UNC Football and bball LOL (1 Viewer)

[Johnny Rock]

This thread is called "UNC Football and bball LOL," not "UNC Academic Fraud - Thank God No Athletes Were Involved."

Of course academic fraud is a huge deal. We all recognize that's why they're in this mess. I expect that all to be sorted out in due course.

It's not a meaningless exercise of changing numbers in a record book. This is about integrity and ethics. This isn't North East Nebraska State - Norfolk Campus we're talking about here.

 

[TobiasFunke]

This thread is called "UNC Football and bball LOL," not "UNC Academic Fraud - Thank God No Athletes Were Involved."

Of course academic fraud is a huge deal. We all recognize that's why they're in this mess. I expect that all to be sorted out in due course.

It's not a meaningless exercise of changing numbers in a record book. This is about integrity and ethics. This isn't North East Nebraska State - Norfolk Campus we're talking about here.

The thread was actually about a previous UNC football scandal involving improper benefits. It just sort of turned into the place where people talk about the academic scandal.

And yeah, it's pretty meaningless. Taking away a banner and title won't retroactively mean the school's fans had less fun watching the team during those seasons, or that the school made less money on those teams, or that another team is suddenly the champs from those seasons.

Plus as I said there's no clear evidence of NCAA violations when it comes to the only program sports fans really care about. Some MBB players took the shady classes but to a man (except for one man who now refuses to go on record) they all say they actually did work for the classes and handed in papers. I would guess some of them are lying, but there's no real way to prove that. And the Wainstein Report concluded that Roy Williams didn't even know about it, which is the big difference between this and the Haskins deal you mentioned before.

The funny thing to me is that there's a lot more meat on the bone when it comes to football and women's basketball and women's soccer, yet somehow you don't hear a lot of demand that those teams forfeit wins and trophies from the media and rival fans.

 

[Archer]

Plus as I said there's no clear evidence of NCAA violations when it comes to the only program sports fans really care about.

 

[Aerial Assault]

The funny thing to me is that there's a lot more meat on the bone when it comes to football and women's basketball and women's soccer, yet somehow you don't hear a lot of demand that those teams forfeit wins and trophies from the media and rival fans.

This "rival fan" wants all UNC programs involved punished equally.

 

[Sammy3469]

From the UNC student newspaper today:

http://www.dailytarheel.com/article/2014/11/more-evidence-emerges-on-jan-boxill

The punchline is Boxill is slated to teach a sophomore level philosophy class there in "Sports Ethics" in the spring.

Keep on, keeping on U*NC!

 

[pantherclub]

From the UNC student newspaper today:

http://www.dailytarheel.com/article/2014/11/more-evidence-emerges-on-jan-boxill

The punchline is Boxill is slated to teach a sophomore level philosophy class there in "Sports Ethics" in the spring.

Keep on, keeping on U*NC!

Sweet Baby Jesus that reads like an Onion article

Men’s basketball tutor Janet Huffstelter emailed Boxill in 2007, asking her for advice on an upcoming quiz in philosophy.

“(Redacted) had a tough week,” Huffstelter said. “I’m sorry he waited until the last minute to call me in for help. I guess it’s not unusual, though.”

Boxill responded with at least six specific questions that could be on the quiz, according to the emails.

Almost all of Boxill’s emails that were released were either her talking about, or to, students. “I will do whatever I can to help you obtain your degree,” she said in one email.

In another: “Just talked with Betsy Taylor in Steele Bldg, and she said she is making you a candidate for May, and that we are correct-all you need to do to is to PHIL with an A-!! And THAT will be done!!! This so great.”

One student emailed Boxill, asking why she hadn’t heard from Boxill about the independent study course in a few weeks. Another student was looking for a way to get six hours to keep his or her Pell Grant, and Boxill suggested six hours of a philosophy or African and Afro-American independent study.

Another student asked for an extension on a paper, and Boxill replied: “I have to say this is getting ridiculous! You have had the entire term to do *VERY MINIMAL* work.”

 

[Johnny Rock]

This thread is called "UNC Football and bball LOL," not "UNC Academic Fraud - Thank God No Athletes Were Involved."

Of course academic fraud is a huge deal. We all recognize that's why they're in this mess. I expect that all to be sorted out in due course.

It's not a meaningless exercise of changing numbers in a record book. This is about integrity and ethics. This isn't North East Nebraska State - Norfolk Campus we're talking about here.

