The disability aspect floors me. S17 has severe dyslexia (mainly the reversal aspect). We paid a good bit out of pocket and had him tested. We took his test results to the high school and they said that he did not get accommodations because “despite his demonstrated disability he has performed at too high a level to obtain services.” His reading was slow and he cannot spell but he was smart enough to work around the issues so they wouldn’t help even though they knew things would just get harder. We finally gave up on getting any accommodations and just paid to get extra help outside school. He could have done better on the ACT with more time but we couldn’t get it without thousands of dollars of additional testing that the high school suggested might cause them to rethink the issue (not even relevant to his issue). It angers me that students that need it can’t get it and those that don’t need it but have a fortune can.
Think of all the grief they could have avoided if only they had logged on to CC first!
@sevmom: “Lots of famous people have kids that went to “elite schools.” Most probably got in as competitive applicants”
Actually, I doubt that most would have gotten in where they did if everything was the same except their parents were no-names who didn’t donate anything.
In other words, their hook got them in over some other average excellent kid.
One thing that kind of leaves me in despair…there’s been a plethora of articles in the past 12 hours over “there are lots of great colleges out there” and “you can be successful without going to a top 20 college” and “don’t worry about prestige…go for the best fit” yada yada. But there’s an actual reality out there that going to one of these schools doesn’t make a kid happier or smarter BUT there’s no denying that the people you meet in college are many times friends for life and those friends do make a difference in future successes. No different than the research that came out a few years ago showing that parents have very little influence over how their children turn out BUT the neighborhood and the school and the friends that the parents choose for their kids growing up, does make a big difference. I don’t mind admitting (since we’re all anonymous here) that it would benefit even my career and that of my spouse if our kids attended Stanford or Yale or Princeton because then we would also have contact with the parents of those kids. And I offer as Exhibit A, my own brother! Who has twin daughters at Stanford even as we speak (not sailors!) and he’s made many friends of fellow parents via his kids.
(i know, this doesn’t reflect well on me…I guess i’m trying to say that i get the lure).
I have a relative in investment banking. Did not go to an ivy. Went to a pretty low ranked college that is never mentioned on CC.
There are quite a few co workers who went to the university of Arizona! They have an investment banking club which I’ve heard is very instrumental in getting these kids internships and helping them navigate getting into IB. From the University of Arizona!
It annoys me when I hear that you have to go to an ivy to get into IB. It’s actually one thing that I have personal knowledge of that is patently not true.
The more fundamental problem is the test is designed as a speed test. Almost everyone would benefit from additional time. A more fair system would either eliminate time limits for everyone or not allow time extensions for those with LDs.
Several years ago it was quite a scandal when Marilee Jones, the Dean of MIT admissions stepped down. She had misrepresented her credentials going back decades. I remember the outrage here on CC then - it had to be 2007 or 2008. I haven’t been around in years but stopped in because I knew the conversation would be going strong. And it is. 
BaseballMaven - interesting perspective. I’m not judging, but that “lure” interests me 0%.
Neither Lori Loughlin nor Mossimo Giannulli went to college, so that might have contributed to their being “out of the loop”. In a recent interview, when their daughter Olivia Jade was asked why she is going to college, she replied that “Mostly, my parents really wanted me to go because both of them didn’t go to college.”
Part of the problem here is the prevailing view by parents (and not restricted to just these indicted parents) of college admissions as fulfilling their aspirations and not just that of their children (or even more than their children since Olivia Jade apparently was not even interested in going to college).
Stanford threw the sailing coach overboard, as they should have, but they had an easier case because no Stanford student is alleged to have benefited from the scam. Some parents paid money to the sailing coach, but then their kids didn’t end up at Stanford.
I’m more interested in hearing whether USC expels Loughlin and Georgetown expels Henriquez. Those students should be gone yesterday.
@roethlisburger My comments are directed to shoring up existing system. I’m fine with extending time limits as long as the test integrity is maintained.
@BaseballMaven There is a lot of truth in what you are saying. There is no doubt that there are connections to be made from elite schools. I hope that this will open up as more and more brilliant kids are “forced” into lower ranked and state schools. Those brilliant kids are still going to achieve great things and become the next generations contacts. But yes, “connections” is one more advantage that the rich have and can give to their kids. I can live with that even though I’m not benefiting from it, as long as its not passed down through fraud.
@mdphd92 “Neither Lori Loughlin nor Mossimo Giannulli went to college”
Apparently, Mossimo dropped out of USC to found his fashion empire
Re: #952
Indeed, if the well-connected kids become less preferred at the elite schools, seeing them attend a wider range of schools would give more other college students the opportunity to make connections with them.
Many of these LDs have fuzzy diagnostic criteria. With something like ADD, where one of the main diagnostic criteria is impulsive behavior(in a teenager!), a doctor could give a LD diagnosis for the kids of most parents who asked for one without doing anything that could be criminally prosecuted.
Damn, I’m shook! what was stolen from us? POS fixer
http://www.tmz.com/videos/1_mbwkx9ji/
Another consideration is the lengths that many of these parents went through to hide from their children the help they were getting. A large donation to a college might have made that help obvious to their children.
@roethlisburger No measure will be perfect. But some posters mention mass use of false LD histories. Seems like (if true) that could be addressed. Or just extent the test time limits, that’s fine.
Just remember 700 more families to go… only going to get worse!
^^^And the rest of the schools that received donations from Singer’s foundation, it’s hard to believe that any of those will turn out to be legitimate