. If you think D1 xc and T&F don't have big dumb egotistical jocks in their ranks who gravitate towards nonsense majors CONSCIOUSLY for the purpose of nonsense, then you aren't well acquainted personally with such athletes.

You called?

You are obviously the clueless one. There may be a fair number of track and field athletes who "gravitate towards nonsense majors CONSCIOUSLY for the purpose of nonsense" (actually, for the purpose of getting solid GPAs without doing much or any work, which is hardly a "nonsense" goal when you think about it) but cross-country? Bullshit. Did you even run in college and have contact with runners from other cross-country teams? Distance runners aren't infallible (half of the people on this board are practically illiterate, in fact, including its Ivy-League-grad founders) but the number who qualify as "big dumb egotistical jocks" by any standard is vanishingly small.

The Real Hero wrote:

The real hero in this UNC scandal is the whistleblower, Mary Willingham. Despite death threats from UNC supporters and an unresponsive administration, she stayed true to the mission of William Friday.

The UNC adminstration wasn't just unresponsive, they attacked Ms. Willingham as best they could with her having whistleblower status. They paid for an "independent review" to discredit her analysis. That review is what UNC supporters hung their collective hats on up until the Wainstein Report got released. Now, Tarheel Nation has changed its tune. "Everyone does it." "The coaches didn't know." "I hope they don't make us give back any of our championship banners." No one, except Ms. Willingham, looks good in this situation.

Wow you're sooooo clever! What an astounding rhetorical device! Your name is nudge nudge. I get it.

Almost All d1 athletes are egotistical jocks and bigger than the population average. Dumb is a subjective term w extremes in the UNC case which shouldn't make us any more tolerant of lesser but still unacceptable stupidity. Except when athletes do hard sciences, they are invariably idiots. They regurgitate information in their soft majors but if you ask them about big ideas in their major, post graduation, they are a travesty to society. You nudge nudge, u cowardly anonymous runner with zero balls, are also an egotistical jock. And defending your fellow athletes academic arrogance is reprehensible.

Not Just Unresponsive wrote:

The UNC adminstration wasn't just unresponsive, they attacked Ms. Willingham as best they could with her having whistleblower status. They paid for an "independent review" to discredit her analysis. That review is what UNC supporters hung their collective hats on up until the Wainstein Report got released. Now, Tarheel Nation has changed its tune. "Everyone does it." "The coaches didn't know." "I hope they don't make us give back any of our championship banners." No one, except Ms. Willingham, looks good in this situation.

You're wrong on a couple of fronts here. First of all, read through all of the comments on this thread. Multiple (I think) UNC grads are labeling the issue a "travesty," "embarrassment," etc. It sucks.

Second, you seem to think that no other schools do this kind of thing. Is that the truth? Do you think other schools do this?

Third, Willingham released all kinds of bogus information in an attempt to sell a book. The AfAm paper about Rosa Parks that was posted earlier? That is fake. That was created for Twitter. She refused to deny that is was fake EVEN THOUGH she knew about the actual paper. She did not have altruistic motives so it is hard for me to give her the high ground.

I am right there with you on the other items, though. String 'em up. I am not proud of UNC right now.

Not Just Unresponsive wrote:

The Real Hero wrote:

The real hero in this UNC scandal is the whistleblower, Mary Willingham. Despite death threats from UNC supporters and an unresponsive administration, she stayed true to the mission of William Friday.

The UNC adminstration wasn't just unresponsive, they attacked Ms. Willingham as best they could with her having whistleblower status. They paid for an "independent review" to discredit her analysis. That review is what UNC supporters hung their collective hats on up until the Wainstein Report got released. Now, Tarheel Nation has changed its tune. "Everyone does it." "The coaches didn't know." "I hope they don't make us give back any of our championship banners." No one, except Ms. Willingham, looks good in this situation.

The problems with the AFAM department have been public knowledge for several years. The University has done everything in it's power to air its own dirty laundry on the issue. The University commissioned the Wainstein report and the previous report by former Gov. Martin.

Mary Willingham was a fraud that tried to pile onto UNC's problems with falsified research on the athlete's reading level. It was an entirely separate issue from the AFAM department and she was rightly discredited.

la mancha wrote:

thanks for weighing in UNC Athlete and take on mens soccer. Talking to people near the womens program and reading his books, I am sure that Anson Dorrance-for all his personal indiscretions that were exposed from that insane Debbie Keller lawsuit, was a stickler for academics with his athletes.

Unfortunately, not true. There are e-mails from him requesting players be enrolled in paper classes to remain eligible.

Pass the Crab legs wrote:

Started in 1993 ???

Wouldn't you love to see Marion Jones' UNC transcript ?

True, but it probably originated under Dean Smith when Duke won back to back basketball championships in 1991 and 1992. The paper classes started in 1993 - the same year UNC won the national championship. The 2005 championship team had NINE African American basketball players.

lot of truth wrote:

Unfortunately, not true. There are e-mails from him requesting players be enrolled in paper classes to remain eligible.

Now just hold on... The whole thread has gotten a bit out of control. There are legitimate "independent study" courses at all schools. They are not all fake classes. I took an independent study course in college (took it pass/fail for credits) and my paper was read and graded by someone who took the time to go over the corrections, etc.

Just an FYI... Not all paper courses are terrible.