And yeah, it's pretty meaningless. Taking away a banner and title won't retroactively mean the school's fans had less fun watching the team during those seasons, or that the school made less money on those teams, or that another team is suddenly the champs from those seasons.

You are delusional. Nobody is going to take away your memories. What a scandal strips away is the facade. If guilty, the stain remains forever.

 

[Tau837]

This thread is called "UNC Football and bball LOL," not "UNC Academic Fraud - Thank God No Athletes Were Involved."

Of course academic fraud is a huge deal. We all recognize that's why they're in this mess. I expect that all to be sorted out in due course.

It's not a meaningless exercise of changing numbers in a record book. This is about integrity and ethics. This isn't North East Nebraska State - Norfolk Campus we're talking about here.

The thread was actually about a previous UNC football scandal involving improper benefits. It just sort of turned into the place where people talk about the academic scandal.

And yeah, it's pretty meaningless. Taking away a banner and title won't retroactively mean the school's fans had less fun watching the team during those seasons, or that the school made less money on those teams, or that another team is suddenly the champs from those seasons.

Plus as I said there's no clear evidence of NCAA violations when it comes to the only program sports fans really care about. Some MBB players took the shady classes but to a man (except for one man who now refuses to go on record) they all say they actually did work for the classes and handed in papers. I would guess some of them are lying, but there's no real way to prove that. And the Wainstein Report concluded that Roy Williams didn't even know about it, which is the big difference between this and the Haskins deal you mentioned before.

The funny thing to me is that there's a lot more meat on the bone when it comes to football and women's basketball and women's soccer, yet somehow you don't hear a lot of demand that those teams forfeit wins and trophies from the media and rival fans.

There is meat on the bone for baseball too. I care about that more than WBB and WS.

 

[Archer]

Another gem courtesy of Pack Pride

http://s16.postimg.org/7mlfo4twj/UNC_Cheats_Action_Figures.gif

 

[Gary Coal Man]

Two former UNC student-athletes sue school, NCAA over academic welfare

Yahoo! Sports

Two former University of North Carolina student-athletes have filed a lawsuit against the university and the NCAA claiming that neither entity is doing enough to ensure that student-athletes are receiving a proper education.

The suit is seeking damages for all student-athletes affected by UNC academic scandal.

According to CNN’s Sarah Ganim, the suit was filed by Michael Hausfeld, one of the lawyer’s in the O’Bannon suit against the NCAA.

Rashanda McCants, a former women’s basketball player, and Devon Ramsay, a former football player, are named as plaintiffs, though the lawsuit, which was filed Thursday afternoon in Durham County court, is seeking class-action status. McCants is also the sister of Rashad McCants, a starter on the 2005 UNC men’s basketball team that won the national championship.

Ramsey was kicked off the football team in 2010 after receiving improper help from a tutor.

Ramsey's attorney, Robert Orr, convinced the NCAA that his client had been wrongly accused and Ramsey was allowed to return to the team. However, he then suffered a career-ending knee injury.

This is the second lawsuit to emerge from North Carolina’s academic fraud scandal.

Former football player Michael McAdoo filed his lawsuit against the schoolin U.S. District Court in Charlotte in November. McAdoo was a former football player who had been kicked off the team in 2010 after the NCAA determined he had received improper help from a tutor.

Last October, UNC acknowledged that 3,100 students – approximately 1,500 of them student-athletes – were steered into bogus classes that were geared toward gaining easy grades and keeping student-athletes eligible. The school also said that many academic and athletic officials knew about the scheme, which went on for 18 years (1993-2011).

 

[Archer]

Interesting take on Roy William's response to the cheating scandal.

http://s21.postimg.org/g6hn6expx/UNC_Cheats_Trial.gif

 

[Archer]

Its honestly hard to comprehend how HUGE this cheating scandal is. Here is the latest from the class action lawsuit recently filed against UNC/NCAA

page 149

"163.The inflated grades from paper classes had a significant impact on student-athlete grade-point averages(“GPAs”).
Each AFAM paper class grade increased a student’s GPA, on average, by approximately .03 grade points.
For at least 169 student-athletes, the grade they received in a paper class provided the GPA boost that either kept or pushed their GPA above the 2.0 level needed each semester to maintain academic eligibility under NCAA rule"

The numbers also show there were a confirmed 1500 athletes who took fake classes over the 23 years they have been cheating.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

Haven't read it yet, but been told this is a pretty nice take down of Willingham and Smith. For the diehards.

http://northcarolina.scout.com/forums/1414-zigga-zoomba-lounge/13640192-mare-bear-wins-whistleblower-of-the-year-award?s=78&page=11

ETA:

Lots of stuff to wade through. Mostly seems like there is some proof that Willingham fabricated some "evidence", ie, saying more athletes actually cheated/steered toward classes than in truth. Seems to really make her look pretty bad. Apparently the national media and authorities are being involved. We'll see.

