Posted on 01/01/2014 5:54:28 AM PST by reaganaut1
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — In the summer of 2011, 19 undergraduates at the University of North Carolina signed up for a lecture course called AFAM 280: Blacks in North Carolina. The professor was Julius Nyang’oro, an internationally respected scholar and longtime chairman of the African and Afro-American studies department.
It is doubtful the students learned much about blacks, North Carolina or anything else, though they received grades for papers they supposedly turned in and Mr. Nyang’oro, the instructor, was paid $12,000. University and law-enforcement officials say AFAM 280 never met. One of dozens of courses in the department that officials say were taught incompletely or not at all, AFAM 280 is the focus of a criminal indictment against Mr. Nyang’oro that was issued last month.
Eighteen of the 19 students enrolled in the class were members of the North Carolina football team (the other was a former member), reportedly steered there by academic advisers who saw their roles as helping athletes maintain high enough grades to remain eligible to play.
Handed up by an Orange County, N.C., grand jury, the indictment charged Nyang’oro with “unlawfully, willfully and feloniously” accepting payment “with the intent to cheat and defraud” the university in connection with the AFAM course — a virtually unheard-of legal accusation against a professor.
The indictment, critics say, covers just a small piece of one of the biggest cases of academic fraud in North Carolina history. That it has taken place at Chapel Hill, known for its rigorous academic standards as well as an athletic program revered across the country, has only made it more shocking.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
“the African and Afro-American studies department...”
The real shysters and frauds are the administrators, presidents, etc., who set up such a farce of a department to begin with. They should be prosecuted for stealing money from the public and forced to pay back all students who attended these worthless classes. All colleges need a cleansing from all this PC nonsense.
You would think that a person who played NFL football for even a short time would accrue considerable benefit. Not so sure. Ten years after playing, those ex athletes are often broke and are saddled with life long debilitating injuries. Some of course did very well. Would love to see an objective study how eighteen year old African American males who are recruited to play in Division 1 university sport programs fare in the long run compared to their peers who are not recruited.
they didn’t get the word -
I have heard in past years that other universities require the student/athletes go to the instructor’s office or empty classroom and sign an attendance form for the class each time it is supposed to meet - no class - just sign!
What good ever came from Africa but the ability to get the hell out of it?
A friend of many years was a 'jock'; he knew many interesting details.
After selecting the school they gave him a list of class recommendations that where 'friends of the team'. Because of the schedule he would unfortunately miss many classes; so this was best.
They suggested when he attended, he wear his uniform so the everyone knew he was on the team.
Not all instructors were in on the plan. His graduation was questionable.
A lucky break, the friend of an instructor had an accident and needed blood; any student who donated blood would receive extra 'help'. He graduated in four.
Was drafted into the pros(number 999+?)instead took a teaching position.
UNC is known as the East Coast’s version of Berkeley.
As we used to say in Raleigh:
NC State = Education
UNC = Vacation
Society has no responsibility to defend stupidity. I say let the sports buffs pay their money and watch their theater.
This happened at Auburn a few years ago, and just like then nothing will come of this. I had a former student that was not bright at all. Sweat as pie, but not very intelligent. I can’t remember what his IEP said. Any way, he was a big recruit for WVU and took most of his classes in a computer room with his “tutor.”
I beleive cheating has become a part of the administration of most universities...pretty sad. I know this is a totally different angle but I had this experience several years ago.
I went back to school to become an RN when I was 49 years old. I attended University of Louisiana at Lafayette College of Nursing, purportedly (at least by the school itself) one of the best, most rigorous nursing colleges. Each semester, they were taking 260 freshmen who had GPA’s that met the current minimum and when I was graduated, there were 35 in our class. Each year, the students were weeded out to fit the smaller and smaller class sizes. I worked my ass off, full-time student, did not work whilke I was in school and it was a bitch.
I had a hard time particularly when I saw classmates pass with 95 to 100 on tests: who were unable to write a sentence that made sense, who did not know the class material and who slept through most of the classes. I was having trouble in the OB semesters (I’m a guy) but I managed to get through.
While studying in the library for the last final exam of my senior year, one of my classmates took out a stack of paper that appeared to have test questions and answers on it. I asked her what that was, she told me that it was the exam answers...she said that she had printed them out from a website that had all of the exams from all of the nursing courses for all four years. She pulled out her computer, logged in with a user name and password and showed me...it was all there: about 200 to 300 questions for each course exam with correct answers. The exams were usually 50 to 100 questions so the teachers must have picked from the bank of questions. I asked her where she found out about this. She said someone had given her the name and password and that she thought that everyone knew about it. I asked if she had to pay for the info...she said that she didn’t but she thought her friend had paid for the log-in info.
She said that the info was only there at certain random times of the day so that the university would have trouble finding it...so you had to print it out when you saw it was available.
I took the exam about 15 minutes after this revelation...I was so livid that I thought I was going to explode during the exam but I managed to finish. I went to the assistant dean and told her, had her log on and she saw the exams...she was quite upset and asked me not to tell any one about it while they investigated....she did say the some teachers were puzzled because students “who were not supposed to pass were making A’s.” I passed the final exam and never heard anything about the cheating...I’m sure that it was swept under the rug...and I’m sure that at least one faculty member had to have been involved to have access to all of the exams.
I don’t know if things are this way at other nursing schools. A huge percentage of my classmates were taking adderall to stay awake for study and clinicals and taking ativan to get a few hours of sleep. And along with the cheating, there are many who I would not want ever taking care of anyone in my family.
A final word of advice from me: Always, ALWAYS, have a family member or closed trusted friend with you when you go to the hospital to help look out for your best interest. ...more so now with Obamacare.
Our daughter went to UNC-CH as as conservative Christian and came out a conservative Christian.
While it is generally better to send a kid to a conservative school, that is no guarantee that they will remain conservative there, either.
I'm just being pedantic but why is there an apostrophe in "A's"?
You would prefer “As?”
Should be “A”s.......
Is there a definitive rule for pluralizing acronyms, abbreviations and individual letters? I understand why you did it that way, but it doesn’t look right. I’ve always seen it handled with an apostrophe, without question.
If they really wanted to get away with it, they should have enrolled all these athletes in a microbiology or molecular physics course and paid the $12,000 to some Chinese dude who didn't speak a word of English.
Maybe if they were like Harvard where everyone gets A’s, this would not be a story...
I know of no “rule” for this....I just have always done it with quotation marks...only to emphasize it as a letter grade...
Hell, where’s the fraud? I say the professor did exactly what he was paid to do! Case dismissed. Next! ...
if they graduate,I think it does help them...at least they get to see how the “other” side lives....jmo...
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