The University of North Carolina campus is in shock, rocked by a massive cheating scandal that apparently involved thousands of student-athletes and spanned almost two decades.
An eight-month investigation revealed that as many as 3,100 students — mostly athletes — in past years took bogus classes and received unearned A’s and B’s, The Associated Press reported.
Nine university employees have either been fired or ordered to face disciplinary review, AP reported.
It’s not clear what the NCAA will do next, but penalties could be harsh and include a reduction in scholarships and vacated wins, AP said.
North Carolina Athletic Director Bubba Cunningham said the school would “work with the NCAA” to “work through the report with them,” AP said.
Most of the cheaters were football or basketball players, university officials said.
“I think the existence of fake classes and automatic grades — you might say an athlete track, where essentially you might as well not have the university at all — I think that’s pretty extreme,” said Howard Gardner, a professor at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education who studies cheating, AP reported. “I hope it’s pretty extreme.”
Chancellor Carol Folt refused to identify the fired employees.
“I think it’s very clear that this is an academic, an athletic and a university problem,” Ms. Folt said, AP reported.
• Cheryl K. Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com.
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