The famous saying “smarts get you further than money can,” may not be very accurate anymore. Most of us, when applying to college, chose to be accepted the old fashioned way. If your academics match up with the university standards, you get an acceptance letter in the mail after anxiously waiting and anticipating the institution’s answer. Others of us have our parents/guardians pay thousands of dollars for an acceptance letter, only to later pay thousands more dollars in tuition.
If this scenario sounds familiar, it’s actually a recent thing that happened. Lori Loughlin, better known as Aunt Becky of the TV series “Full House,” has had two daughters go through high school, both of which are now in college. Both girls attend University of California. Loughlin’s youngest daughter, Olivia Jade, is a YouTube star who started her own fashion and makeup collection with 1.9 million subscribers. Loughlin and her husband connected with a college admissions consultant, William ‘Rick’ Singer. Singer promised to guarantee admission into USC for both daughters as recruits for the crew team, although neither participated in sports. Their parents sent $200,000 per daughter through his non-profit, plus another $50,000 per kid to USC senior associate athletic director Donna Heinel. After sending the money to Singer, he set up fake athletic pages to get the girls admitted, according to the feds, he only required pictures of the girls using ergometers, meters that measure the work someone has put in exercising.
As if this wasn’t a big enough scandal, federal prosecutors indicted 33 other famous couples in a massive bribery case that the U.S. Department of Justice declared was the biggest college admissions scandal it has ever had to deal with. Between 2011 and 2019, according to websource Town and Country magazine, ‘Singer racked up on about $25 million through the scheme from big wigs in various industries including gaming executive, a Napa Valley vinter, co-chair of an international law firm, prominent Silicon Valley investor who advocates for social responsibility, and actress Felicity Huffman.’ All 33 of them paid either Singer or his close friends to help their child(ren) cheat on the ACT/SAT college admission test, or pretend to be an athlete to land a spot at one of America’s elite colleges/universities, or both.
Donating a building or donating to the schools’ scholarship funding is one thing, but committing deception and fraud to admit your child(ren) into school is completely different. Especially when they don’t actually care about attending school for higher education in the first place, according to Jade. While vlogging on her YouTube channel, Jade said that she didn’t care much about school, but wanted the experience of college parties, and would continue her channel no matter what. Which seems like a rather silly thing to be investigated for; ‘parents pay to get their child into college, child couldn’t care less.’
We’re not completely sure whether or not these celebrities will actually be locked up for fraudulent activities, but one thing is certain: their careers are over.
