[Genuine Realist]

We will see how this all plays out.  Cooperation should buy him a more lenient sentence than what he would have otherwise gotten, but that doesn't mean he should get a more lenient sentence than everyone else.  I presume he will have a lot of counts to answer for.  I'm curious what the lawyers here think.

BC

Vandemoer, 41, pleaded guilty Tuesday in Boston to one count of conspiracy to commit racketeering. In his plea agreement, prosecutors and his attorney agreed to recommend a prison sentence of 18 months.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/nation/artic...682141.php

Agreed to a prison term of 18 months?!? WOW!

At that rate, the water polo coach and the associate AD at SC will be in for decades.

That's somewhat misleading. Parole eligibility occurs after you've served one-third of the sentence, or six months. It might also be a maximum of 18 months. Journalists almost never get that right.

It showed up a few years ago when that Reddit founder committed suicide after being caught doing massive theft of intellectual property at MIT. His family computed up the maximum sentence he faced and did a real propaganda number that he was being punished in draconian fashion. The reality was, after sentencing guidelines and good time came into play, he figured do to about 90-120 days in stir. It doesn't seem like a reason for suicide to me.

Manafort, by the way, figures to be out in 16 months after his first Federal sentence.

---

I realize that this wasn't the focus of the investigation, but one paragraph caught my eye:

“There is a front door which means you get in on your own,” Singer said. “The back door is through institutional advancement, which is 10 times as much money. And I’ve created this side door in.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/12/heres-ho...orked.html

Singer created the side door, and he (and the parents and coaches) will be punished for it.  But isn't the back door illegitimate as well?  Doesn't it give one pause that a mega-donor can get less-qualified applicants admitted?  Or is it more or less acceptable compared with the "side door options" created by Singer?

That may not have been the focus of the investigation, it certainly has been a focus of the media coverage.

How often the backdoor is used, and at what dollar level, is hard to dig out because schools don't talk about it. It's quite clear it happens at some level, and moderately clear that the more established the school the fewer are allowed in this way and at higher costs.

Whether you think it is legitimate probably tends to depend upon your outlook generally.

Arguments against include:
- it offends one's sense of fairness
- it is bad public relations for the university because of exactly this rich people get everything theme
Arguments for include:
- these are private entities allowed to choose who attends - in a general sense no university is required to choose students with the highest grades and test scores they can get to attend (though most do)
- the funds from one such admit can go along way to supporting the other ... 1599 admits (or so)
- there are many private schools (not Stanford) struggling to keep the doors open and staff paid. Perhaps keeping the place afloat is worth a fairness hit for a handful of applicants.


There seems to be scores of commentaries already published along the lines that this is no different from other advantages that wealthier students are well known to have; some going so far to state that it is the equivalent of hiring an SAT tutor.
hmmmmm.

I'm not big on the existence of White privilege generally, but this is core stuff. Pretty poor.

---

I realize that this wasn't the focus of the investigation, but one paragraph caught my eye:

“There is a front door which means you get in on your own,” Singer said. “The back door is through institutional advancement, which is 10 times as much money. And I’ve created this side door in.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/12/heres-ho...orked.html

Singer created the side door, and he (and the parents and coaches) will be punished for it.  But isn't the back door illegitimate as well?  Doesn't it give one pause that a mega-donor can get less-qualified applicants admitted?  Or is it more or less acceptable compared with the "side door options" created by Singer?

That may not have been the focus of the investigation, it certainly has been a focus of the media coverage.

How often the backdoor is used, and at what dollar level, is hard to dig out because schools don't talk about it. It's quite clear it happens at some level, and moderately clear that the more established the school the fewer are allowed in this way and at higher costs.

Whether you think it is legitimate probably tends to depend upon your outlook generally.

Arguments against include:
- it offends one's sense of fairness
- it is bad public relations for the university because of exactly this rich people get everything theme
Arguments for include:
- these are private entities allowed to choose who attends - in a general sense no university is required to choose students with the highest grades and test scores they can get to attend (though most do)
- the funds from one such admit can go along way to supporting the other ... 1599 admits (or so)
- there are many private schools (not Stanford) struggling to keep the doors open and staff paid. Perhaps keeping the place afloat is worth a fairness hit for a handful of applicants.


There seems to be scores of commentaries already published along the lines that this is no different from other advantages that wealthier students are well known to have; some going so far to state that it is the equivalent of hiring an SAT tutor.
hmmmmm.

I'm of a different mind about that. The street wisdom up in the Hillsborough/San Mateo area is that $10,000,000 gets your child into Stanford. I don't have that sort of means, but if I did give a donation of that size, you're damn straight I'd expect my child to be fast tracked. I'm not going to give that sort of support and end up in the same queue as everyone else. Fair's fair.


HOWEVER, I'd also expect my kid was presenting a competitive application, one that can stand comparison with the rest of the candidates. Fair is fair in that sense, too. Where the prosecution takes on legs here is the phony resume and fraudulent applications - frauds in which the actual admissions offices are not involved. It's one thing to put a big red check on an application that has some merit, an open quid-pro-quo, quite another to pony up an application that has no basis in reality.

Dershowitz's article is one of his better ones. He's curious how the kids admitted fraudulently actually performed against the 'real' matriculates. That is an interesting question.

