2008 Woodie Awards
Video related to this article is available below.Issue date: 3/4/08 Section: News
Admissions conflicts of interest echo student loans | Interactive Feature
Experts compare and contrast last year's student-loan crisis and the admissions world
Alyssa Schwenk
At Penn, Cuomo's investigation revealed a relationship between Penn and Citibank, which gave the University a 2-percent fee from every loan borrowed by a Penn student in the CitiAssist program. The University then redistributed the money as financial aid.
The University and the Attorney General quickly settled, with Penn agreeing to redistribute $1.6 million to students who had used CitiAssist loans.
After the settlement, Penn underwent a "thorough examination by our internal audit and compliance team of all departments under the [Executive Vice President] and energized the staff to be extra-diligent in managing contracts with all external vendors to ensure we were - and are - compliant" with conflict-of-interest policies, Executive Vice President Craig Carnaroli wrote in an e-mail.
"We continue to review our policies to make sure that they are in the best interests of the students," he added.
But while Penn quickly responded to the issue, one of the investigation's worst widespread effects was the shattering of the public's trust in financial-aid offices across the country.
"The consequence and the negative outcome affected everybody, and that means today families are bewildered and the nation as a whole is worse off, I believe, as a loss of that trust," said Barmak Nassirian, the deputy director of the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers.
And with many in the higher education community already wearied from Cuomo's exhaustive investigation, this recent flare in the admissions world caused some to wonder if another investigation would be needed.
A community reacts
With the publicity following the Hodara story, the reaction in the admissions community was swift and largely negative. Many saw Hodara's knowledge and positions as unfair advantages to her clients.
"It's shocking to hear. You can't do that. I worked in the Dartmouth admissions office and it would have never occurred to me. That's cheating," said Michele Hernandez, president of Hernandez College Consulting.
The University and the Attorney General quickly settled, with Penn agreeing to redistribute $1.6 million to students who had used CitiAssist loans.
After the settlement, Penn underwent a "thorough examination by our internal audit and compliance team of all departments under the [Executive Vice President] and energized the staff to be extra-diligent in managing contracts with all external vendors to ensure we were - and are - compliant" with conflict-of-interest policies, Executive Vice President Craig Carnaroli wrote in an e-mail.
"We continue to review our policies to make sure that they are in the best interests of the students," he added.
But while Penn quickly responded to the issue, one of the investigation's worst widespread effects was the shattering of the public's trust in financial-aid offices across the country.
"The consequence and the negative outcome affected everybody, and that means today families are bewildered and the nation as a whole is worse off, I believe, as a loss of that trust," said Barmak Nassirian, the deputy director of the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers.
And with many in the higher education community already wearied from Cuomo's exhaustive investigation, this recent flare in the admissions world caused some to wonder if another investigation would be needed.
A community reacts
With the publicity following the Hodara story, the reaction in the admissions community was swift and largely negative. Many saw Hodara's knowledge and positions as unfair advantages to her clients.
"It's shocking to hear. You can't do that. I worked in the Dartmouth admissions office and it would have never occurred to me. That's cheating," said Michele Hernandez, president of Hernandez College Consulting.
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