BUZZ

UNC Spent $500K-Plus For PR Help After Academic Fraud Scandal

Posted on June 10, 2013
By College Fix Staff
Share to:
More options
Email Reddit Telegram

The University of North Carolina has spent more than $500,000 for public relations assistance in the wake of its academic fraud scandal, the Charlotte Observer reports.

Three weeks before a former governor would announce in a report that UNC Chapel Hill’s academic fraud scandal stretched as far back as the mid-1990s, a trio of public relations experts readied Chancellor Holden Thorp as part of a four-hour prep session that included handling likely questions from reporters.

It was part of a public relations and communications effort that ultimately cost the university more than $500,000 over the past two years.

The Fleishman-Hillard firm received $367,000 for 22 months of work; Doug Sosnik, a political consultant who is also a National Basketball Association official, received $144,000 for 10 months work; and Sheehan Associates of Washington, D.C., received nearly $20,000 for work performed on “two occasions,” a university official said.

The university’s privately funded foundation is picking up the tab.

Read more from the Observer here.
As The College Fix reported in August, the academic fraud took place solely in the African and Afro-American studies department, largely from summer 2007 to summer 2011.
The department was responsible for 54 no-show and fraudulent classes. 67% of the classes were made up of student athletes—most were football players. Classes were either taught “aberrantly” or “irregularly,” the university admitted, following its own investigation in to the matter. The ugly details include unauthorized grade changes, forged faculty signatures on grade rolls, and limited or no class time.
For more about the scandal, click here.