<p>"A student who, swept up in an admissions frenzy, resorts to bending the rules to secure a spot among the elite." A fascinating tale of deception and discovery, plus info on five other Ivy impostors.</p>
<p>Yale</a> Daily News - The man who duped the Ivy League</p>
<p>I can't believe there's someone like him in the world. CRAZY!</p>
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[quote]
“None of this would have happened without Victor at all,” Maharaj said after his sentencing. </p>
<p>He’s right, in a way. If his ex-boyfriend had not reported him, his forged application may never have been exposed, and he could have walked away from Yale in a commencement gown instead of handcuffs.</p>
<p>“If there was anything to find out, no one would have found out about it,” he said. “Trust me, no one would have found out. I had a year left. It was done. It was done.”
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Wow. I had not heard of the girl from MT. It's crazy that someone would go to such lengths to get into Ivy League....</p>
<p>There are more nutcases and fearless people out there than you can imagine.</p>
<p>Some are more stupid than others. I can't believe that you would tell anyone if you'd been able to pull this off. </p>
<p>The guy mentioned at the end of the article who got into Princeton was discovered because someone who ran against him in high school recognized him at a track meet, IIRC.</p>
<p>at least he worked for the A's when he was there.</p>
<p>. .</p>
<p>MT= Montana, so I think butternut is referring to the girl who wanted to go to harvard and assumed a different identity.</p>
<p>Strange...I know someone who is quoted in the article!</p>
<p>Yeah, I meant Montana, just didn't feel like writing it out. :p</p>
<p>its amazing that he got so close to succeeding</p>
<p>Absolutely amazing:
"He is Akash Maharaj, once a junior in Morse College, now a convicted felon. Kicked out of Yale College in the summer of 2007 for forging his application, he now faces five years of probation during which he must pay Yale over $31,000, for scholarships he stole — or else serve three years in jail."</p>
<p>Why on Earth would you call them "nutcases?" They are trying to steal a valuable commodity...and often just for the love of learning. That's my opinion, of course, but Akash was actually a brilliant playwright at Yale. He did well compared to many students who were "officially" admitted.</p>
<p>I agree that "nutcase" isn't the right word.
Sociopath is.
There are many things I'd love to have, but I'm not going to forge and lie about my whole life in order to get those things.</p>
<p>Makes you wonder about the possible hundreds of people that got away with it.</p>
<p>Personally, I think the real admissions 'fraud' regarding the Ivies have to do with completely mediocre students who get admitted just because they happen to have powerful connections. Best example: George Bush, who, by his own admission, was a completely unmotivated and lackluster student, yet still got into Yale and then, despite not even being able to get into the University of Texas Law School, still somehow got into Harvard Business School, because he is a scion of a powerful political family. Lest that be taken as a partisan statement, one need only consider Al Gore, who barely graduated in the top half of his high school class (25 out of 51), yet still got into Harvard, almost certainly because his father just happened to be Senator of Tennessee Al Gore Sr. Furthermore, of Gore's children, Karenna, Kristin, Sarah, and Al Gore III, all four went to Harvard. Now, granted, I can agree that they're probably intelligent, motivated and well-educated people, but for all four to get into Harvard doesn't seem like a coincidence. After all, we can all surely think of quite a few highly intelligent and highly motivated students who couldn't get into Harvard. But all 4 of Gore's kids did. </p>
<p>Gore's</a> Grades Belie Image of Studiousness (washingtonpost.com)</p>
<p>Hence, it's rather hard for me to get too upset over a guy who bent the rules to get into an Ivy, when, frankly, the rules themselves are unfair. As things stand now, those who have the mere luck to be born to powerful families enjoy a significant admissions advantage over those who don't have that luck.</p>
<p>Fraud, forgery and theft are not "bending the rules." Don't try this at home kids.</p>
<p>This was like reading an insane soap opera.</p>
<p>The students in the article made up their identities and forged their records. However, you must take everyone's competitive spirit into account. Almost everyone in the nation wants to go to an Ivy League university out east, as shown by the admissions rates. Yes, this was wrong, but it happened.</p>
<p>Sometimes, people want to attain their goals anyway possible. It's just a matter of, as some people might say, "doing the right thing."</p>
<p>I'm not sure what your point is nhsharvard...</p>
<p>You are right, it happened. Is there a moral here? Or is it like the song that plays about 3x per hour on hit radio currently "you're not sorry, you're just sorry you got caught".</p>
<p>I read the News article. The fraudulent student never once communicates a sense of remorse, or even cops to doing <em>anything</em> wrong.</p>
<p>Sociopath is exactly the right word.</p>
<p>I'm actually more bothered by the quote from the Yale student: “Didn’t we all exaggerate on our applications to some extent?”
am I just being anal, or is exaggerating an application a form of dishonesty? I hope there aren't too many students at elite universities who think that's acceptable.</p>