Executive's degree from Louisiana diploma mill
By Jeremy Heidt, jheidt@nashvillecitypaper.com & Chris Lewis, clewis@nashvillecitypaper.com
September 17, 2003
James McKinney thought he needed a little “extra” polish for his resume, but instead he became part of a massive fraud in academic degrees.
The two degrees McKinney claims on his resume come from Columbia State University (CSU), which has been long-exposed as a diploma mill in Louisiana. The company was shut down by federal authorities in 1998 and its founder was indicted in April for mail fraud related to the non-existent school.
McKinney, who recently took a job as vice president of operations with Nashville-based IASIS Healthcare’s hospital in Mesa, Ariz., has a track record as an executive. Most recently, he was president of Leland Medical Centers in Plano, Texas, for a year and before that he worked for American Medical International (AMI), which later became part of the No. 2 U.S. hospital owner Tenet Healthcare Corp.
To “earn” a bachelors and masters degree from Columbia State University, McKinney said he undertook an “intense curriculum” through a correspondence course. He also said was unaware the university was actually a fraud until informed by a reporter Tuesday.
Experts in the field of higher education say diploma mills are easy to spot if one uses some due diligence, but how do you tell if a graduate knew it was a fraud?
“That’s the quintessential question, but you can’t see in people’s heads,” said Dr. John Bear, a tracker of diploma mills. “CSU was one of the most flagrant. You have to question the judgment of the person for choosing this so-called school.”
Company officials at IASIS did not return calls for comment. The company’s human resource department did confirm information listed on McKinney’s resume.
In its case against the former owner and operator of Columbia State University, the U.S. Attorney’s office said Ronald Pellar, 73, set up the scam in 1996 through a business office in San Clemente, Calif. Pellar then falsely represented CSU as a government-approved university in Louisiana with a faculty and accreditation sufficient to offer degrees by mail in as little as a month.
CSU advertisements claimed students could earn a “real” college degree for a small price: $2,495 for the bachelor degree; $2,995 for a masters; and $3,295 for a doctorate. The student could also see substantial savings by purchasing a combination of degrees.
In the indictment, the FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service alleged Pellar took in more than $10 million and defrauded students by “giving the impression it was a legitimate academic institution.” Pellar, who faces a maximum potential sentence of 45 years federal prison and potential fines of $2.5 million, is currently serving 67 months for a previous conviction on federal contempt charges from an unrelated case.
McKinney said he was one of several employees to be enrolled by AMI in the supposed university.
While McKinney was truthful on his resume, some cases pose a significant challenge to both employers and academic institutions.
In December 2001, Notre Dame football coach George O’Leary made national headlines when he resigned in shame over having lied about his academic and athletic background on a resume. He claimed he had a master’s degree from New York University in 1972, when he did not.
Last year, similar revelations regarding a fake degree from CSU resulted in the early departure of the men’s soccer coach at UCLA.
Incidents like these high-profile cases are only “the tip of the iceberg” of fake degrees, counterfeit documents and outright lies, according to Bear.
Kevie Mikus, senior human resources consultant for the HR Group in Brentwood, said her consulting firm checks backgrounds carefully, including academic history listed on resumes as part of the candidate screening process.
“It really boils down to honesty and integrity issues and making sure someone has represented themselves appropriately and honestly,” Mikus said.
Unfortunately, Bear notes, pressure to have a degree often leads people to take shortcuts because “a lot of jobs’ pay scales have degrees ranks,” which pay so much per degree or level of academic attainment.
Unfortunately, many people who lie or fudge their resumes do not get caught because information is so easy to hide and rarely checked, said Dan Miller, a high-profile career consultant and owner of The Business Source in Franklin.
“The most phony degree in America right now is the MBA because it’s becoming so common,” Miller said.
Even medical credentials can be faked quite easily, according to Bear. He bought a medical degree from Harvard that is virtually indistinguishable from a genuine diploma for $39.95 over the Internet.
Verifying a degree is a relatively easy process of making a phone call, but usually people interviewing prospective employees have already made a decision to hire based on a face-to-face meeting, the experts said.
Colleges and universities that get federal funding are also bound by the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (also known as the Buckley Amendment) when it comes to disclosing information about students and alumni.
The institution is given latitude to decide what kinds of details it will release as “directory information.”
There’s also the question of a whole new spectrum of degree programs, which due to long-distance learning, don’t require physical classroom attendance for a set number of years. Many of these video, web or long-distance programs can be quite legitimate, such as The University of Phoenix, now recognized as the largest university in the U.S. because of its aggressive marketing of distance learning.
Carolyn Hadden, president of The Hadden Group in Nashville, a career placement agency said that in her 12 years in the business, she’s only come across three instances where someone has lied about their educational background. But to guard against that rare occasion, she advised employers to be diligent about check-ups.
“If they (the applicant) don’t sound very knowledgeable about their own college, of course that’s a red flag. If they can’t talk intelligently about their degree, then that’s another red flag,” she said. |
