Economics, state and city news, immigration, law and education. In her career at the wall street journal emily is held reporting and editing positions in new york, london, pittsburgh and atlanta. Tonights featured offer, melissa korn reaches a Higher Education were reported for the wall street journal previously she wrote for dow jones newswire she is a graduate of Cornell University and the Columbia University graduate school of journalism. Also we have jennifer levitz. She is a National Reporter for the wall street journal. Previously schroepfer the providence journal. She has been a member of two Pulitzer Prize finalist teams prayed she graduated from loyola university, maryland. And theyre reviewed of unacceptable, they wrote the authors highly readable expose goes well beyond the tabloid level. A capable examination of the seeming intersection of ambition, money, and Higher Education. Library journal calls it a fastpaced account of the massive College Admission scam designed by brick. This indictment of contemporary American Culture offers an indepth look at families who were willing to break the law and ignore Ethical Principles to provide Higher Education to their children. A well researched and detailed picture of a crime emerging in an American Culture corrupted by wealth and celebrity. It is my pleasure to have them here tonight to talk about the book. With that i will pass things off to emily. Host terrific prude we are thrilled to be here tonight to talk about this captivating book. Melissa, lets start with the scam. Melissa want you start us off. How did what prosecutors call operation varsity blues work . How did masterminds think of it . Guest it was a really complex scheme, that is one of the things about it. How many parts there were two account how many people needed to be involved for it to be successful. So there is the testing part of it where rick singer paid off administrator and a proctor and had his clients get their teens attested for learning differences so they could get extended time on act or sat breed once they got extended time they could then register to take their test at these particular sites. The proctor would go after the student was done, fix some wrong answers and in some cases sit alongside the students and help the answers or in one took the test for 18 who didnt sicken another house in another state. That was a testing part. Another part was athletic recruiting and undermining that system. A singer would pitch his clients as a star athlete, soccer players, rowers, tennis players, he would have an athletic profile for them kind of a one page resume speaking about accolades and championships and things like that. Send them to a school, pay off a coach or by the coach to have that teen flagged as a recruit. And the kid would get into school because athletes could such benefit in the admissions process. Host wow that is a scam. And jennifer, what drove him . Was he trying to get rich . It wasnt Something Else . Yes rick singer was an extraordinarily competitive man. To the point that everyone we spoke to from his childhood years to college this guy just did not want to lose. He picked played pickup basketball is throwing elbows. If the Kosher Little League team, her little junior high kids he would try to run up the score by 50 points. He ran a call center and got everyone to get on the phones more and turn the place around. There was something about him and they said it was almost like his mind was tilted like a gambler. Seemed that with the parents, he took it as a personal challenge. He had these parents often just as competitive as him, come to him and it was a puzzle. His family was georgetown, the kid doesnt quite cut it here take it upon himself to do this. And i dont think it was really about money. He did become very rich. And we know bought a big house. He had a nice car and he works constantly. He just worked aroundtheclock pretty really didnt take vacations, his house it looked like he lived in it that much. He didnt hobnob, whos invited to parties and instead at nights hed be at the municipal pool doing things to get his name on the leaderboard for the most laps. She went wow thats competitive. What drives a parent to do this . Guest i thanks the culture in the community in which these parents live. Its a very strange little bubble that allows them to have a very warped view of the world. And what success was. I think a lot of these parents really had quite a short list of what acceptable destinations schools might be for their kids fraid not all of them but somewhat rooted in that part is almost a habitual view of Higher Education the idea that schools are bus without understand the nuance and how many other wonderful colleges were out there. So these that jennifer said they were competitive, that targets they wanted to meet their goals. They also were people for the most part and wanted people to help make it happen for you help to for them. And singer often came highly recommended by friends, financial fiber, neighbors his name got passed around. I do know for some of them they went to singer typically for the illicit activities. Others started on the legal side and then went over the line as they were closer and closer to college. Host wow. And jennifer how did the parents come to cross the line that melissa is talking about . Guest a really varied. Some of the parents hired singer for Legal College counseling. That went on for a good long time. Before they cross the line. In other parents really came to him almost immediately for his dark arts. [laughter] they heard about this and went