Massive Cheating Scandal to Get Children Admitted to Elite Colleges

I'm slightly surprised because there are so many legal ways to game the system.

"I hereby bequeath $500,000.00 the university in exchange for the naming rights to the toilet paper dispenser affixed to Dickinson stall in Dewey Cheatem & Howe restroom at Weiner & Cox Hall on Beaver Family Foundation Quad."

zcvxcvx wrote:

Pretty remarkable story. I would have thought that rich people would just, at worst, negotiate with college presidents and admissions directors about charitable giving in connection with their kids' admission. One kid in the story went from 1020 PSAT to 1420 SAT by having a smart kid take the test.

Yeah, I assumed the same thing. When I hear about the American airistocracy attending all the Ivy's I just kinda assumed they were there because their family had building's and scholarships named after them. I never ever thought they actually made it in like regular people.

Part of the reason these schools exist is to keep the children of the well born from mingling with the new money.

DaPope wrote:

zcvxcvx wrote:

Pretty remarkable story. I would have thought that rich people would just, at worst, negotiate with college presidents and admissions directors about charitable giving in connection with their kids' admission. One kid in the story went from 1020 PSAT to 1420 SAT by having a smart kid take the test.

Yeah, I assumed the same thing. When I hear about the American airistocracy attending all the Ivy's I just kinda assumed they were there because their family had building's and scholarships named after them. I never ever thought they actually made it in like regular people.

Part of the reason these schools exist is to keep the children of the well born from mingling with the new money.

It sounds like they caught a lot of people with new money doing this.

Old money knows how to do this without getting caught or leaving a paper trail.

I’m withholding comment until AOC chimes in. And then my reaction is whatever she says.

Ivies Suck wrote:

Bribes, Cheating, ACT, SAT, Actors, Coaches. Everyone was involved.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/fbi-accuses-wealthy-parents-including-celebrities-in-college-entrance-bribery-scheme/ar-BBUGhsh?ocid=ientp

Time for a remake of the 80's classic movie "Class"

Old Money doesn't have to do anything quite this tawdry. They are fine with leaving a perfectly traceable paper trail:https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/10/18/day-three-harvard-admissions-trial/

Old Money wrote:

It sounds like they caught a lot of people with new money doing this.

Old money knows how to do this without getting caught or leaving a paper trail.

It sounds like they have these guys on tape agreeing to the various cheating schemes. That's nuts.

Do these guys ever go to the movies? If they did, they'd know that when you join a criminal venture, you never, ever want to hear the details. And you definitely don't want to hear that the plan is illegal. Everyone who's watched the Sopranos know that if there's even a hint of criminality, you need to get all flustered, say there must be a misunderstanding and deny that you would even consider breaking the law.

This is all basic stuff. How did they miss it???

Old Money wrote:

It sounds like they caught a lot of people with new money doing this.

Old money knows how to do this without getting caught or leaving a paper trail.

Yeah, but as the Ivies have gotten more meritocratic, even Old Money has had to adapt.

You can read all about it here .

https://www.justice.gov/file/1142876/download

Here are some of the top schools that have been entangled in the case:

■At Stanford University, sailing coach John Vandemoer allegedly agreed to accept hundreds of thousands of dollars to clear the way for two students – who lacked the sailing skills required to compete at the Division 1 level – to become part of his sailing team so they could gain admission to the school.

Vandemoer is scheduled to plead guilty Tuesday afternoon in US District Court in Boston to one count of racketeering conspiracy. Federal prosecutors want him to serve 18 months in prison in part because he “abused a position of trust.”

Prosecutors said Singer and Vandemoer agreed to payments for two students – and the price tag for one was a $500,000 payment. Ultimately, neither went to Stanford, but Singer still made a $160,000 payment to the sailing program.

According to the school’s website, Vandemoer is still the coach of the sailing program.

■At USC, Singer made payments totaling approximately $350,000 to a private soccer club controlled by two USC coaches, prosecutors said. In exchange for the payments, the coaches designated four children of Singer’s clients as recruits for the soccer team, even though none of them played competitive soccer.

Singer also made payments to an account controlled by the USC water polo team, whose coach designated two students as recruits, prosecutors said. In addition, Singer made private school tuition payments for the children of the water polo coach.

And, prosecutors said, “on multiple occasions, SINGER’s clients made payments of between $50,000 and $100,000 to a university account controlled by a senior official of USC’s athletic department.”

■At Georgetown, prosecutors said, Singer paid then-Georgetown University tennis coach Gordon Ernst more than $2.7 million in return for Ernst designating 12 applicants for the team.

