Kind of a busy day for a Monday. Kudos to Morlin and the S-R for moving a lot of big stories today. Getting that diploma mill list was a real coup, not to mention a public service.

I noted a few of the people off the WA portion of the list. I noticed a singer from my hometown with a fake high school degree.

Orrico, Stacie Joy

http://blush-response.livejournal.com/449243.html

Combing through this list is going to be a bigger workplace time sink than NCAA bracketology.

Good job.

Cite the exact authority McDevitt used to justify witholding the names.

Actually. High Schools do not award degrees. They have either diplomas or equivalancies.

Great story. This is the kind of reporting I expect from The Spokesman-Review. It's fearless public service journalism. Those of us who have no degrees, and who have had doors closed to us because of it, have only ourselves to blame I suppose but we are surely cheated of an opportunity to compete when liars make the cut with fake credentials. Those who have put in the work to get their degrees are cheated, too, when someone gets the same credit for none of the effort. The schools were cheated, the people were cheated - apparently by public servants. This whole thing stinks. I'm going to comb that list for Tennesseans.

This reporting is very irresponsible to the greater community and to the larger picture. Most of the people on that list are actually victims and have had their dreams shattered by the Randocks via their web of lies. To the consumer, Saint Regis was an accredited Liberian school. Back in 2003 if you had called the Liberian Embassy they would've verified Saint Regis was accredited. Calls to the Minster of Education's office in Liberia also verified the accreditation of Saint Regis back in 2003.

The writing of these news articles, with the immediate negative connotations prefacing everything assumes everyone on that list is crooked and the posting of the entire list leaves open for witch hunts. The list doesn't show the people that never used the Saint Regis degree to get a job or a promotion. That list doesn't show the people who found about Saint Regis that took the degree off their resume immediately and are embarrassed to have ever dealt with them and had gotten fooled and ripped off. The list doesn't show the people who never used Saint Regis Degree for anything whatsoever.

The writers of these articles know this but they continue to write in irresponsible manners and also went against what the Justice Department decided. The "scoop" is just to smear 10,000 victims that got ripped off to get web hits and sell newspapers and to put something in the resume of the reporters when it is all said and done.

Victims? I find it hard to believe these people are victims. Since when is it that you can get a college degree without going to college?

And I'm sorry, but Liberia's accreditation doesn't mean anything in this country.

I see no victims on that list. Just shameful fraud.

Well, as you state, Liberian Accreditation means nothing, then what is the problem then ?

And actually, you can get a college degree in the United States without ever going to college. People do it every day via complete remote classrooms across the world to utilizing the procedures of Thomas Edison State College (www.tesc.edu), Charter Oak State College (www.cosc.edu), and Excelsior (www.excelsior.com) and many others. These schools accept documented portfoliio assessment and testing methodologies for college credit. Excelsior (formerly State College of New York) used to give practically half of a Bachelor's degree for merely scoring well on the GRE exam. Sites such as www.bain4weeks.com explain ways, albeit aggressive and best case scenario ways to get a Bachelor's degree in, well, 4 weeks. Entire degrees can be completed in the United States from state schools without ever stepping foot in the classroom. It is happening right now.

What is getting lost in translation and what I object to in these articles is that this case, admitted by even the Justice Department themselves, was complicated and a well done scheme. Even the Justice Department admitted they have never worked a case this complex before. Saint Regis was a diploma mill, but it was an accredited diploma mill and fooled a lot of people. Accreditation verified by Liberian Officials up to the highest levels.

Accreditaion domestically and internationally is quite complicated for the average layman and even college officials are not up to date on some of these matters.

Throw in gullible people who have a dream to complete college, a nice pitch by the Randocks, a slick website, respectable foreign credential evaluators evaluating Saint Regis and yes you get a list of 10,000 victims. Were they all victims ? Of course not, but the way that list is presented suggests everyone is guilty of fraud and open to witch hunts, look at the comments listed here already people are fishing already.

Look how this was written in one of the articles.

Quote:

Brett C. Jarmin paid $1,041 for a bachelor of science degree in criminology and criminal justice. Jarmin had worked as chief of police in Edgemont, S.D.

Jarmin was fired in October 2000 after helping his department to unionize. He later sued Edgemont city officials, settling out of court in 2006.

His telephone number has been disconnected.

:End Quote

This says nothing that Jamin committed fraud to get the Chief of Police position nor used his Saint Regis degree at all and I am not even sure Saint Regis was around much in 2000 when he was fired for unionizing. I read that and said "So what?". That said nothing and unfortunately the majority of readers, based on the way the articles are written, will agree with you that all they see is shameful fraud. I hope in the end, people can still think for themselves and look at all of the complicated circumstances that happend for most folks, over 5 years ago.

Damn straight. Let this be a lesson to everybody. When you want the real thing, look no further than The Franklin Mint. Why, they will even provide a certificate of authenticity for your NASCAR cuckoo clock hand-painted by Thomas Kinkade.

Sid, one of those people on that list is a local school superintendent who I found via some online digging and asking around, did call himself "Dr. so-and-so"

If you knew what he did at his district, his purchasing of a degree from a diploma mill is a disgrace to the values he exhorted to his students.

Liberia?! Come on, who gets their degree from Liberia? Someone would have to be really gullible to fall for this as a trick. I'd bet 99 percent of these individuals knew they were getting fraudulent credentials, and few of them passed up the extra money and accolades. Liberia is a joke.