Largest College Admissions Cheating Scandal Ever

31 July 2019, 05:02 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Piano*Dad:
quote:
Originally posted by pianojuggler:
Hmmm... George Washington University is number 63 in the USNews ranking, below University of Washington, Washington University (St. Louis), and Georgetown.

Lloyd Elliot and Stephen Joel Trachtenberg wanted GWU to be known as "Harvard on the Potomac". What happened there?

If GWU has been climbing in the ratings and in actual quality, where was it before now?

GW debuted in the rankings in 1996 (at number 46). Before that they weren't even considered for a ranking. That's what Trachtenberg's efforts accomplished. All of the schools in, say, the top 100 are really good. GW was just a low-quality commuter school in 1980. That changed. Their recent drop to 63 is sudden (Morse likes those moves, remember). They tracked (pun intended) in the low 50s for many years. That is a very high ranking for a place that was pretty much a dump a generation earlier.

Interesting. I looked at Georgetown, American, UMCP, George Mason, and a few others. Of those, only Georgetown appeared to be higher quality than GWU.

I don't remember who did the ranking, but in the early 1980s, GWU had the fourth-highest ranked Russian program in the country after Oberlin (number one) then Harvard and Yale (tied).

By the time I graduated, I described GWU as a third-rate education at first-rate prices. Elliot raised the tuition 9 percent in the last year I was there. He thought that would attract a higher-caliber of riff-raff. A couple years later, as Trachtenberg was on his way out, he was on the radio *bragging* that GWU had the highest tuition and fees of any school in the country... as if that was the sole measure of its quality or prestige. He then said that it really wasn't a barrier because hardly anyone paid the rack rate. Ummmm... I did.

Interesting that you refer to GWU as a "commuter" school. I thought it was a good thing that a lot of my fellow students were mid-career adults who were going back to school. It brought a diversity of ideas that I hadn't seen elsewhere. On the other hand, several classes were taught by mid-career adults who were pretty thin on teaching skills. They had a lot of real-world domain knowledge. Not much teaching ability. Except for that practicing gynecologist who taught Biology for Non-Science Majors. He was great.

GWU's biggest strength always seemed to be simply proximity to da gummint. It had location, location, and location. I used to buy my groceries in the Safeway in the basement of The Watergate.

31 July 2019, 05:04 PM

Piano*Dad

quote:
Originally posted by QuirtEvans:
quote:
Originally posted by Piano*Dad:

Public universities, by and large, have fallen. This is because they have lost funding so their resource base has declined relative to what private universities offer, which is an important component of the US News measure.

I have a question about this. What about the U Cals? Not Berkeley, which is an amazing school. And not UCLA. But what about the others? Specifically, Santa Barbara (ranked 30), Irvine (ranked 33), Davis (ranked 38), San Diego (ranked 41). Those places were thought of as much lower tier or even just party schools (I'm talking about you, UC Santa Barbara) when we were college age. The idea that any of those places would be ranked higher than private universities like Boston University or Case Western (both ranked 42), just as examples, would have been eye-popping. And it's my understanding that a lot of the UC system is in a funding squeeze. Am I wrong about that? What's the explanation there?

Not really sure. Part of this is due to the fact that US News didn't even include the branch campuses of the UC system (besides Berkeley and UCLA) until fairly recently (late 1990s). But let's roll the camera backward to 1997. The branch campus rankings have indeed improved, but they were highly ranked in the past too.

Here is 1997:

Santa Barbara -- 46
Davis ---------- 40
Irvine --------- 48
San Diego ------ 43

Here is 2007:

Santa Barbara -- 47
Davis ---------- 47
Irvine --------- 44
San Diego ------ 38

Here is 2019:

Santa Barbara -- 30
Davis ---------- 38
Irvine --------- 33
San Diego ------ 41

I think that these four UC schools made their move recently, after Morse added Raj Chetty's "mobility index" to the data.

Arguably this is good. We want to reward schools that promote "social mobility."