past the niceties go very quickly got down to business. As far as how he got them to cross the line, some of the parents have certainly argued they were manipulated. Misled. They were confused. We do know that there were conversations where he would talk to a parent and really just paint a very grim picture of this kids chances. And of course the parents were kind of shocked because they had thought they would keep moving on these elite circles and he said no youre not getting in anywhere. And so they would come away convinced they had to do something to make their child stand out. That is what many of them have kind of said. We also know he was very emotionally intelligent. He was very good at sort of figuring out what a parent was worried about. Maybe they were worried the kid is a poor testtaker. Figuring out who might be amenable to crossing the line. Remember he had many legal clients he did not cross the line with. On the other hand, is the prosecution has pointed out this was a criminal conspiracy. You needed one person, rick singer to bribe the coaches, set up a test site. But you need the parent to write the check and do all sorts of other things ranging from flying the kids to the prep site in houston or West Hollywood to posing them on athletic equipment, making it cover stories for the school, to writing a big check. And these crimes often played out over months. I wasnt one day i just ran into a store and this lack of judgment came upon me. There are chances are for people to back out along the way. Its very interesting the decisions that people made. And we try to really get at that. Its really raised in you can see people with this. But at some point, at least the ones who pleaded guilty at some point got on board. Host rights. It is amazing. Melissa, jennifers talking im thinking of a couple of things from your book that just really stuck out. Where you show parent sort of question and or questioning the judgment when houseman is driving her daughter. Pugh tells a little bit about how that played out to the West Hollywood site . Guest hoffman was working with singer for the girls and for College Counseling. And the older daughter, she kinda has jennifer described it slowly got more and more on board the scheme. And in the day comes when she has to drive her daughter to the test site to take the test. And the daughter doesnt know anything is going big on shes going to take her sat but felicity knows that mark, this corrupt proctor is going to fix her answers after words. So they drive down from the house in the hollywood hills, the daughters nerves are taking her sat everyone is nervous she said oh maybe we can go get ice cream after . Felicity agrees but her mind is clearly elsewhere. She is thinking turn around, turn around i need to turn around. And she doesnt. And she goes and drops her daughter off at her daughter takes the test. And he fixes the answer she is a wonderful score. And theyve spoken about how awful she felt in that moment. She said her head is spinning thinking she knew it she did was wrong but she just did it just kept going. And then with her younger daughter a year later and said unit were not not doing this it just doesnt feel right. She had her husband on the scheme for the younger daughter just about a week before prosecutors were bringing the case in, about two weeks before. Host wow. Jennifer tells without arrest moment was like for the family. How did that play out . Guest still amazes me and what happens and what i would do if this was me. Basically this had been in the works for weeks. Him and kept very quiet. So the fbi, i will give you the example for los angeles that was kind of the epicenter. To the fbi there would have met in the dark very early in the morning and like the starbucks parking lot in about 13 different teams of agents. They fanned out and went to the home. The big homes behind gates long driveways and they banged on the door, fbi, they were armed. People were inside they were almost all asleep. I know one mom was in her pilates close. Maybe they were up but most were sleep and startled. They went to the door and their team of people. They cooperated, they were allowed to kind of change into sweats or jeans or something. They brought them out and put them in government sedans and took them downtown l. A. To the big federal building. They were really, this was a real exposure for them, this is criminals theres nothing spared here. It was shackles, it was brought into this Holding Cells and their photograph taken in fingerprints. Then they were put into big cells. And the men were put in one and the women were put in another. And they were given some bologna sandwiches or something for they were all sitting there and in the men sell, curious things started to happen which was a couple people started to recognize one another. There like, they really knew a couple people and then there was a doctor in there in his scrubs, then moved in emily or circles. We know that eliciting hoffman and James Buckingham are friends. Ohio, youre hereto okay. So in the mens sell, they are sitting there and some of them knew while they were there but some didnt. They did not know it they all had in common. One of the coaches spoke up and said hey you guys know rick singer . And the whole cell went quiet and everyone looked at one another. And theyre like oh my god. That is when they realize what was going on. Host s of the fbi didnt tell them when they showed up that morning for for a told him that there been charged with. There being charged with fraud. People dont really know exactly what that means. I