Doesn't mean there weren't paper classes of course.

Interesting thing to me on page 8: Since 1993, the number of Freshman who scored below an 1100 on the SAT has pretty steadily dropped from 650 students to 217 students in the 2013 school year. So the school has gotten a lot tougher to get into the last 20 years. Not sure I would have guessed that.

 

[Johnny Rock]

So when is everything stripped, vacated and neutered?

 

[ConstruxBoy]

Lots to investigate I guess.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

Tar heel colored view of the new Willingham info from someone more into it than I am:

Athletics did inform academics of potential problems with certain classes, including AFAM. Athletics were essentially told to stay in their lane. This happened in 2002 (I think it was '02) and again in '07.

Athletics were told that an annual report would be made examining enrollments by student-athletes in independent study classes, and the report would be sent to the Chancellor. Reports were never made.

Mary only helped about 15% of the number of total athletes she said she helped. None of which were from the '05 basketball team. Very limited few in football.

Requirements in the 'paper classes' required quite a bit more than originally thought. Multiple papers, with 15 page finals in some instances.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

Looks like trying to throw the dead cat onto the academic folks instead of the athletic department.

 

[TobiasFunke]

This stuff is way too in the weeds for me, but the one thing I was able to pull from it is that Willingham has gone after the "Starting 5 + 1" of the '05 title team on their classes (and I think on their literacy too?), yet the records reveal that she never worked with any of the starting 5 or the 2 reserves who got minutes for that team because she didn't work with any MBB players until the 05-06 year and all seven of those players had left the program by then due to graduation or early entry into the NBA draft.

So in addition to essentially calling out players by name without providing evidence to support her assertions- which is pretty sleazy as it is- she apparently didn't even work with them and had no basis to pull their records or to know anything else about them.

Is that accurate, Construx?

 

[RUSF18]

So the thought is that an otherwise excellent academic school had this massive hole in one of its departments that a large percentage of athletes eventually got wind of, and not only did athletics have nothing to do with it, but it was athletics who tried to get it stopped?

Tough sell.

 

[pantherclub]

Haven't read it yet, but been told this is a pretty nice take down of Willingham and Smith. For the diehards.

http://northcarolina.scout.com/forums/1414-zigga-zoomba-lounge/13640192-mare-bear-wins-whistleblower-of-the-year-award?s=78&page=11

ETA:

Lots of stuff to wade through. Mostly seems like there is some proof that Willingham fabricated some "evidence", ie, saying more athletes actually cheated/steered toward classes than in truth. Seems to really make her look pretty bad. Apparently the national media and authorities are being involved. We'll see.

Doesn't mean there weren't paper classes of course.

Interesting thing to me on page 8: Since 1993, the number of Freshman who scored below an 1100 on the SAT has pretty steadily dropped from 650 students to 217 students in the 2013 school year. So the school has gotten a lot tougher to get into the last 20 years. Not sure I would have guessed that.

that link goes to a thread on Inside Carolina. Did you want us to read the whole thread or is there another link? Not sure what reading a thread on there supposed to do

 

[Archer]

 

[ConstruxBoy]

This stuff is way too in the weeds for me, but the one thing I was able to pull from it is that Willingham has gone after the "Starting 5 + 1" of the '05 title team on their classes (and I think on their literacy too?), yet the records reveal that she never worked with any of the starting 5 or the 2 reserves who got minutes for that team because she didn't work with any MBB players until the 05-06 year and all seven of those players had left the program by then due to graduation or early entry into the NBA draft.

So in addition to essentially calling out players by name without providing evidence to support her assertions- which is pretty sleazy as it is- she apparently didn't even work with them and had no basis to pull their records or to know anything else about them.

Is that accurate, Construx?

Pretty much as I see it from that, but we'll see how it plays out. Like you said, more details than I care to get into.

