<p>"Investigators say a former vice president and dean at a New York university forced students to cook, clean, wash clothes and chauffeur her family -- and threatened that their scholarships would be revoked if they refused.</p>
<p>An arrest affidavit unsealed by federal prosecutors this week alleges that Cecilia Chang required scholarship students at St. John's University to take out the garbage, shovel snow and cook food at her home in Queens, New York.</p>
<p>"Chang threatened the students and placed them in fear that if they refused to perform these personal services, they would lose their scholarships and be unable to attend St. John's," FBI Special Agent Kenneth F. Hosey said in the affidavit.</p>
<p>At the time, she was a vice president and dean with the authority to award scholarships, the affidavit said."</p>
<p>Even though these charges haven’t been proven yet, Chang’s track record certainly is suspect. Whenever I hear of bizarre stories like this, I have to wonder how these people look at themselves in the mirror every day. Well, as my husband often says, “It’s a big world.”</p>
<p>The abuse of power is frightening. I do some college counseling in Queens via a grant-funded program that provides private advising to young women who wouldn’t otherwise get it. St. John’s is on many of their lists. Most of the girls in my program are the first in their families to go to college; they depend on need-based and merit aid, and they would be very reluctant to speak up if someone at their college in a position of authority were to abuse that power. So stories like this one are very unsettling, and we can only assume (or at least hope) that such situations are rare.</p>
<p>Unbelieveable! Thank goodness someone was brave enough to speak out.</p>
<p>Perhaps sending her son to law school will prove to be one of her better investments - she may be needing a good lawyer for years to come with the track record she appears to have.</p>
<p>FBI normally got involved when inter-state crimes are committed. In this case, the money from the University is donated by multi-state doners, Chang embezzled the University fund, thus the investigation.</p>
<p>She embezzeled funds from a Saudi Arabian charitable foundation to the tune of $250,000.- as well as stealing university funds. Embezzlement is FBI territory.</p>
<p>WOW,that is shocking! That’s actually the college that gave me the second-best financial aid package (with lots of scholarships), so at one point I was seriously considering going there. Now I find myself wondering if I would’ve been expected to vaccuum her house if I’d gone there. Yikes.</p>
<p>What is sad is so many people like this are able to maneuver their way into top power positions without anyone stopping them. I am sure her abuse of power started long before she was in this position, she just didn’t get caught or it was pushed under the rug to avoid embarrassment. A lot of times these people are just quietly let go and given excellent recommendations so he or she can be a problem for someone else as long as it isn’t them.</p>
<p>This is so true. I know of a case where someone high up in a college embezzled money, was fired, and is now employed in a very similar position at another college - all within the past year. We can only assume the separation agreement included the first college not reporting it, or the second college did not do their due diligence in checking past employment. Either way it stinks.</p>
<p>Due to the threat of lawsuits, companies usually do not give out any type of recommendations for former employees - all they will do is confirm the dates of employment and the title.</p>
<p>Not much to sue over if you say “Our company policy is just to confirm dates of service and job title - here they are - xxxxxxxx.”</p>
<p>Maybe that is why people can continue to get jobs after they do something wrong, because potential new employers have no way of knowing about the wrongdoing.</p>