think some of them probably knew. But remember this, some of these people years had gone by since they had done business with rick singer. Host wow. While that is an extraordinary scene. And melissa what should readers think . Maybe not show but what do you think readers will think of the parent chapter in your book, what should we make of them . I think one of the challenges in writing this book and digging into some family and notes on them was that i personally as a parent could relate to some aspects of who these people are. Not in their actions, but in their approaches and intentions perhaps, wanting to do whats best for their kids, maybe feeling insecure as a parent and have this person come second fix it all for you and wanting to rely on the experts. I think it will be too easy to outright hate these parents and say oh they all did awful things. Yes, parents have pleaded guilty to felony criminal charges. But, they all got there for some different reasons. So i think we kind of relate a little to them. I feel bad for some of them. Not too bad, but you feel a little bad for some of them. Clearly they got off track somewhere in their parenting and understanding of what was success. I think you end up getting a little angry at them. They didnt give their kids space to figure themselves out. They had such a myopic view of what their kids should look like didnt bother to let the kids good on the path on their own. They were little more overbearing than perhaps they should have been. They also just seems so focused on the facts to many of them. Which is frustrating. Teens wouldve been perfectly fine at other schools. For them to say, usc or bus tour must be georgetown things like that. So its a range of emotions. Think each parent each family story they end up with rick singer for very different reasons. Host writes, fascinating. Jennifer, what about the kids . Were any of them charge . What do they think about all of this . The u. S. Attorneys office in massachusetts, when they announced, some of the kids knew and some didnt. It was a possibility that the kids could get charged. That was march 2019. None of the kids have been charged. I personally dont think any of them well. They said it that day, the parents were the primary drivers here. Again they set it up. The kids most of them were in high school. It was very hard on the kids. We got the first interview with one of the kids. Talk about how he felt about it. It was pretty heartbreaking. Because he was a young man who was so talented already on his own. He was working so hard. Whos looking at the hct classes, had been unlike the college acacia train since the ninth grade, practicing. He also had a list of colleges that did not even include usc. He had a range of schools. There are some state schools and some private schools of environment, but he felt betrayed when this happened. His father came home that day after being in the jail cell they had to post bail. When he was in the kitchen and his father walked in. The first thing he said his father was why didnt you believe in me . Host that is heartbreaking. Guest it also shifted a little bit as he talked about it from anger to kind of feeling a little bad, feeling sad for his dad for not quite getting it. And upset with himself for not speaking up her there was not anger in that reaction. And then, when jennifer spoke to him months later, he was a little bit more time to see about a little more perspective. In a little more like thats really sad that my dad thought he needed to do that. Thought this needed the path i needed to take. Speech i think he grew up a lot from this incident. Said he realized his parents, a lot of parents in his community had been too invested in the kids lives pretty sort of gone along he was 20 now and he said he realized he was not going to do this anymore. That he was going to make his own decisions. In fact when he made a decision to speak a did not consult with the lawyers or the family representative. I had is calling get a Little Information and the lawyers like he did what . He spoke to you . Later found out the father was thinking i cant believe he did this, its a huge mistake. But they were in the story came out of his point of view is out there he was so thoughtful, they all said we were wrong. He could handle himself. I think he spoke out to prove a point. I can make a good decision you can trust me. So when thats fastening so it them wrong twice and away. Where the kids now . Guest its a range. A number of the universities kick students out once they were caught up in this. So georgetown and yale hands and furred rescinded admission offers are kicked out students who were already there. Somewhere in northwestern. At lake forest where one of the womens volleyball coach have been charged and pleaded not guilty, school, the students didnt seem to know what was up when the parents had a singer to pay the coaches alleged. The kids did not seem to know. Usc reviewed dozens of cases. Cases of the kids whose parents were charged. And also other kids too it turned out were connected to all of this even if there parents did not face criminal charges. Not everyone was kicked out of ufc. This young man that jennifer and ive been talking about, he was still there we spoke to him over the winter. Others just left voluntarily. There is been a range. Those who say that their schools had to defend themselves and sad to actually belong here my own merit. Host amidst all this, melissa tells how hard is it to get into college . I mean i know they felt they needed to do this. But did they . Guest it depends what