The University of Southern California said it had identified six current applicants associated with the case and would reject them. The school informed an additional number of enrolled students who were linked to the scandal that they could not register for classes until administrators had determined their level of culpability.
Yale, another university implicated in the fraud, reminded students last week of a long-standing policy to rescind the admission of students who falsify applications. A statement from Stanford said that inaccurate information on a college application was grounds for being “disenrolled” from the university or having an offer of admission rescinded, “as has happened regretfully in the past.”
The 33 wealthy parents charged in a federal indictment with paying large sums to get their children into leading universities are the targets of criminal complaints. But it is the schools themselves that must grapple with how to mete out justice to students who gained admissions through fraudulent means.
The scope of the scandal has left many college administrators in uncharted ethical territory.
“A college is not in a great position to investigate,” said Theodore O’Neill, who was dean of admissions at the University of Chicago for two decades. “The admissions process is held together by a tissue of trust.”
Colleges have policies for addressing cheating by enrolled students. But now they must evaluate allegations of cheating that occurred before students ever set foot on campus — acts that some may not have known were being done on their behalf. Moreover, some students who gained admissions to universities through fraudulent means may have already graduated, raising the question of whether they ought to be stripped of their diplomas.
The schools, themselves under investigation by prosecutors, are eager to show they are taking steps to deter flagrant admissions fraud. But the conclusion of the criminal cases could take months and perhaps exonerate some of those involved.
A former federal prosecutor, Berit Berger, said that it could be tricky for universities to conduct internal investigations during a possibly protracted criminal proceeding.
College disciplinary systems do not necessarily operate on a standard of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. But if a school expelled a student, and a trial then exonerated the family, “that’s not a good look,” said Berger, now director of the Center for the Advancement of Public Integrity at Columbia Law School.
Berger also wondered what universities might do if students implicated in the scandal have already graduated. “Do you pull the parchment?” she said.
At least one school, Wake Forest, has said that a student implicated in the indictment will remain enrolled.
“At this time, we do not plan to take any action against her when there is no evidence she had any knowledge of the alleged financial transaction,” said Katie Neal, a Wake Forest spokeswoman.
It is not just the nationwide college admissions scandal, which authorities labeled Operation Varsity Blues, that is prompting review.
In the wake of revelations about the fraud and abuse that were rampant at T.M. Landry High School in Louisiana — which was the subject of a scandal of its own — students who had enrolled in college faced scrutiny from their administrators and peers.
The bribery scheme has also torn through the world of elite Los Angeles area prep schools. Harvard-Westlake School received subpoenas from federal investigators before the case was publicly announced. Two parents named in the case resigned from the board of trustees of Sage Hill, a private school in Newport Coast, California.
“We condemn the alleged actions of those implicated in this scandal as they clearly do not reflect our school’s mission, values and vision,” Sage Hill said in a statement, adding that the “consistent practice has been to recommend against the use of independent college counselors.”
Some of the students implicated in the case unearthed by federal prosecutors last week appear to have been knowing participants in the fraud.
But it was adults who played the dominant roles, with parents, consultants, college officials and athletic coaches under indictment for scheming on behalf of unwitting children.
In the indictment, which contains transcripts of conversations between parents and officials at the organization that arranged the bribes, one parent recounted a “glitch” when her son, fraudulently recruited as a track athlete, was asked about the sport by an adviser at orientation.
“Apparently the adviser said something to the effect of, ‘Oh, so you’re a track athlete?’ And [my son] said, ‘No.’ Cause, so [my son] has no idea,” the transcript reads.
“I understand, she won’t even know,” another parent said, referring to elaborate plans to deceive her daughter about an arrangement to falsify her standardized test score.
Still, several colleges issued statements this week indicating that students unwittingly associated with the scandal could still be held accountable because they are required to certify, by signing their applications, that they had told the truth.
At the University of Texas, for instance, that language reads: “I certify that the information I have provided is complete and correct, and I understand that the submission of false information is grounds for rejection of my application, withdrawal of any offer of acceptance, cancellation of enrollment and/or appropriate disciplinary action.”
University officials declined to discuss specific cases, citing privacy rules, but they said punishment could be as severe as being expelled or having admission rescinded. The federal investigation found that a Yale coach gave bogus athletic endorsements to two students, one of whom was admitted to the college, Tom Conroy, a spokesman for Yale, said Tuesday. He said that how well a student performed academically while at Yale would not factor into a disciplinary decision.
“When applicants sign their applications, they attest that the contents are true and complete,” MConroy said.
Even beyond such formal attestations, some ethicists said there was a case for expelling the students who benefited unknowingly from their parents’ machinations.
“It’s pretty common in the law, and it coincides with moral intuitions: If you’re the unwitting beneficiary of a fraud, you don’t get to keep the benefits,” said Brian Leiter, director of the Center for Law, Philosophy and Human Values at the University of Chicago, who has posted on his philosophy blog, “Leiter Reports,” about the scandal.
And children, Leiter said, share a common interest with their parents. Allowing them to acquire a prestigious college degree would reward their parents’ behavior, even if they had been unaware of it. But he said what to do with students like those at T.M. Landry whose high school administrators had falsified their applications was more difficult, because the school had an interest in raising its own reputation.
“If it’s entirely on the administrator, probably the penalty shouldn’t be exacted on the student,” he said.
Messages left with more than three dozen parents and students associated with the alleged scheme were not returned Tuesday.
William Singer, the college counselor at the center of the fraud case, expressed sympathy for the children of his former clients who now find themselves facing possible expulsion, his lawyer, Donald Heller, said in an interview.
“He feels horribly for the distress the kids are going through,” Heller said. Singer’s suggestion, for what it’s worth, is that “each student should be judged on the student’s personal culpability — as opposed to the conduct of others,” the lawyer said.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.