Does anyone from the Suffiend community have additional context on what’s happening here?
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Headmaster Charlie Cahn of Suffield Academy in Connecticut on leave amid IRS investigation, school email says**
The headmaster at a prep school in Connecticut is part of an Internal Revenue Service investigation and is on a leave of absence, according to an email sent Thursday by Suffield Academy officials.
Charlie Cahn has been head of school since July 2004, according to his LinkedIn page.
An email addressed to the “Suffield Academy Community” on behalf of the school’s Board of Trustees said that on Wednesday, they “became aware of an investigation by the Internal Revenue Service involving Charlie Cahn.”
“We are cooperating fully with the investigation,” the email said. “Effective immediately, Charlie is on a leave of absence.”
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I guess we have figured it out… .headline should be sufficient (it may be paywalled)… and I am sure FAR more articles to come..it is…not good and more schools may be involved it seems. This is going to be a scandal and a half.
From today’s globe:
Chen and Chang [her husband] run admissions business — XueMei Education in Shanghai (and Boston).
“Chen and her husband, Henry Chang, promised they could personally lobby admissions directors and headmasters at selective American boarding schools to “ensure admission” for their customers’ children.”
Can you summarize? The article you linked is behind a paywall.
Basically looks like Chen, a Suffield board member, ran a high-end admissions company in China that was listed publicly in China for awhile - at that point the company made a lot of public promises about ensuring admissions to prep schools and touted her access to heads of school etc etc.
“At least half a dozen times, beginning in 2018, Cahn headlined events organized by XueMei in China, according to the company. During presentations at luxury hotels, including the Mandarin Oriental and the Four Seasons in Hong Kong, he spoke to parents and students about Suffield’s academic programs, campus renovations, and fund-raising. Before one event, XueMei said that Cahn would conduct one-on-one interviews with prospective applicants.”
Obviously heads go to China all the time and schmooze with rich people, it is their job, but I am guessing there were tax and reporting shenanigans. AND the fact she was on his board is conflict of interest that shouldn’t have been IMO (having served on an independent school board).
She is no longer on the board.
No details of exact IRS investigation in article though.
Article also mentions that Milton admissions officers were also on her company’s website (though that, in and of itself, doesn’t really mean much to me).
(and sorry, I didn’t think I was a logged in and it was paywalled for sure - I don’t think it is reported elsewhere yet)
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also if you google, the AI overview already will steal the summary from globe.
If you wait 2 days I suspect way more press will pick this up - great click-bait I would think - very wealthy Chinese families, prep schools, etc.
There is definitely an issue with the governance of the school if a Board member was running a business that profited from access to the school. That, however, doesn’t answer the questions about why Cahn resigned or the IRS investigation. I’m not going to speculate about what happened, but the Board should have raised questions about this long ago. I wouldn’t want to be one of the other Board members who has to face questions about why they ignored this for so long.
100% agree on all counts.
The fact she resigned from board and the same time he left is a VERY strong indication to me this is all connected. Odds against are awfully small (though not 0 I suppose).
Also, globe has 3 unique articles on this, the author seems “on it” so more to come I am SURE.
Daily globe update (these are all front page stories!)
Cahn apparently went missing for 2 days before his leave of absence as announced. The school called the Police and a missing persons case was opened as officials at the school couldn’t find him - sounds like he was AWOL. Not really anything else new in the article.
I won’t update again unless real update - people can obviously google if interested - but strange times over there.
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