school they wanted to go to. For the vast majority of students go to college for to admit for that college. Its not hard to get into college. Its very hard to get into certain schools. It is gotten a lot harder to get into some of those schools in the past five, ten, 15 years. Application volumes have risen, admit rates have dropped. People see that they get nervous they decide to apply to more schools. Its a vicious cycle. When youre looking at students in the 5 range, stanford, high schools are the latinos, usc is in there. It seems really daunting. So you can kind of understand why some parents think they need to kind of boost their odds a little bit. Whether its an ethics coach or paying to have their kid to go on volunteer trips further resume looking for a way to stand out imperfectly qualified applicants. The parents ticket is a new anxiety among parents of high school students. When they see those low admit rates and they hear the horror stories. 4. 5 weighted gpa didnt get in anywhere. Host jennifer, what is your sense of the high school of sending these kids to the schools. The high schools were rick singer had clients. Is there any reform happening there . Guest the high schools were interesting in this book. Because on one hand, a lot of the schools seem to almost perpetuate anxiety how many kids got into the school that met on the website. There clearly interested in tha that. They said that they told everybody doesnt matter where you go. People explore different messag message. As always this tension between the guidance counselor at the school and the private counselor that the parent would hire. That came up a number of times guidance counselor at the school they talk to a college may raise a red flag. It seems like you know johnny is applying to schools some of the schools have just said to parents, if you work with a private counselor, you cant work with us. You have to pick. We are not going to be party to something you are doing that may be sketchy. Guest to answer that a little bit pretty think some of the private schools in particular, those families are paying all this tuition to go to the high schools. The counselors, the principles the headmaster said this is what we do. Let us do it. Will help support your student. Your kid is applying to college free but some families are just like what they are hearing. They dont like it when someone has too much of a reach school perhaps. There are seven other kids in the class applying there, your odds arent that great. You need to apply to better school. The going to go until they will find somebody will tell them what they want to hear. Sue and right. Thats tough to be at. So melissa what surprise you in reporting on the story the most . Oh goodness. Im cynical by nature. So i dont know if i was surprised that there were people fighting very creative ways to get an edge here. Think part of what surprised me was first of all the complexity of the operation. The administrators the proctors coach singer had a fulltime staff. His bookkeeper, his assistance in all of that to make this work. Think the thing that really surprised me was how many close calls there were. At times when they almost got caught in the game almost came crashing down but didnt. It was surprising to learn about why they didnt. Theres often a mix of inertia and information. So usc when there were questions the person who got put in charge, into the bottom of it and figuring it out and all of that, somebody thats working with rick singer. And theres always an explanation for why that person was all on the crew team or the Baseball Team or whatever it wa was. Youre learning all these things in your thinking oh my gosh they were so close. And the fact that ultimately when this scheme got taken down it had nothing to do with singer. It led to the takedown. Host tells more about what led to the takedown. Sure. It was just a strange, unrelated case of a thought for the Security Exchange commission got a tip from an investor who is in the area. Start looking into this fraud thats very routine led them to a businessman in los angeles go to the house to get documents anyway he comes back to boston to try to make a deal and perhaps be a witness and help them expose the larger scheme in return for leniency. And during that, when that happens prosecutors want to really dig into a persons past. Because if they are going to use them as a reliable witness, they dont want anything to surprise them. Dont them to say thinkers they have to every thing as bad as done. They look at the financial records i see money moving between him and he just came out and said oh the coach at yale solicited me for a bribe to get my daughter in school. I have to pay money. So you can imagine this room and boston were the prosecutors thought they had a stock fraud case thinking doing lets hear more about that. And that got out of the room and ran down the hall to his boss and said he think we might have something very interesting here. This guy did not know rick singer. But what they did is they used him to bring in the yale coach. To set the yale coach up in boston. Got him on tape. During the course of watching that interaction he said something about rick, rick singer miss it we wonder rick singer is. So they flipped the yale coach and then they go to they get rick singer, they have him on the phone prayed they catch them, listen to his calls for a while. Rick singer in september of 2018. And confront him at a hotel in boston. And then you can kinda figure out the rest. Rick singer flips and turns over his rolodex. And there you have operation