Note that the thread "ADs getting help cleaning house" is already covering this.
Just came across this update with more names and details.
"Now listen here Wade, this is not my deal here"...
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...Felicity-Huffman-college-bribery-scandal.html
Loved Kellyanne Conway's tweet: "They worried their daughters are as stupid as their mothers."
The number of articles I have read about this that have stated that coaches were paid off to help kids get athletic scholarships to prestigious schools is ridiculous. I'm not a fake newser, but this is making me question a few things. Nevermind that some of these schools don't have athletic scholarships to begin with, but what economic sense would it make to pay a million dollars for a $300,000 athletic scholarship?
How taking advantage of comparatively lax academic standards offered to athletes has been confused with receiving scholarships is perplexing to me.
I think your missing their strategy, assuming I understand this scheme correctly.
Schools want well rounded students. The more well rounded you are, the more "points" you get. So, besides grades, they look at extra curricular activities, sports, arts, charity work, etc.
Coaches of sports teams, whether an NCAA sport or not (as well as in some schools marching bands or other areas where the school is known for) will sometimes put in an extra word to the admissions staff if there is someone they really want on their team.
It doesn’t matter whether the school offers scholarships in the respective activity. It’s just a matter of using any advantage in the applicants background to get in.
So, if they can bribe a coach to put in a (false) good word for their child, then that’s another possible advantage trying to get into that school. It’s not like these kids are actually going to play that sport. It’s all a scam.
Also, this has absolutely nothing to do with economic sense. These one percenters don’t care about that. They only care about getting their kid into these "top brand" schools. No matter how much it costs.
I'm not missing anything.
These people are not angling to receive athletic scholarships, but its been reported in many articles that these people were paying to coaches to offer them athletic scholarships to XX University. Then, some of the schools don't even offer athletic scholarships so it's double fail reporting.
They were paying coaches to include them in the admissions process as athletes so they could take advantage of lax standards that are offered to some athletes. I get what is going on here and think it needs to be reported factually and correctly which is not happening in many cases.
I also think the perception that these people were getting athletic scholarships paints athletic departments in a far more corrupt light than they need to be because there would be several additional layers of checks and balances with compliance that would be gone thru if people were receiving scholarships for sports they weren't playing.
As it is, there were obviously bad actors in athletics, but not systemic corruption throughout entire athletic departments which might be inferred if the scholarship thing were in fact true.
Okay. I get you now. You’re right, that’s lousy reporting.
The number of articles I have read about this that have stated that coaches were paid off to help kids get athletic scholarships to prestigious schools is ridiculous. I'm not a fake newser, but this is making me question a few things. Nevermind that some of these schools don't have athletic scholarships to begin with, but what economic sense would it make to pay a million dollars for a $300,000 athletic scholarship?
How taking advantage of comparatively lax academic standards offered to athletes has been confused with receiving scholarships is perplexing to me.
It isn't about athletic scholarships, it's about admission preferences for recruited athletes at said schools. The "students" were not even athletes, but had fake athletic credentials
Again, no kidding. You missed the point of my post. I am frustrated by the “fake news” reporting that these kids parents were paying “to receive athletic scholarships” as was reported by many outlets in the early going
Okay, I was kind of skimming. I don't get why would somebody pay that much for admission to USC? It's a good school, but there are plenty of schools with equivalent reputations.
Then, I followed that up with it must be because a lot of these folks in this scam are Hollywood folks, and USC is a premier film (and to some degree, acting) school. That's why they want their kids to be able to go there, if that's what the kid wanted.
There's also an element that people look at a university that's strong in their field, and assume that it is equally strong in all of them. My father, a political science professor, tends to judge the quality of a school by it poli sci department.
I will agree that I tend to judge schools by their reputation in math, but I also know there are other disciplines. The fact is there is no school that is worth hiring somebody to take your SATs, and dupe admissions into thinking that you are a star athlete. What kind of self esteem do these people have? It's like being proud of a grade you got by hiring coursehero.com to write a paper for you (which is how I assume these "students" figured they'd get by once they got in).