 

[Archer]

Yeah, these public records and emails sound like nothing was going on. Really.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B83-n0cCUAMleEN.png

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B9b7wyXCYAAcOlp.jpg

 

[ConstruxBoy]

So the thought is that an otherwise excellent academic school had this massive hole in one of its departments that a large percentage of athletes eventually got wind of, and not only did athletics have nothing to do with it, but it was athletics who tried to get it stopped?

Tough sell.

Agreed.

The best way I've come up with to try to understand what went on is to go through the 5 levels of wrong doing:

1) Paper Classes - There is nothing wrong with paper classes, per se. Lots of schools, if not all, have them. They are usually used for more advanced studies and students, but they could also just be easy classes at a given school. I don't see any violation here, although certainly I question the department head if so many of his classes are paper classes.

2) Steering athletes toward paper classes - Again, nothing technically wrong assuming the athletes keep their GPA above the minimum, but certainly sleazy looking and taking a sort of short cut on the athlete's education.

3) Favorable grading of papers - Here is where you pretty much cross the line, although technically it may not be a violation. The athlete writes their one paper, which deserves a C on any standard scale of merit and the grader gives the paper an A. This will give the school/department a bad reputation and should get the grader fired, but again, not sure this is technically an NCAA violation.

4) Grade changing - Athlete above writes the paper and it is graded as a C. Someone else changes the grade to an A to keep the athlete eligible. This is certainly an NCAA violation. Cheating at it's most basic.

5) No work - Someone else, Tutor, Grad Asst, actually writes the paper for the athlete. The Athlete does no work at all. This is fraud. Certain violation. Throw the book at them.

So as I understand it, numbers 1 and 2 are pretty undeniable at UNC. The question is how much of 3-5 was happening. The allegations are that a lot of that was happening. But those allegations are almost completely based on one whistle blower, WIllingham. And if there is evidence that she exaggerated or even outright lied about how much 3-5 was happening and for which athletes, well, it makes the NCAA's case tougher.

 

[Tau837]

So the thought is that an otherwise excellent academic school had this massive hole in one of its departments that a large percentage of athletes eventually got wind of, and not only did athletics have nothing to do with it, but it was athletics who tried to get it stopped?

Tough sell.

Agreed.The best way I've come up with to try to understand what went on is to go through the 5 levels of wrong doing:

1) Paper Classes - There is nothing wrong with paper classes, per se. Lots of schools, if not all, have them. They are usually used for more advanced studies and students, but they could also just be easy classes at a given school. I don't see any violation here, although certainly I question the department head if so many of his classes are paper classes.

2) Steering athletes toward paper classes - Again, nothing technically wrong assuming the athletes keep their GPA above the minimum, but certainly sleazy looking and taking a sort of short cut on the athlete's education.

3) Favorable grading of papers - Here is where you pretty much cross the line, although technically it may not be a violation. The athlete writes their one paper, which deserves a C on any standard scale of merit and the grader gives the paper an A. This will give the school/department a bad reputation and should get the grader fired, but again, not sure this is technically an NCAA violation.

4) Grade changing - Athlete above writes the paper and it is graded as a C. Someone else changes the grade to an A to keep the athlete eligible. This is certainly an NCAA violation. Cheating at it's most basic.

5) No work - Someone else, Tutor, Grad Asst, actually writes the paper for the athlete. The Athlete does no work at all. This is fraud. Certain violation. Throw the book at them.

So as I understand it, numbers 1 and 2 are pretty undeniable at UNC. The question is how much of 3-5 was happening. The allegations are that a lot of that was happening. But those allegations are almost completely based on one whistle blower, WIllingham. And if there is evidence that she exaggerated or even outright lied about how much 3-5 was happening and for which athletes, well, it makes the NCAA's case tougher.

I like the way you broke this down, but I do not believe evidence of 3-5 happening was based almost completely on Willingham. Where did you get that?

 

[ConstruxBoy]

I saw a blurb at one point that she was really the one with the "evidence" and direct proof of things occurring. Maybe it was from too long ago? TBH, I haven't paid a ton of attention lately until I saw that thread on IC. I know they had released transcripts that showed what grades certain people got. But as far as I could tell, Willingham was the only one willing to testify about it, other than McCants. Has that changed?

ETA: Didn't Crowder and the Tutor that McAdoo used refuse to talk to investigators? Maybe I'm behind the times.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

Maybe I should go to Pack Pride to get up to date.