[Genuine Realist]

We will see how this all plays out.  Cooperation should buy him a more lenient sentence than what he would have otherwise gotten, but that doesn't mean he should get a more lenient sentence than everyone else.  I presume he will have a lot of counts to answer for.  I'm curious what the lawyers here think.

BC

Vandemoer, 41, pleaded guilty Tuesday in Boston to one count of conspiracy to commit racketeering. In his plea agreement, prosecutors and his attorney agreed to recommend a prison sentence of 18 months.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/nation/artic...682141.php

Agreed to a prison term of 18 months?!? WOW!

At that rate, the water polo coach and the associate AD at SC will be in for decades.

That's somewhat misleading. Parole eligibility occurs after you've served one-third of the sentence, or six months. It might also be a maximum of 18 months. Journalists almost never get that right.

It showed up a few years ago when that Reddit founder committed suicide after being caught doing massive theft of intellectual property at MIT. His family computed up the maximum sentence he faced and did a real propaganda number that he was being punished in draconian fashion. The reality was, after sentencing guidelines and good time came into play, he figured do to about 90-120 days in stir. It doesn't seem like a reason for suicide to me.

Manafort, by the way, figures to be out in 16 months after his first Federal sentence.

---

I realize that this wasn't the focus of the investigation, but one paragraph caught my eye:

“There is a front door which means you get in on your own,” Singer said. “The back door is through institutional advancement, which is 10 times as much money. And I’ve created this side door in.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/12/heres-ho...orked.html

Singer created the side door, and he (and the parents and coaches) will be punished for it.  But isn't the back door illegitimate as well?  Doesn't it give one pause that a mega-donor can get less-qualified applicants admitted?  Or is it more or less acceptable compared with the "side door options" created by Singer?

That may not have been the focus of the investigation, it certainly has been a focus of the media coverage.

How often the backdoor is used, and at what dollar level, is hard to dig out because schools don't talk about it. It's quite clear it happens at some level, and moderately clear that the more established the school the fewer are allowed in this way and at higher costs.

Whether you think it is legitimate probably tends to depend upon your outlook generally.

Arguments against include:
- it offends one's sense of fairness
- it is bad public relations for the university because of exactly this rich people get everything theme
Arguments for include:
- these are private entities allowed to choose who attends - in a general sense no university is required to choose students with the highest grades and test scores they can get to attend (though most do)
- the funds from one such admit can go along way to supporting the other ... 1599 admits (or so)
- there are many private schools (not Stanford) struggling to keep the doors open and staff paid. Perhaps keeping the place afloat is worth a fairness hit for a handful of applicants.


There seems to be scores of commentaries already published along the lines that this is no different from other advantages that wealthier students are well known to have; some going so far to state that it is the equivalent of hiring an SAT tutor.
hmmmmm.

I'm not big on the existence of White privilege generally, but this is core stuff. Pretty poor.

---

I realize that this wasn't the focus of the investigation, but one paragraph caught my eye:

“There is a front door which means you get in on your own,” Singer said. “The back door is through institutional advancement, which is 10 times as much money. And I’ve created this side door in.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/12/heres-ho...orked.html

Singer created the side door, and he (and the parents and coaches) will be punished for it.  But isn't the back door illegitimate as well?  Doesn't it give one pause that a mega-donor can get less-qualified applicants admitted?  Or is it more or less acceptable compared with the "side door options" created by Singer?

That may not have been the focus of the investigation, it certainly has been a focus of the media coverage.

How often the backdoor is used, and at what dollar level, is hard to dig out because schools don't talk about it. It's quite clear it happens at some level, and moderately clear that the more established the school the fewer are allowed in this way and at higher costs.

Whether you think it is legitimate probably tends to depend upon your outlook generally.

Arguments against include:
- it offends one's sense of fairness
- it is bad public relations for the university because of exactly this rich people get everything theme
Arguments for include:
- these are private entities allowed to choose who attends - in a general sense no university is required to choose students with the highest grades and test scores they can get to attend (though most do)
- the funds from one such admit can go along way to supporting the other ... 1599 admits (or so)
- there are many private schools (not Stanford) struggling to keep the doors open and staff paid. Perhaps keeping the place afloat is worth a fairness hit for a handful of applicants.


There seems to be scores of commentaries already published along the lines that this is no different from other advantages that wealthier students are well known to have; some going so far to state that it is the equivalent of hiring an SAT tutor.
hmmmmm.

I'm of a different mind about that. The street wisdom up in the Hillsborough/San Mateo area is that $10,000,000 gets your child into Stanford. I don't have that sort of means, but if I did give a donation of that size, you're damn straight I'd expect my child to be fast tracked. I'm not going to give that sort of support and end up in the same queue as everyone else. Fair's fair.


HOWEVER, I'd also expect my kid was presenting a competitive application, one that can stand comparison with the rest of the candidates. Fair is fair in that sense, too. Where the prosecution takes on legs here is the phony resume and fraudulent applications - frauds in which the actual admissions offices are not involved. It's one thing to put a big red check on an application that has some merit, an open quid-pro-quo, quite another to pony up an application that has no basis in reality.

Dershowitz's article is one of his better ones. He's curious how the kids admitted fraudulently actually performed against the 'real' matriculates. That is an interesting question.