The soccer player may have needed more hours to be eligible for the season but didn't have the time for another course. As an athlete, you have very structured hours at big NCAA schools. I had to take classes between 8:00am and 12:00pm. Anything that started after noon would have bled into practice time.

So if you don't get into a certain class one semester, you might need extra hours. A lot of athletes handle this via summer school to stay ahead of the game. Independent Study courses are another way to get hours without missing practice. In my case, I had to take them pass/fail and they never counted towards a major. They were basically electives, so you couldn't really abuse them.

I am guessing the soccer case was a student who had too few hours and needed to get another class on her schedule but everything was full. I doubt it was a grade-related issue. Of course I could be wrong.

TL;DR - The issue with UNC is that the "paper courses" were fake, not that they were paper courses ipso facto.

The problems with the AFAM department have been public knowledge for several years. The University has done everything in it's power to air its own dirty laundry on the issue. The University commissioned the Wainstein report and the previous report by former Gov. Martin.

Mary Willingham was a fraud that tried to pile onto UNC's problems with falsified research on the athlete's reading level. It was an entirely separate issue from the AFAM department and she was rightly discredited.[/quote]

That is just NOT true. UNC has stonewalled and produced bogus "reports" - like the Martin report. They have been dragging their feet and denying for almost 5 years. Willingham is not a fraud. As a whistleblower, she faced what many such people face. UNC has tried to discredit her in order to cover up all the fraud.

What is funny is that UNC has not only been involved in academic fraud for 18 years, but also involved in the free car rental scheme, free trips provided by agents, Hansborough's mom having an affair with a UNC administrator and flying all over the country on UNC's dime to see her sons play for UNC and Notre Dame, the dentists who supply free $1000 mouth guards to the basketball players, PJ Hairston and his gun/pot issues, Graves staying at one of Roy Williams' homes and being busted for drugs, not to mention the infamous Marvin Austin. The scope of their cheating is really just unbelievable.

It's not unbelievable. Unfortunately it's pretty commonplace, and mild compared to what other programs are able to pull. If there are any SEC runners on the board you've all seen the types of vehicles the FB players drive. The feud between athletics and academics someone mentioned earlier doesn't exist in a lot of places. The professors want to win as bad as the coaches. Especially in the south. UT athletics built the university a new admissions building. A lot more people donate to an athletic department than a science/math etc... The professors don't really care about teaching anyway, it's all about the grant money for whatever they're really working on. No one was ever tenured for being an outstanding teacher.

no it hasn't wrote:

The scope of their cheating is really just unbelievable.

unfortunate wrote:

It's not unbelievable. Unfortunately it's pretty commonplace, and mild compared to what other programs are able to pull.

It is believable but to suggest that this is commonplace or the norm is ridiculous.

Here is what the president of the Drake group said: "I can safely say that the scope of the 20-year UNC fraud scandal easily takes the prize for the largest and most nefarious scandal in the history of NCAA enforcement. The depth and breadth of the scheme -- involving counselors, coaches, academic administrators, faculty, athletic administrators, et cetera -- eclipses any previous case," Gurney said.

Miss St tried to pay Cam Newton 100,000 Auburn got away with it. (Very good source at AUB)

Ole Miss had basketball coaches get caught taking courses for women on the team.

Remember Tyson Gay at Arkansas.

Notre Dame is going through fraud issues currently. This stuff happens every year. The scope of the people caught might be unprecedented, but the fraud isn't.

To call academic fraud the most nefarious scandal in NCAA enforcement history, in the wake of Jerry Sandusky is inappropriate. But remember it's the NCAA not the FBI. It's a business, and they don't make money by enforcing rules, or catching the people who make up 99% of their income. If the NCAA really existed to do what was right we would have had a football playoff years ago.

he should have said:

I can safely say that the scope of the 20-year UNC fraud scandal easily takes the prize for the largest and most nefarious DISCOVERED scandal in the history of NCAA enforcement. The depth and breadth of the scheme -- involving counselors, coaches, academic administrators, faculty, athletic administrators, et cetera -- eclipses any previous case.

i have little doubt that there are comparable, if not larger ones, going on at many other schools.

unfortunate wrote:

Miss St tried to pay Cam Newton 100,000 Auburn got away with it. (Very good source at AUB)

Ole Miss had basketball coaches get caught taking courses for women on the team.

Remember Tyson Gay at Arkansas.

Notre Dame is going through fraud issues currently. This stuff happens every year. The scope of the people caught might be unprecedented, but the fraud isn't.

To call academic fraud the most nefarious scandal in NCAA enforcement history, in the wake of Jerry Sandusky is inappropriate. But remember it's the NCAA not the FBI. It's a business, and they don't make money by enforcing rules, or catching the people who make up 99% of their income. If the NCAA really existed to do what was right we would have had a football playoff years ago.

Paying a player any amount of money is fundamentally different than an organized scheme of fraud that lasted almost two decades and included over 3000 student athletes.

And, from the academic integrity point of view, this is far, far worse than the Penn State matter which should have been left to the criminal court system.

See also:

Congratulations. Buy yourself an extra sucker today as a reward.

My post specifically concerned distance runners. Are you going to tell me you really think the average distance runner is bigger than the average American? Maybe male college distance runners have slightly bigger penises than men in the at-large population, sure, but I don't think this is what you're getting at here.'

OK, my bad -- I didn't realize until the very end here that I was being trolled. Touche'.