From the Washington Post
An eight-month probe has estimated that the “shadow curriculum” that existed at the University of North Carolina from 1993 to 2011 offered a grade-point boost from phony coursework to more than 3,100 students, including a disproportionately high percentage of student-athletes.
The report, released Wednesday after an investigation led by attorney and former Department of Justice official Kenneth Wainstein, also provided the deepest reading to date on the link between student-athlete counselors and the Department of African and Afro-American Studies. In particular, it details a slide presentation to the North Carolina football staff in November 2009 that warned coaches that the “shadow curriculum” would desist because of the retirement of its designer.
One slide from the presentation noted that counselors from the Academic Support Program for Student-Athletes (ASPSA) read: “We put (athletes) in classes that met degree requirements in which:
— They didn’t go to class
The scandal involves athletes being encouraged by school officials to take these fake classes. The University has tried to shield the basketball coach by stating Roy Williams did not know about these fake classes.
The NCAA is currently performing a separate investigation.
Questions for the future.
Will UNC have to forfeit games and seasons going back 20 years including the 2005 and 2009 National Basketball Championships?
Will "graduates" who took these specific classes have their degrees stripped, forcing the, to retake courses?
Will the athletic programs face huge sanctions including loss of scholarships, ban on postseason play and even suspensions of seasons/death penalty?
I have observed denials by the UNC Cfficials while demonizing whistleblowers.
For reference- a previous cheating scandal at another university
A smaller but similar situation occurred in at the University of Minnesota involving the 1997 Final Four basketball team.
This at the time was called by the NCAA "One of the worst cheating scandals of the previous 20 years." Minnesota started punishing itself by reducing scholarships before the NCAA came down with sanctions and therefore avoided postseason bans.
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - The University of Minnesota escaped the harshest sanctions possible for widespread academic fraud in its men's basketball program because of its vigorous response to the scandal, the NCAA said.
Minnesota was slapped with four years probation and other penalties, but escaped the punishment it had feared most, a ban on postseason play.
Members of the NCAA's infractions committee said that even though the Minnesota scandal was among the most serious cases of academic fraud in 20 years, they were convinced the school was "deeply ashamed." "You have to determine whether you caught the attention of the university and whether it caught the attention of others," said committee chairman Jack Friedenthal, a law professor at George Washington University. "The University of Minnesota is and should be deeply ashamed of what happened.
I never saw anyone at the University of Minnesota blame a whistleblower.
UNC needs to face the harshest penalties by the NCAA.