But if you look under the hood, that's a measure that will automatically lift schools in states that have a larger fraction of their population below the federal 20th percentile of the income distribution and punish schools in states like Virginia where the cutoff for 20th percentile of the national income distribution is only the 12th percentile of the Virginia distribution. If Morse had asked a different question, like, "how well do you do with the poorer population in your state, since that's who forms the bulk of your students," the UC schools would not have risen so much.

It's all a game.

31 July 2019, 05:45 PM

QuirtEvans

I guess I’m thinking about twenty years earlier.

If I’d said, I’m going to Case Western, people would have asked why. Cleveland? Good school, but no particular reason for me to be there as opposed to other places. Relatives in Cleveland, maybe?

If I’d said I was going to UC Irvine or UC Santa Barbara or UC Davis, jaws would have hit the floor. The reaction would have been “you’re kidding, right?”

I don’t mean to be dismissive or insulting, but that’s how I remember them.

31 July 2019, 06:54 PM

Nina

I dunno. One of the reasons why I think obsessing over these ratings is crazy has to do with the specializations that are present in so many schools.

Life sciences, vet school, animal husbandry/animal science--UC Davis is one of the top schools.

Cognitive psychology/neuroscience, microbiology--UC San Diego.

Shoot, even lowly Arizona State is #2 in the nation for supply chain management. I guess if I were counseling a kid, I'd pay attention to what they wanted to major in, and give that at least as high a weight as the school's overall ranking.

31 July 2019, 08:34 PM

QuirtEvans

quote:
Originally posted by Nina:
I dunno. One of the reasons why I think obsessing over these ratings is crazy has to do with the specializations that are present in so many schools.

Life sciences, vet school, animal husbandry/animal science--UC Davis is one of the top schools.

Cognitive psychology/neuroscience, microbiology--UC San Diego.

Shoot, even lowly Arizona State is #2 in the nation for supply chain management. I guess if I were counseling a kid, I'd pay attention to what they wanted to major in, and give that at least as high a weight as the school's overall ranking.

One-third of kids nationwide are undecided. The second largest group changes their anticipated major.

31 July 2019, 09:29 PM

Piano*Dad

The bulk of the UC schools are really good in the same way that eastern privates and midwestern flagships are good. They have excellent departments across the board, not just in a few strange specialties, and the average student quality is quite high.

Average student quality at a place like Case-Western is slightly higher, but I'll bet that the mobility score at UC Irvine is substantially higher than at CWRU and most of the other top 50 places. On other measures like faculty and staff salaries, UC's may benefit from money illusion (high nominal numbers compensating for high CA real estate prices). The UC's may also be doing well recently on the opinion survey part of the scoring.

31 July 2019, 11:50 PM

Cindysphinx

LS can confirm that Tufts is changing. It used to be a quirky, chill kind of place for kids who had business being in a place like Harvard.

Now there is a big push to raise standards and be more elite.

Too bad. It was a good fit for kids like LS, who needed a place to grow up a bit.

01 August 2019, 08:32 AM

Piano*Dad

I'm still not forgiving Tufts for swiping one of my great young economists because her husband wanted a job in the Boston area.

01 August 2019, 08:57 AM

markb

quote:
Interesting. I looked at Georgetown, American, UMCP, George Mason, and a few others. Of those, only Georgetown appeared to be higher quality than GWU.

I don't remember who did the ranking, but in the early 1980s, GWU had the fourth-highest ranked Russian program in the country after Oberlin (number one) then Harvard and Yale (tied).

By the time I graduated, I described GWU as a third-rate education at first-rate prices. Elliot raised the tuition 9 percent in the last year I was there. He thought that would attract a higher-caliber of riff-raff. A couple years later, as Trachtenberg was on his way out, he was on the radio *bragging* that GWU had the highest tuition and fees of any school in the country... as if that was the sole measure of its quality or prestige. He then said that it really wasn't a barrier because hardly anyone paid the rack rate. Ummmm... I did.