The “bribes, falsely labeled as ‘consulting’ fees” were drawn from Singer’s bogus charity and sent to the coach’s residence in Falmouth, Massachusetts. “In exchange for the bribes, the Georgetown coach designated approximately 12 applicants as recruits for the Georgetown tennis team, including some who did not play tennis competitively,” prosecutors said.

Ernst is a member of the New England Tennis Hall of Fame and was named this summer to be the woman’s tennis coach at the University of Rhode Island. Federal prosecutors are seeking to force Ernst to forfeit a condo in Falmouth at 25 Gang Way, Unit 25, according to court records.

■At UCLA, prosecutors said, Singer “directed $100,000 from one of the KWF charitable accounts to a sports marketing company controlled by the UCLA men’s soccer coach” and the coach “arranged for the daughter of one of SINGER’s clients to be designated as a recruit for the UCLA women’s soccer team, thereby facilitating her admission to UCLA.”

■Former Yale women’s soccer coach Rudolph “Rudy” Meredith, of Madison, Conn., is charged in federal court in Boston with two wire fraud counts.

Prosecutors said that Meredith, who coached the Yale soccer team from 1995 through November 2018, “agreed with Singer and others known and unknown to the United States Attorney to accept bribes in exchange for designating applicants to Yale as recruits for the Yale women’s soccer team, and thereby facilitating their admission to the university, in violation of the duty of honest services he owed to Yale as his employer.”

Meredith is scheduled to make an initial court appearance on March 28.

The purpose of the scheme was to “facilitate the admission of students to Yale as recruited athletes, regardless of their athletic ability; and to enrich MEREDITH and Singer personally,” the filing said.

In early 2017, records show, Singer was introduced through a Los Angeles-based financial adviser to the family of a prospective student identified as Yale Applicant 1.

The financial adviser told Singer that Applicant 1’s father wanted to make a “donation” to “one of those top schools” for his daughter’s “application,” the filing said. The following day, Singer sent Meredith Applicant 1’s resume and personal statement, which contained links to her art portfolio. Singer wrote that he would “revise” the materials to “soccer,” the information said.

Then on Nov. 13, 2017, records show, Singer sent Meredith an athletic “profile” that falsely described the applicant as a co-captain on a prominent club soccer team in southern California, according to the information.

Meredith later designated Applicant 1 as a recruit for the Yale women’s soccer team, even though he knew she didn’t play competitive soccer, authorities said. Applicant 1 was admitted to Yale.

On Jan. 1, 2018, Singer mailed Meredith a $400,000 check, drawn from one of the charitable accounts linked to Singer’s foundation, according to the document.

During the spring and summer of 2018, Applicant 1’s family paid Singer about $1.2 million in multiple installments, including $900,000 paid to one of the charitable accounts tied to Singer’s foundation, according to the information.

“MEREDITH did not disclose any of the payments he received from Singer and KWF [Key Worldwide Foundation] to Yale,” the information said.

In addition to accepting bribes from Singer, Meredith also “solicited a bribe directly from the father of Yale Applicant 2 in exchange for designating her as a recruit for the Yale women’s soccer team,” the document said.

The father of Applicant 2 met with Meredith in a Boston hotel room on April 12, 2018, records show. But the FBI was listening in.

“During the meeting, which was surreptitiously recorded by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (”FBI”), MEREDITH stated that he would designate Yale Applicant 2 as a recruit for the Yale women’s soccer team in exchange for payments to himself totaling $450,000,” the filing said.

At the meeting, “MEREDITH accepted $2,000 in cash as a partial payment toward the $450,000,” the filing said, and the coach “subsequently provided the father of Yale Applicant 2 with information about a bank account in Connecticut to which he wanted future payments to be wired.”

On April 18, 2018, the filing said, “MEREDITH received a further payment of $4,000, which was transmitted to the Connecticut bank account via wire transfer in interstate commerce, pursuant to MEREDITH’S instructions. The wire was sent from a bank account in Boston, Massachusetts that, unbeknownst to MEREDITH, was under the control of agents of the FBI.”

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/03/12/former-women-soccer-coach-yale-faces-federal-charges-bribery-plot-tied-school-acceptance/EMSUoJyST0cWH03EBYL3yM/story.html

Scrooge McScrooge wrote:

Old Money doesn't have to do anything quite this tawdry.

As someone who has done admissions work at an Ivy, I can tell you that even Old Money can be shameless and tawdry when necessary. My favorite were the parents who proposed having their kid live off campus as a freshman so he wouldn't be caught drinking on campus. In the end, Jr ended up in the dorms. It turned out his parents didn't realize that the "zero" in the "zero tolerance" towards freshman drinking was aspirational, not literal, at least for some students.