varsity blue. Host there is a chain of rats though thats amazing. It really is. I really did notice however talking when time was why the lawyers. I thought i finally understand now and mob movies have you did a crime was somebody, you really had to kill that of the person. Because they were going to slip on you. They had to disappear. Switch it this is not how the investigation usually works. Usually get the lowdown mechanical off the chain. Here you could have quickly got connie got rick singer. And he gave up these other people these other parents. Going about this criminal investigation. The u. S. Attorney massachusetts was very worried originally about rick singer because it was very risky to have your main cooperator hes a crook right . Can you trust this person . And can you believe what hes saying . And sure enough when they flip him, he goes off the rails a little bit. The first few days, they give him the burner phone whatever he set up. They go back and do your thing. Going to listen and pretty gets desperate phone, hey tips and parents off on wearing a wire, you havent done anything yet. So he takes that chance. He felt bad for some of the families. I think maybe just didnt want. He ends up, they find out pretty fast. The u. S. Attorney in boston was like get him back here now. We cannot have him out there roaming around. We need to babysit this guy. So the bring him back and they just set him up at a conference table, overlooking boston harbo harbor. And he is in there making his calls with his agent next to him doing his thing. And in his tracksuit beside them sort of walking around. People walking and when they had to go to the bathroom they walked with him. He was on a short leash after that. But then he became, probably because he so competitive he decided im going to be a witness im going to be the best witness theyve ever seen. And he made one call after another and just turned over from what i understand like 150 names. So we have like 55 people arrested. They probably could have gone further. But a guess at some point you have to decide we have to stop here. Cxr Jennifer Jennifer go back there were 150 . Guest this is what ive heard. He turned over, well over 100 names. He was going to be the best witness. So you could go after there had to be more parents. From the prosecutors point of view, you to build a case you had to have a lot of information. And they did not have it on a lot of these people. But he did give them a lot of names. We do know after this if you remember there was that day and then it seemed like a trickle of cases. We are still wondering sometimes who else is out there . And are some parents we know for instance are quite a few parents who got lawyers. Because they were kind of anticipating someone is going to come knocking i did something here. One dad, i think he came forward. Its like youve got me. He went over to the cops and said hey im involved in this. Exactly right . And so they were presumably 70 something parents out there wondering if one predawn knock on the door i saw one question are we doing questions are what are we doing . Im not sure. I do have some questions in the chat. An assemblage of other question questions . Still when i guys come back really start in with those. Subject is a couple questions in the chat. Moma sent me what was a difference of writing a fulllength book about a story like this in writing an article . This is something jennifer and i talked about a lot. As far as newspapers reporters, the longest stories are normally right are at most about 2000 words. And this was close to 100,000 words. And so very daunting. Our agent actually really helped us frame it from the very beginning before we knew how to do any of that or what it was going to look like. And then each chapter at a time we each worked on individual chapters or part of a chapter each kind of took ownership of certain families or certain characters in the book. And with each other. Many a lot of google docs. [laughter] is quite daunting at the outset. And then again at the very end kind of intimidating. But each chapter was like a couple of those really long stories. And it seemed a little less terrifying. Sue went actually. I kept thinking ahead and editor that say how do you even know, one at a time for a just break it down one chapter, im not writing an entire book today writing this. I will say, wasnt just scary was liberating in some ways our editor, you have never change right dialogue, color, seems its all fast right now the stuff is made up. We paint a full picture anyway you cant when youre limited to a few hundred words to tell the entire story. It is really interesting and fun opportunity. With very different models. Another question pray could you please give us your best tips for interviewing witnesses and sources . Guest wow. I think acknowledging to people that this coming of this is really hard. And that you are hard to talk, maybe you even feel like why should i talk . And i say this because it was true. We really want to hear your side of the story. Youre going to be in the book. You are in the files everything is written about you and the courts. Everything from these documents. But help us fill in you. Help us humanize you and present you, present the whole story. I think once we kind of did that, we did get some people to open up. It was hard. There were a number of awkward lunches or something where they would come in order and just not eat and sit there. That kind of thing. Sometimes its a matter of sitting there and letting the person slowly start to tell their story. You give a low