Interesting that you refer to GWU as a "commuter" school. I thought it was a good thing that a lot of my fellow students were mid-career adults who were going back to school. It brought a diversity of ideas that I hadn't seen elsewhere. On the other hand, several classes were taught by mid-career adults who were pretty thin on teaching skills. They had a lot of real-world domain knowledge. Not much teaching ability. Except for that practicing gynecologist who taught Biology for Non-Science Majors. He was great.

GWU's biggest strength always seemed to be simply proximity to da gummint. It had location, location, and location. I used to buy my groceries in the Safeway in the basement of The Watergate.

I have a pretty similar take on GW in the early 90s. I got my MA from GW in 1994. The classes were held in the evening in Crystal City, not on the GW campus (for those of you familiar with DC/NOVA). My major was called Crime in Commerce, and the teachers were likely mid- to late-career. While they seemed to know their stuff, most of the teachers weren't particularly skilled at teaching. The curriculum centered around white-collar crime and was likely among the earliest of such majors. While the class topics were generally interesting, there was a lot of time on content that, while it would be good to have a general or working knowledge of the topics, didn't need whole classes devoted to them, e.g., questioned document examination, forensic psychology, and conspiracy. The more relevant classes, such as accounting, were taught by an assistant IG at HUD, but he'd get so off topic that we didn't really learn much. The teacher for fraud in government contracting gave us what I thought was too much busy work from which I didn't learn a whole lot. Plus, the curriculum really could have used much more, and better, instruction in accounting and auditing. My two favorite classes, criminal law and procedure and evidence, were taught by two Secret Service agent lawyers who were quite good. Overall, though, I was underwhelmed by the program and disappointed that I didn't feel I learned a whole lot of practical skills from an expensive, private school. On the upside (depending on your political leanings), Hillary Clinton spoke at graduation.

01 August 2019, 09:37 AM

QuirtEvans

We toured GW a few years ago, and Lara liked it a lot. The area has changed so much. I worked in the Watergate complex for a couple of years, and lived two blocks from the GW metro stop for one of them, and I hardly recognized the place.

The school has grown so much it has a satellite campus across the river, and some number of freshmen have to live there and take a class or two over there.

Rebecca's best friend from high school goes there, and loves it. I imagine it's pretty good for the sorts of people who want to go into foreign service.

I read a story recently that said that they are trying to retool a bit ... cutting enrollment and focusing more on STEM.

01 August 2019, 09:48 AM

markb

quote:
I imagine it's pretty good for the sorts of people who want to go into foreign service.

That's my impression, too. My cousin's daughter graduated from GW this past spring. I think her major was international relations, or something like that. She'll be in a grad program there in the fall for geography.

GW seems to have a good reputation, at least 'round these parts, albeit an expensive one.

01 August 2019, 10:03 AM

QuirtEvans

Here's a version of the story I saw.

https://wamu.org/story/19/07/1...decrease-enrollment/

01 August 2019, 10:12 AM

Piano*Dad

Well, if anyone is interested in my slightly longer take on the story of George Washington and the evolution of the higher education industry in the US, Google Books permits you to read the introductory chapter of my last book.

The Road Ahead: Introduction

The relevant pages start with "A Note on Method" which is the 3rd from last page in the introduction.

[Edit: When I checked to see if the link works, I find that they've decided to cut the last three pages of the introduction from the preview. It's almost like they knew I wanted those pages. It worked at first, but now those pages have disappeared.] Hmmmm.

22 October 2019, 04:38 PM

wtg

quote:
Actress Lori Loughlin and 10 other parents accused in a massive college admissions scandal are facing additional charges, the Justice Department announced Tuesday.

A grand jury in the District of Massachusetts brought new charges against 11 of the 15 parents charged in the college admissions case, including Loughlin and her fashion designer husband, Mossimo Giannulli.

Loughlin and the 10 other parents facing new charges have pleaded not guilty to the previous charges in the alleged admissions scheme.

The new charges in the third superseding indictment allege that the 11 defendants conspired to commit federal program bribery by paying off employees of the University of Southern California to facilitate their children’s admission. Arraignment dates have not yet been scheduled.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/u...ons-scandal-n1070111