Alcohol policies show elite schools at their worst. Hypocritical does not begin to cover their sins.

Portland Hobby Jogger wrote:

I'm beginning to think that the powerful and wealthy in this country are all corrupt. That they constantly use bribery and graft to game the systems to work exclusively for them and their progeny.

So, how do we fix this? Meaningful social, economic, and, political reforms to level the playing field or something akin to what those Bolsheviks did in 1917? Trouble is brewing...

I am on board that there are some that cheat the system but an article about less than 50 parents (out of the thousands that are of similar circumstances) makes you believe that everyone that is wealthy in this country is corrupt? Really?

Imagine if there were an article about a wealthy parent that did it the right way was published every time that happened - first no one would be interested in reading it, 2nd it would overwhelm the articles about the cheats.

Also don't think the whole Bolsheviks thing turned out well for many people.....

not wealthy wrote:

They just are not rich enough. They are trying to penny-ante it. The real ultra-wealthy accomplish the same thing by "donating" the the university endowment. See, Kushner, for just one

Probably true, but in that case the schools are just as complicit. And really, more moral indignation should be directed toward them than towards the rich people who, let's be honest, are just doing what rich people do.

Uncle Rico wrote:

I'm slightly surprised because there are so many legal ways to game the system.

"I hereby bequeath $500,000.00 the university in exchange for the naming rights to the toilet paper dispenser affixed to Dickinson stall in Dewey Cheatem & Howe restroom at Weiner & Cox Hall on Beaver Family Foundation Quad."

I was slightly disappointed to miss out on this bargain: $100,000 for naming rights, including a nice plaque, to a men's room at Harvard Law School's Wasserstein Hall. (For $25,000,000, the Wasserstein family got the whole hall, which also seems like a pretty good deal, but it's out of my price range.)

The charging documents state that Huffman had the site where her daughter took the SATs moved from her own high school to a test center West Hollywood. Her test was then administered by a proctor who had flown in from Tampa and told investigators that he 'facilitated cheating, either by correcting the student's answers after the test or by actively assisting the student during the exam.'

In this case, Huffman's daughter scored a 1420, which was a 400 point improvement from her PSAT results just one year prior.

Soon after the proctor was paid $40,000 by Key Worldwide Foundation, the same organization that Huffman would later give a $15,000 donation to, according to the documents.

The documents also include the transcript of a phone call between Huffman and the individual who facilitated the test in which she admits that her older daughter had assistance and expresses her desire for her younger daughter to get similar help.

In a follow up call just this past December, Huffman and her unnamed spouse spoke about their daughter wanting to get into Georgetown.

It was then decided that the young girl would take the exam twice, one on her own and once with help, to ensure she got the score necessary to get her into Georgetown, it is claimed.

Loughlin and Giannulli 'agreed to pay bribes totaling $500,000 in exchange for having their two daughters designated as recruits to the USC crew team - despite the fact that they did not participate in crew - thereby facilitating their admission to USC,' according to the documents. The couple emailed Singer in 2016 about their daughters college prospects, stating that they wanted to do the necessary work to see that the girls got into USC as opposed to ASU.

Problems arose however when Olivia's guidance counselor became curious as to how she managed to receive admission based on her involvement in crew since she did not row.

la gente ésta muy loca wrote:

You can read all about it here .

https://www.justice.gov/file/1142876/download

I-Hsin Chen , also goes by the name Joey .

Ali Khosroshahin, the former women's soccer coach at USC, Laura Janke, the former assistant women's soccer coach, and Jovan Vavic, the school's current water polo coach are also charged in the case alongside Dr. Heinel. The 'cheating' referenced in the documents occurred in four forms.

'Bribing college entrance exam administrators to allow a third party to facilitate cheating on college entrance exams, in some cases by posing as actual students,' is the first.

'Bribing university athletic coaches and administrators to designate applicants as purported athletic recruits - regardless of their athletic abilities, and in some cases, even though they did not play the sport,' is the second.

(That is what the documents accuse Loughlin and her husband of doing with their daughters. )

'Having a third party take classes in place of the actual students, with the understanding that the grades earned in those classes would be submitted as part of the students' application,' is the third.

The fourth was 'submitting falsified applications for admission to universities ... that, among other things, included the fraudulently obtained exam scores and class grades, and often listed fake awards and athletic activities.'

Parties are accused of then 'disguising the nature and source of the bribe payments by funneling the money through the accounts of a purported charity.'

wow that's why our 4:06 milers can't get a scholarship! all the spots are sold to hobby joggers with admissions consultants

also got a kick that the actor William H. Macy is implicated in this scheme as a parent - the fake athlete/high test score scam sounds like it cam right out of the movie Fargo - you betcha!