prompt and they would open up more and then more and more and more. And then going back to them again a few weeks later. To see if they have more to share. Their memory wouldve been jog by the first conversation and they would want to tell a little bit more about at this time. Or actually, i was sinking about maura came across an email heres what really happened. What jennifer said, essentially you cant hide from this, right . You are going to be part of the story. You can help make sure it is full and fair and accurate. Or you can pretend like its not happening a stick your head in the sand. We are still going to find ways to learn all this information about you. When there are people who did not want to talk themselves, sometimes they would, this person is a proxy for me. This person can tell my back story. Or sometimes if they werent offering up this people would find them ourselves. And circle back to that person again and say we know more about you now, you ready to show your side . Not in a threatening way but as jennifer said. Right, right. Its a good question from the chat. How much of the parents decision you think was driven by a sense that everyone does this. Did you feel that was pervasive . Guest this was Cocktail Party conversation for parents and certain social circles. I think there is so much discussion who is your sac tutor, hoosier coach, hoosier private coach . They lived in a world where this was normal. The bare minimum youre going to do was get eight tutor. You are being somehow for ms. In her parenting duties if you couldnt do at least that. There wasnt a function and everyone else was trying to gain systems on how to try to get ahead. Everyone knew someone who donated a building at a school. Or was a legacy or Something Like that. There was a sense that if you werent doing something, your kid was going to be losing out. Now, you think everybody was doing exactly this . They did kind of say other people are finding angles and edges and having a friend is on the board somewhere right a letter of recommendation. Those things that are kind of on the end of the spectrum perhaps. And to add to that. Theres some financial means funny but interesting dialogue and some of the case conversations or parents were trying to get out of ricks singer of someone else was doing it for like it would make them feel better. Think they wanted to know im not the only one doing this. Does it seem likely to you that if rick singer was operating like this on the west coast, they are not similar operations and other wealthy communities in other geographie geographies . Guest we discussed in the book a little bit other cases of people who found weaknesses and found ways of kind of manipulating the system. Theres long island case, not that long ago of somebody who is taking sats for other teens. When he went off to college to fly home on weekends for other young men are young women with kind of gender means. So yes, there are other people doing improper things to get an edge to gain a singer. Was not just in california he would fly all over the country all of the world. He was working with legally and otherwise. As a story of someone in the boston area that was working with international and taking money for not great counseling. There are other College Counselors are people who call themselves College Counselors who find loopholes. Encourage families to give up guardianship of their children so the kids could apply for Financial Aid and get scholarships. As the wall street journal reported on that just this past year. So yes there are sprays and things happening all over the place. We keep trying to uncover more of them in new ones will pop up. Move schools move away from requiring the sat and act and b test optional. They has to be some criteria. As soon as people figure out what that next kind of information is there going to find a way to gain that too. Could you talk a little bit more about the private College Counseling industry . Define for me reporting that those who have use these services have improved College Acceptance rates . Are all these being sold a bill of goods . Guest so it is a huge and quick fast growing industry. And it is everyone from people who have certifications and graduate degrees in counseling , a former College Admissions officers often go into this business. Former High School Guidance counselors, all the way to a parent their kid got into princeton so they must know what they are doing. It is a broad range. And there arent any requirements or standards of practice. You can join organizations with your intentions. There is with the industry. Its hard to say how effective they are. For certain people yes. Even with rick singer we heard families and kids talk about that school wasnt on her radar until he mentioned it. Turned out to be the best place possible for the kid. It can be helpful it can be effective. While there is an assumption they only work with super wealthy families, he has rates at a reasonable for more middle income families as well. In their private counselors who do a ton of pro bono work with students whose own high schools need a guidance counselor the senior year. You need the support and guidance. And their high school isnt providing it. For someone from outside would be able to help. Known singer all vow to their not helpful at all berries. Another question from the chat comments, thank you all for your excellent reporting. Aside from the degree of culpability, whether other factors that determine which parents the prosecutors decided to charge . Did Felicity Huffman and laurie loughman, celebrity