<p>I am probably going to get a lot of crap for posting this, but I just want to make sure that Rutgers students know who is going to be among their classmates next year. More importantly, since all public education with in-state tuition is at least partially subsidized by tax-payers, I think it’s important that NJ residents know what their tax dollars are paying for.</p>
<p>I am a senior at a public high school in North Jersey. I was accepted at Rutgers with a Presidential Scholarship, but decided not to attend in favor of a much smaller school located out of state. This other school does not have as generous merit aid as Rutgers, but is a much better fit for me. I do sometimes regret my decision, and I hold Rutgers in the highest regard. </p>
<p>The junior class in my high school is extremely competitive, and this winter, several top-ranked students in that class (who also had impressive extracurricular activities and SAT scores to boot) were found to have hacked into the school grading system over the course of several months, not only improving their grades but also lowering the grades of other students to improve their class rank. What they did was not a temporary lapse–it required several months of planning and took quite a bit of time. In addition to their access to grade information, they were also able to access information about teachers’ bank accounts and other personal accounts. Needless to say, they were suspended from school indefinitely and also had legal action brought against them (not quite sure of the outcome there). </p>
<p>Regardless of their actions, however, these students were all accepted into the Rutgers Business School to start in the fall of 2011 and graduate in the class of 2015, a year ahead of their classmates. I am not sure if they are earning their GEDs or not, but at this point they will not have any sort of high school degree by the time that they enter Rutgers. Moral of the story to their high school classmates: If you cheat and break laws, you can enter college early. </p>
<p>The point I’m trying to make here: unfortunately, these are the kind of students that Rutgers is accepting. When schools accept students based solely on GPA and SAT scores, this type of thing happens.</p>
<p>Web espionage is a really valuable skill that is only bound to increase in the future. I mean, Mark Zuckerberg is worth upwards of $13 billion right now, and he started FB after hacking a school’s infrastructure. And Julian Assange made the public question the actions of world superpowers. Honestly, how informative is a number like a GPA when compared to a proven ability to orchestrate the infiltration of a system? Its crummy that they lowered the other kids’ scores, but a). if I know I earned an A in a course and I get a piece of paper that says I have a C, I am for sure gonna raise hell until it is corrected b). never under estimated that the human is a social creature, their actions may come back to haunt them sooner than later and c). Ethics is usually either lesson 1 or 2 in most business courses today, their ears will be bleedin’ soon enough.</p>
<p>I am going to the Rutgers Business School as well, and I look forward to studying with these hackers. If somebody is smart enough to hack into the schools machines, they must know something we do not.</p>
<p>Yes, it is a crime. But personally, it’s a white collar crime which I only think brings out their intelligence. I would even press to say that if they managed to rob a bank through hacking the inter-webs I would be even more impressed.</p>
<p>By the way. These hackers who you probably consider criminals get the best jobs. Companies want these hackers to work for them so they could protect the company against other hacker organizations. And their paychecks, let’s just say it’s in the six figures if they are good.</p>
<p>Rutgers realizes the potential to be had here, so why not take it? All press is good press, and these students are just that.</p>
<p>Not Haddonfield. I’m almost tempted to say which school it is because for the massive administrative oversights that allowed this to occur, negative publicity is probably just punishment. There was really no publicity with this problem at all save a small article in our local Patch saying the technology system had been breached, which is a real shame.</p>
<p>As for the rest of you–I’m sorry for posting this here. I forgot I was on College Confidential, land of ruthless ambition. </p>
<p><em>I</em> don’t care how much money they make or how much they “succeed” in life. I’m going to become a poor history teacher because I’m doing what I love, what is right, and what will help others. I am going to be perfectly happy. I just warn individuals who are applying to Rutgers however, and basically anyone from NJ that sees this, that our state flagship is completely unaccountable as far as accepting quality applicants. For all of the individuals who say that hacking/cheating is a skill that makes an applicant attractive to a university–why does community service matter so much to applicants to top schools (You know, those that, unlike Rutgers, actually look at activities and personal references?) </p>
<p>And for the person who asked about the records and the school removing it–all Rutgers asks to confirm from a high school applicant is their SAT scores. Grades are self-reported. No letters of recommendation are asked for or even accepted if sent. I can’t remember if disciplinary action is asked about on the application, but it’s not easy to lie, especially for these individuals. Rutgers has no accountability with its acceptances.</p>
<p>While I am not particularly excited as others may be about studying alongside these students (and within a school which would allow it), I’ve witnessed countless examples of cheating and overall lack of integrity already - this just goes a big step further in that direction. :/</p>
<p>What confuses me is that the high school will have to send a legit transcript at some point so Rutgers can confirm that the self-reported scores are accurate. At that point, wouldn’t the school be able to notify Rutgers of this oversight?</p>
<p>1) The students had “impressive extracurricular activities and SATs” as you have mentioned. These students were definitely intelligent and smart, and so would have been accepted to Rutgers even if this issue of hacking hadn’t happened. </p>
<p>2) Were the administrators and the bank officials eating peanuts when these students committed their act? How can these students do all these hacking and officials do not have even a slightest inkling?</p>
<p>3) Rutgers has self-reporting grade at the time of application. Later, if the student gets accepted, Rutgers requests an official verified transcript from the high school. May be if these students falsified their grades etc. on transcripts, they would be caught when a verified official transcript is requested from the school (as Koto pointed out).</p>
<p>4) Just personally, I feel that this students should get a chance to correct or rectify themselves. Suspending and jeopardizing their whole life is not the answer to the issue. These students should be given a chance to correct themselves because they might have hacked under pressure of college admissions etc.</p>
<p>Actually, community service is only looked for when graduating from high school. Top schools like Harvard and Yale don’t give a rats ass about how you helped your local homeless shelter. They just want to see you juggle multiple things at once. They are elitists, with good reason. When looking for graduate school, no co-curricular activities matter. Your GPA and test scores do, however. That is all they look at. </p>
<p>I am glad you are going into the profession that you love, but so are these hackers. You are giving back to the community, but they are too. It just isn’t as overt.</p>
<p>Just wondering, jp, how are they (covertly…?) giving back to the community?</p>
<p>I would agree with collegebiomed that we don’t know any qualifying information about these students and that perhaps there was some sort of immense pressure on them to succeed, but that doesn’t excuse their behavior altogether.</p>
<p>Rutgers accepts students based off their application, and I’m sure they didn’t put on the application that they hacked into their schools grading system. I don’t think they do any sort of background check, but if Rutgers finds out about it after they are accepted and they didn’t mention it then that could be reason to expel them.</p>
<p>OP’s complaint is Rutgers simplified admission criteria of GPA and SAT allows fraudsters in.
But how about these schools famous for scrutinizing essays? Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford…</p>
<p>Any institution (college, bank, government) is at risk of fraud. When people sign the line that says he/she is truthful, there is a moral and ethical obligation to be truthful.</p>
<p>Yeah, cheating is disappointing and it doesn’t just begin when you get to college, nor does it end there. You can only try to live up to your own moral standards and hopefully you can sleep well at night. Sometimes you will win because of it, and sometimes you will lose to the cheater. Just try to keep it all in perspective. And that’s my parental advice for the day.</p>
<p>I would beg to differ with this statement because Rutgers denies those who have lied on their preliminary applications. If the score and gpa does not match what the applicant initially put down, they are immediately denied. The only reason Rutgers uses this system is because they get many applications and they need to cut down the number of applications to read. They believe that if the student truly has an interest to go to the school, they will be honest about their academic and score records. Rutgers proudly tells everyone that this system has worked for them and they have only had two people lie since they started this system.</p>