 

[pantherclub]

I saw a blurb at one point that she was really the one with the "evidence" and direct proof of things occurring. Maybe it was from too long ago? TBH, I haven't paid a ton of attention lately until I saw that thread on IC. I know they had released transcripts that showed what grades certain people got. But as far as I could tell, Willingham was the only one willing to testify about it, other than McCants. Has that changed?

ETA: Didn't Crowder and the Tutor that McAdoo used refuse to talk to investigators? Maybe I'm behind the times.

the transcripts never contained names

I dont get the angle of UNC fans trying to discredit MW. The UNC commissioned Weistein Report is what says it all and will be what the NCAA uses. Not Mary W.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

I guess I need to read the Wainstein report to get up to date.

ETA: Here it is if anyone else missed the whole thing, with a summary by Deadspin:

http://deadspin.com/unc-investigation-reveals-widespread-academic-fraud-1649405561

 

[The Commish]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

 

[TobiasFunke]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

Also, the idea that the NCAA is the only thing that can damage UNC is silly. The reputation of the school and the athletic department has taken a beating well beyond the allegations in the report, mostly because of Willingham and the reporters that have run with her accounts. It's given them enough bad press to last a lifetime, probably had a negative impact on applications and maybe even post-graduation hiring, athletic recruiting, and who knows what else. It's disingenuous to ask why UNC alums/fans care about her apparent lack of credibility given the damage she's done.

 

[meanjoegreen]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

There are more football players on a team, therefore there would be more football students. There were 167 enrollments for the men's basketball team for fake classes under Roy Williams in an 11 year span. When you think about how many players are on a basketball team, that is most of the team.

 

[TobiasFunke]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

There are more football players on a team, therefore there would be more football students. Most of Roy Williams basketball players took the classes as well. 167 men's basketball players took the fake classes over an 11 year span under Roy Williams. That is practically the whole basketball team every year under him.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it was 167 enrollments (i.e. classes taken). Not 167 players. Back of the envelope math it comes out to maybe 6 total classes per semester taken by the entire roster combined. Also taking a paper class is not, by itself, evidence of wrongdoing. The report says as much; in fact it goes even further than that and exonerates the basketball team to a significant degree, noting that the players say they worked hard on their papers and that there's no evidence to the contrary.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

There are more football players on a team, therefore there would be more football students. Most of Roy Williams basketball players took the classes as well. 167 men's basketball players took the fake classes over an 11 year span under Roy Williams. That is practically the whole basketball team every year under him.

Well, as I said above, there is no issue with taking a paper class. The issue is with someone changing or doing your work. The question I think is how often that happened and to whom?

From the report: "over 3,100 students received one or more semesters of deficient instruction and were awarded high grades that often had little relationship to the quality of their work."

That's embarrassing to the university, but is deficient instruction or low relationship of grades to work an NCAA violation? I don't know, although I would guess that it is not.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

Maybe LOIC I guess? But not the same as the instances of changing grades or doing work for the student (fraud).

 

[meanjoegreen]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

There are more football players on a team, therefore there would be more football students. Most of Roy Williams basketball players took the classes as well. 167 men's basketball players took the fake classes over an 11 year span under Roy Williams. That is practically the whole basketball team every year under him.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it was 167 enrollments (i.e. classes taken). Not 167 players.

That is what I meant. If you look up I changed it before you wrote that. I guess you weren't the bearer of bad news after all.

 

[The Commish]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

There are more football players on a team, therefore there would be more football students. There were 167 enrollments for the men's basketball team for fake classes under Roy Williams in an 11 year span. When you think about how many players are on a basketball team, that is most of the team.

ok? Throw the book at them if they find that the basketball players (or any student athlete for that matter) were given special privilege over everyone else who took the class. I have no problem with that. Problem is, the report doesn't say that, so they're going to have to use something more than the report to make that case. Them enrolling isn't a crime or against NCAA rules.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

There are more football players on a team, therefore there would be more football students. There were 167 enrollments for the men's basketball team for fake classes under Roy Williams in an 11 year span. When you think about how many players are on a basketball team, that is most of the team.

ok? Throw the book at them if they find that the basketball players (or any student athlete for that matter) were given special privilege over everyone else who took the class. I have no problem with that. Problem is, the report doesn't say that, so they're going to have to use something more than the report to make that case. Them enrolling isn't a crime or against NCAA rules.

Right.