status play a role . Guest that was a good question for they were highprofile. But i dont know that there celebrity status played a role. Because there were a number of parents who were wealthy who you never would have heard of. I think that his clients, rick singer had they were wealthy people. Because you kind of had to be to work with him. They were going to be from some of the higher tears. Different professions. I think that one of the main thing for the prosecutor, they had to pick cases that they had some kind of evidence of the parent knew that they were doing something wrong. They wanted to get people on tape. They wanted to know that the parent had already, that they had paid rick singer. So they were really looking for concrete evidence to try to build this case. So that is why they went to the links they did to get him to call all of these parents, even parents hed already done deals with earlier. And give a cover story. Which is my charity is getting audited. And you know i just want to let you know that you may be getting a call. So just lets talk about remember how i got your son into school as a tennis player. And he didnt play. Some of parents like yes, yes thats right okay. Then they got them to sort of reiterate what they had done, on the phone no one likes to get audited. They want to get the story straight. What should i say, all is the source . To pass it out. Thats why they could do that. They had to know by that the view of the government you done something wrong. So i think of the cases they went after. There were a number of cases they chose not to pursue. But they had some other big names that we heard of that they didnt go after. Think it was more about the evidence. But certainly those two parents, they became the face of it because they were so well known. But there were some big needs in the financial world. In the silicon valley. So it was almost unfortunate for the actresses. I think of time for one last question he sort of touched on earlier, melissa. We are back out again. Can and is this still happening . [laughter] can it happen again . Of course it can happen again. We just have to depend on intrepid reporters like yourselves to uncover it. But is it still happening . Are you on the case now . Guest so i think, after this broke in the spring of 2019, bunch of schools had coaches named in this and otherwise came out and said, were going to start to audit applications a little bit more. Going to try to verify some of the materials on the application is accurate to the best of our ability. Were going to make sure that if someone is recruited to a particular team that they actually join the team. And playford and if not they better have a good explanation. But they acknowledge, they cant do that for every application. And ive written in the journal the applications for some school is so high that you are getting a few minutes, five or ten minutes to look at an application to make a first decision. See you are not able to go call that Old Folks Home to make sure they volunteered 20 hours a week protocol the high school make sure someone is actually the president not the Vice President of the club. They just cant do it. So theres still just so much trust into the system. And because of that there are people who will take advantage of that trust. And lie about certain things or exaggerate. Or create some Anonymous Club to put on the resume. Or pretend to be a better athlete than they are. So yeah, there are schemes. There are games people are playing. One more question from katie. What impact you believe this has on Higher Education . Ill let melissa answer that one. Guest i answered about a month ago but with a pandemic we have seen so many schools face relief serious financial challenges. Really exit essential question at the moment is how do they proceed given everything going on. I think it is really hard for a school right now to say that theyre not going to Pay Attention to who is a full paying student. Her who can dangle hundred thousand dollars or a Million Dollars or 10 million. Not that it is a direct quid pro quo. But that is really appealing and you have to think about the institutional needs. And what is best for the schools for admission or their longterm advisor. It is hard to say that this scandal will have a huge impact on Higher Education with moments of introspection and soulsearching and all that stuff. Think there is a little bit of that. I think of a lot of schools pretty quickly returned to their Standard Operating Procedure but a lot of schools are still certainly pushing schools for certain students. Still have plenty of College Nights creeping earlier and earlier. Ten you to get emails talk about their own kids case and why these upper middleclass white teenagers and disadvantage these days. I mean the craziness and anxiety is absolute still there. That hasnt gone away. I dont know if this fundamentally changes Higher Education. I think people look a little bit more closely at their own practices. With others managing the jury is still out. This has been wonderful. Thank you melissa, thank you jennifer thank you emily for leading our discussion tonight. The book is unacceptable in the making of the College Admission scandal. The link from us or to mcnally jackson. Com for to help you will consider getting it from us. So thank you very much thank you for everybody who watched. Statement during a virtual author talk hosted by the Aspen Institute near Times Economics reporter discuss what he think social safety nets have not succeeded in america. Theres a portion of that author