Name: 爆弾のような贈収賄スキャンダルは、大学入試の「腐敗」にどのように光を当てるのか (How a bombshell bribery scandal illuminates the 'corruption' of college admissions)
Uploaded: 2021-01-14T08:46:45.000Z
Duration: 8 min 6 s
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JUDY WOODRUFF: High school students and their parents know all too well just how intense

the competition for college admissions can be.

But today's announcement from federal prosecutors was still a shocker.

They arrested and charged 50 people across the U.S. for participating in a bribery and

cheating scam to get students into elite schools.

The case was called Operation Varsity Blues.

As William Brangham tells us for our weekly education segment, Making the Grade, the scheme

allegedly included wealthy parents, among them well-known actresses, college coaches,

and a dishonest college admissions counseling program.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: The scheme revolved in large part around a college prep business, often

The government said the company's founder, William Singer, helped students cheat on standardized

tests, and paid roughly $25 million in bribes to college athletic coaches so that kids could

enter college with fake athletic credentials.

In some instances, the students didn't even play the sport.

To mask the fraud, some students faces were actually Photoshopped onto another athlete's

Two well-known actresses, Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin, allegedly paid into the

Among the schools targeted were Yale, Georgetown, Stanford, and UCLA.

And here's how Andrew Lelling, the U.S. attorney in Massachusetts, characterized this case:

ANDREW LELLING, U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts: This case is about the widening corruption

of elite college admissions through the steady application of wealth, combined with fraud.

Every year, hundreds of thousands of hardworking, talented students strive for admission to

As every parent knows, these students work harder and harder every year, in a system

that appears to grow more and more competitive every year.

For every student admitted through fraud, an honest, genuinely talented student was

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: For more on this, I'm joined by Jeffrey Selingo.

He's been covering higher ed in America for 20 years, including for "The Chronicle of

Higher Education," as well as in three of his own books on the topic.

JEFFREY SELINGO, Author, "College Unbound: The Future of Higher Education and What It

Means for Students": It's great to be here.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: So, this is a jaw-dropping bribery scandal.

I just sort of am gobsmacked by the complexity of this.

It seems that the bribery falls into two categories here, cheating on athletics and that role

in admissions, and cheating on standardized tests.

Can you explain how cheating on the testing worked?

JEFFREY SELINGO: So, what they did was essentially get doctor's notes to allow these students

to take the test by themselves with proctors that were paid off.

And those proctors either had somebody else take the test for these students, or they

corrected the exam, so that the students would get higher scores.

Those scores were then reported to the universities, who, of course, didn't really know who actually

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: And then -- so, obviously, a higher test score helps you get into schools

But the second part of this is that -- the bribing of athletic coaches and the creating

JEFFREY SELINGO: I mean, this was the most amazing one to me, because many of these students

didn't even play the sports they were purported to play and that they recruited for.

And every year, these coaches -- and these are at high-level institutions, in some cases

at Division I institutions -- they're recruiting athletes starting in their sophomore and junior

So for these students to not have to play these sports,and then to get in under that

pretense of those sports, I think, was absolutely shocking and amazing to me.

And these athletes are given tips in admissions, right?

They -- all these colleges have to fill teams, right?

They need a starting pitcher on the -- on the baseball team.

They need rowers on the crew team, right?

And so, every year, athletes are given advantages in admissions.

And, clearly, these students were as well.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: How significant is that advantage?

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: I mean, for people who are not familiar with this, the role -- if you

really are a star athlete, can you get into a school that would really traditionally be

I mean, in many of these schools, they are basically the -- the athletic director or

the coaches come to the admissions team and say, these are the students we really want.

Now, will they accept the bottom of the bottom in terms of academics?

Other schools will and just basically say, we will give them kind of academic support

But, basically, every other part of their application could be pretty minimal, but as

long as they have athletics on it, it really does help.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: One of the details that you touched on here, I just find it so striking.

And this was a young woman in Southern California who didn't play soccer.

This -- the guy William Singer helped set up a phony athletic profile, sort of pretending

that she played on a very competitive team in Southern California.

They then bribe the Yale soccer coach, $400,000, to recruit this student, even though the coach

knew that the student had never even put her foot on a ball.

I can't even imagine what these other athletes on the team thought of this.

But, more so, there was probably an athlete or two that were in the recruiting system

for Yale that didn't get in because this student or these students got in.

And that's not only true at Yale, but at these other institutions.

The U.S. attorney talked about it as a zero-sum game.

I mean, in admissions, to be honest with you, I think that many more students are not admitted

who are qualified, because the admissions rate at some of these places is like 8 to

But, in athletics, you're really competing against one or two other people.

And so, in those cases, I think they probably took a spot of somebody.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: At its core, really, this is about wealthy parents who are trying to

buy in some ways even more influence for their wealthy children, right?