See, to me, the most interesting results will be for case 3 in my list above. There is nothing wrong, rules-wise, with having paper classes or steering athletes into them(1 and 2). And there are clearly violations for changing grades and committing fraud (4 and 5). But the case that seems to come up most often (again, most often) in the report is number 3, Crowder giving them better grades than you would think they deserved. That's not too hard to "prove" in the court of public opinion, although surely reasonable people may disagree on what constitutes a C and what constitutes a B-. But I think in a real court, or even the NCAA "court," it would be harder to nail down with certainty. You almost would have to read most/all the other papers to get an idea for the reasonable grade. Of course, if all the papers in the class, athlete or not, were graded by Crowder with super easy grades, that's really hard to do.

Should be interesting to see how they handle it. I'm wondering if the Freeh report at PSU becoming such a big fight will cause them to ignore the Wainstein report completely and do their own investigation? And how long would that take?

 

[BassNBrew]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

Also, the idea that the NCAA is the only thing that can damage UNC is silly. The reputation of the school and the athletic department has taken a beating well beyond the allegations in the report, mostly because of Willingham and the reporters that have run with her accounts. It's given them enough bad press to last a lifetime, probably had a negative impact on applications and maybe even post-graduation hiring, athletic recruiting, and who knows what else. It's disingenuous to ask why UNC alums/fans care about her apparent lack of credibility given the damage she's done.

Not true on the applications Tobias. One senior I know at a very good high school with an A- gpa, AP classes, and activities out the wazoo (both athletic and social) was just denied admission. I'm amazed a how competitive admission is at UNC and State isn't that far behind. This bad press has had zero impact on the quantity or quality of incoming freshman imo.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

Also, the idea that the NCAA is the only thing that can damage UNC is silly. The reputation of the school and the athletic department has taken a beating well beyond the allegations in the report, mostly because of Willingham and the reporters that have run with her accounts. It's given them enough bad press to last a lifetime, probably had a negative impact on applications and maybe even post-graduation hiring, athletic recruiting, and who knows what else. It's disingenuous to ask why UNC alums/fans care about her apparent lack of credibility given the damage she's done.

Not true on the applications Tobias. One senior I know at a very good high school with an A- gpa, AP classes, and activities out the wazoo (both athletic and social) was just denied admission. I'm amazed a how competitive admission is at UNC and State isn't that far behind. This bad press has had zero impact on the quantity or quality of incoming freshman imo.

Whoa. Stop the world, I want to get off. Did you just say something mostly complimentary about North Carolina State university??

*texts BnB to tell him his FBG logon has been hacked...

 

[BassNBrew]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

Also, the idea that the NCAA is the only thing that can damage UNC is silly. The reputation of the school and the athletic department has taken a beating well beyond the allegations in the report, mostly because of Willingham and the reporters that have run with her accounts. It's given them enough bad press to last a lifetime, probably had a negative impact on applications and maybe even post-graduation hiring, athletic recruiting, and who knows what else. It's disingenuous to ask why UNC alums/fans care about her apparent lack of credibility given the damage she's done.

Not true on the applications Tobias. One senior I know at a very good high school with an A- gpa, AP classes, and activities out the wazoo (both athletic and social) was just denied admission. I'm amazed a how competitive admission is at UNC and State isn't that far behind. This bad press has had zero impact on the quantity or quality of incoming freshman imo.

Whoa. Stop the world, I want to get off. Did you just say something mostly complimentary about North Carolina State university??

*texts BnB to tell him his FBG logon has been hacked...

50/50 I'll have a family member at State in the next 4 years and then I guess I'll have to root for their sorry #### underachieving choking team(s). One is looking at engineering and has VaTech/State/GaTech on his list in that order. One is applying to transfer to UNC/State in that order if he drops out of D1 soccer. The youngest has pretty decent odds of playing ACC D1 soccer and his wish list is Wake/UNC/State/Clemson in that order. Going to visit the campus this weekend. When I get back to town you can hosed me down.

eta: I guess I really don't need to root for State to be a State fan, I just need to revel in anything bad at UNC.

 

[tdoss]

So we're back to the "fake classes for everyone makes it alright" defense?

 

[ConstruxBoy]

I'm not sure that's really a defense.

 

[TobiasFunke]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

Also, the idea that the NCAA is the only thing that can damage UNC is silly. The reputation of the school and the athletic department has taken a beating well beyond the allegations in the report, mostly because of Willingham and the reporters that have run with her accounts. It's given them enough bad press to last a lifetime, probably had a negative impact on applications and maybe even post-graduation hiring, athletic recruiting, and who knows what else. It's disingenuous to ask why UNC alums/fans care about her apparent lack of credibility given the damage she's done.