discussion. This is a new york and then i moved to l. A. For a few years, writing for the wall street journal about the chinos the united states. And what struck me then, was how Little America resembled these childhood memories i had. You know, as it reporter pour into the poverty stats and the numbers on showing americans really dismal health situations. The statistics about how really threadbare social cohesion. The idea that it took over in my mind was how could a country, this rich, provide such a crummy deal to so many of its people . So i came to kind of understand that my grandparents really lived in exception. They achieve their prosperity through really narrow window of opportunity within a few decades after world war ii. I also now understand that that window was really narrow because it was really only open for whites. In the question that popped up for my mind at the time that i have been chewing on ever since then. It is just openly emerged. Its whited this window close when so Many Americans are still on the outside . You know . When i took interest in a lot of the social tie ends about racial division. Theres been a lot of research by economists, by sociologist, Political Science kind of like how intense racial divisions are in the united states. They called them, theres a bunch of names for them you can call content or fear or bigotry, racism, theres all this research about how these feelings stand in the way of developing the kind of empathetic thinking that is the richer social safety nets that help pull other societies together. Theres research about how immigrant kids entering Public Schools in california encouraged American Parents to pull their kids out and put them in private schools. Theres research about how cities with more Diverse Communities spend less on public goods like trash collection and street maintenance. Theres research on how white protestants but less in the collection basket at church as the share in the black congregation rose. So it might be the aha or the epiphany, when i was living in l. A. , which was in a normatively balkanized city. In looking through these stats and looking through kind of the dismal social and Health Outcomes and economic outcomes for much of the population of the united states, the thought that jolted my mind is what doesnt the u. S. Behave like the prosperous country that it is . My conclusion, couldnt escape the conclusion was that racial divisions just got in the way of empathy. Now, that is the bold long admittedly part of the story. The new side of the story and that, it is shorter, happened just a few years ago when donald trump decided to run for president. From his very first speech where he blasted mexicans, racists and thugs illegally over the board of the president had to work really hard to rekindle the racial and ethnic divisions that were just below the political conscience. His racial appeal came to me like a slap in the face, you know . It reminded me abruptly of how racial hostility could further poison our future. As demographic change transport our ethical reality. Those speeches, trump portrayed himself as a voice of White America. That america which has forever held a range of power. Building the walls and pulling up the drawbridge to stop the rise of a truly multiethnic racial. Witnessing such a large share of White America circling the wagons for the privilege. It just had to write this book. I just had to make the case that these politics have forever damage the fabric of the nation. They are undermining our social contract and they are turning us into a failed state. To watch the restless website booktv. Org search for Eduardo Porter the title of his book american poison in the search box which youll find top of the page. Heres a look at some Publishing Industry news. Author and journalist gail died last week at the age of 83. She was a contributor to vanity fair and newark magazine. As well as the author of 17 books which included a bestselling title, passages. That was published in 1976 and sold 10 million copies. The near times reports that an already busy fall publishing season has gotten more hectic. Due to lack of capacity of the two largest book printing companies. Jealousy printing its files for bankruptcy in april which is up for sale or trying keep up with the increased workload as books that were delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic compete with titles that were already scheduled for the fall season. French economist has refused to edit portions its latest book, capitals and ideology make it available for the chinese market. They say quote they basically wanted to cut all parts referring to contemporary china. In particular to inequality in china. Also npd bookscan reports print book sales were up 8 of the week ending august 22. Adult nonfiction books continue the positive sales trend just up over 9 . In the Miami Book Fair has announced it will be a virtual festival for the first time in its history. Author events will be held from november 15 until the 22nd. And will include more than 250 authors. The book says program director, reflected on pivoting from it in person to an online event, telling the miami herald quote, i feel like im building the bridge across the grand canyon as im walking. Its like put the board down, take a step, the next board down, take a step. It is a work in progress. Book tv will continue to bring you new programs and publishing news for you can also watch all of our archive programs any time booktv. Org. i came out this book from sort of this
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