HSD official obtained Ph.D. from diploma mill

Washington Technology ^ | 05/30/03 | By Patience Wait and Wilson P. Dizard III

[Robert A Cook PE]

Heads up!

[longshadow]

here's some juicy info about the hiring of Crabtree (Callahan) by the WH, from WorldNetDaily:

Curious confluence
Callahan's Sept. 30, 1996, promotion to the White House from a lower-paying government job in Pittsburgh is marked by a curious confluence of events.

• The next month, PRC's contract was terminated, although many PRC technicians -- including Sandi Golas, Bob Haas and John Spriggs -- stayed on to help Northrop Grumman make the transition. (The three now work for Northrop Grumman in the White House. They testified, somewhat reluctantly, about the e-mail scandal in last month's House hearings.)

• Callahan replaced veteran White House computer manager Sheryl Hall, who says she was demoted for speaking out against the White House political appointees using government resources to build the first lady's WHODB donor database. Hall was heavily involved in the Lotus Notes e-mail project at the time. She has since become a whistle-blower and a plaintiff in Judicial Watch's Filegate suit against White House officials.

• At the end of September 1996, White House official Jim Wright, branch chief of IST's Data Center, came back to work after a two-week leave of absence for "stress," a former colleague says -- only to find out that Callahan had taken over his old Lotus Notes project. He was soon at odds with Callahan over her handling of the e-mail project, the colleague says.

• On Oct. 17, 1996, the new server-based Lotus Notes e-mail system first went on line -- with its now-famously flawed Mail2 server.

• At the same time -- just weeks away from the November 1996 presidential election -- news broke of Clinton-Gore fund-raiser John Huang's shady (now illegal) dealings. Secret meetings between Clinton and Huang's Beijing-tied boss, James Riady, were also revealed.

Looks like you memory is pretty good.

[Rocky]

Does "PhD" stand for "Phony Diploma"?

[decimon]

"Resume fraud" was that labor lawyer's term:

"“There is something called resume fraud, which this would be considered,” Lorber said. “It’s what it sounds like—not the embellishment, but a fraudulent addition that indicates a job or degree.”"

I think her actions in getting those degrees were knowing and purposeful. She got the degree mill degrees to advance in rank. OTOH, she's received performance awards. OTTH (on the third hand), the allegations of malfeasance during the Clinton years is a serious matter but a separate issue.

[kcvl]

Laura L. Callahan was appointed as the Department of Labor’s Deputy Chief Information Officer (CIO) in November 1999

[kcvl]

Dr. Laura Callahan
Department of Homeland Security
Office of the CIO
Via Remote Delivery Site
245 Murray Drive, Building 410
Washington, DC 20223

laura.callahan@dhs.gov

(202) 786-0086 (voice)
(202) 786-0267 (fax)

[decimon]

These PR people certainly know their business. Callahan is posed and backdropped perfectly in that picture. My pictures look like some guy who was dragged out of bed by some organized crime squad.

[realpatriot]

She is a dumbass, coulda got her diploma for $9.95 on eBay here.

[FreeTheHostages]

fascinating

[TankerKC]

Congressional scrutiny of Homeland official steps up (Laura Callahan update) ^

[Sparta]

I thought the Department of Homeland Security^TM would have the best and brightest defending us. That's what its proponents were saying when they created it.

[tracer]

"All lies!" 8~)

[Bernard]

Laura L. Callahan, now senior director in the office of department CIO Steven Cooper, states on her professional biography that she “holds a Ph.D. in Computer Information Systems from Hamilton University.” Callahan, who is also president of the Association for Federal IRM and a member of the CIO Council, is commonly called by the title “Dr.”

Callahan’s resume says she began her civil service career in 1984. Before joining HSD, she was deputy CIO at the Labor Department.

This is very educational. I didn't realize that the title "CIO" existed prior to 1984. I thought it was invented during the dot-com craze. The amount of knowledge you gain here is amazing.

[tracer]

You should check out "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" from blockbuster. You'll understand the origin of Appy's quotation and ROTFLYO at the same time....

[decimon]

You should check out "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" from blockbuster. You'll understand the origin of Appy's quotation and ROTFLYO at the same time....

Saw that when it came out some...geez...good 25 years ago. Expected it to be too silly to be funny but it got me.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

Are highly educated people no better in government jobs than someone without the education? Is it really necessary for teachers to have expensive masters degrees before they can go on and teach?

Probably not. As a business owner, I found education was not important in looking for quality of employees. Give me character and attitude any day. There are college graduates I wouldn't want and some of my best employees lacked high school diplomas.

Years ago, students were taught by teachers who had high school diplomas. Many had taken a course they called "normal training" in high school and went straight to one-room schoolhouses. My cousins came from such a school. One PhD, two with masters in engineering and the other a couple of degrees. Never knew of a student that couldn't read and write and do math. The teachers stoked pot belly stoves and cleaned their own classrooms with the help of the students. I say lets bring back one room schoolhouses with teachers from normal training.

[gcruse]

AAMOF, the college in Canyon, Texas, used to be called West Texas State Normal Teacher's College. Always wondered what the
'normal' meant, but never asked.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

I'm sure it is where they trained teachers. My mother took this course in high school and went straight to a one room school house. This was very common in those days. I have visited one room schoolhouses. When I was young, even though I went to school in town, on vacation days I would visit the one room schoolhouses with relatives. We used to take visitors to school with us and no one thought anything about it.