Not true on the applications Tobias. One senior I know at a very good high school with an A- gpa, AP classes, and activities out the wazoo (both athletic and social) was just denied admission. I'm amazed a how competitive admission is at UNC and State isn't that far behind. This bad press has had zero impact on the quantity or quality of incoming freshman imo.

Well that's good news for the university I guess- although not for your friend obviously. I hope things work out for him/her.

 

[BassNBrew]

There's no way they will just use the Wainstein Report. If that's all they use, UNC wins in a big way when it comes to athletics. That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

Also, the idea that the NCAA is the only thing that can damage UNC is silly. The reputation of the school and the athletic department has taken a beating well beyond the allegations in the report, mostly because of Willingham and the reporters that have run with her accounts. It's given them enough bad press to last a lifetime, probably had a negative impact on applications and maybe even post-graduation hiring, athletic recruiting, and who knows what else. It's disingenuous to ask why UNC alums/fans care about her apparent lack of credibility given the damage she's done.

Not true on the applications Tobias. One senior I know at a very good high school with an A- gpa, AP classes, and activities out the wazoo (both athletic and social) was just denied admission. I'm amazed a how competitive admission is at UNC and State isn't that far behind. This bad press has had zero impact on the quantity or quality of incoming freshman imo.

Well that's good news for the university I guess- although not for your friend obviously. I hope things work out for him/her.

It's not just an isolated incident either. Several kids thinking UNC was a shoe in are having to downgrade. Heck, I even hearing about decent students getting wait listed at Wilmington and ApState doesn't take everyone who can chew gum any more because it's so tough to get into UNC and State.

It's too small of a sample size to make any conclusions, but the condo units in downtown Charlotte I lease are getting rented by mostly UNC grads going to work for the big banks. One of them was actually a former Tarheel bb player with a championship ring of some sort. Interesting enough his roommate was Duke guy and the unit was split down the middle with UNC and Duke gear.

 

[drfeelgood]

This bad press has had zero impact on the quantity or quality of incoming freshman imo.

I wouldn't have thought the academic fraud scandal would have an impact on the quality of students wanting to attend UNC. It is a great academic school regardless of the lack of character shown by many school administrators, coaches, and professors. It certainly put a stain on the school in terms of athletics and academic fraud, but it appears in regard to fake classes it was isolated to the Afro-American Studies Program.

 

[drfeelgood]

That report essentially says Crowder created "paper classes" under the AFAM department because she sympathized with students and student athletes who were struggling because they weren't prepared. The classes were for anyone/everyone to take and she ran everything from top to bottom. It also says that student athletes were advised by advisors to take the classes because word had gotten out on how easy they were. From what I remember 47 or 48% of the students that took the classes were student athletes....most of them being football players.

I think it was reported that the classes were for the athletes, and word got out about how they were fake and easy, and it spread throughout the greek system, and they told their non-greek friends. Crowder worried about all the greeks and others starting to fill up the classes. *Greeks as in fraternity and sorority, not people from Greece. lol

 

[The Commish]

So we're back to the "fake classes for everyone makes it alright" defense?

I don't think anyone is using that as a defense. It's a simple statement that these classes, while a joke, were there for everyone to take. There are few schools in the country that don't have "easy" classes. Every school I attended had them and the students knew what they were and which professors to take and yes, a ton of athletes took those classes too. I had almost the whole basketball team (over two sections) taking one of them with me while I was at WF.

 

[ConstruxBoy]

There are no easy classes at Duke

 

[TobiasFunke]

So we're back to the "fake classes for everyone makes it alright" defense?

I don't think anyone is using that as a defense. It's a simple statement that these classes, while a joke, were there for everyone to take. There are few schools in the country that don't have "easy" classes. Every school I attended had them and the students knew what they were and which professors to take and yes, a ton of athletes took those classes too. I had almost the whole basketball team (over two sections) taking one of them with me while I was at WF.

There's also nothing to "defend" any more. The AFAM problems were discovered and addressed. The people primarily responsible are long gone. There will be more strict monitoring in the future. Were it not for the faux outrage that by some amazing coincidence seems to come almost exclusively from UNC's athletic rivals and the profit-driven attacks of Mary Willingham this story would have died a long time ago.