The University of Illinois identified 14 students who used this drastic method to secure need-based aid after high school counselors started wondering why wealthy students were getting invited to special programming for low-income students. "They started asking questions, and that tipped us off to look deeper into our information, because this isn't something that we would have necessarily thought to look for otherwise," says Borst.
He stresses that while families may think they've identified a harmless hack, the practice has a direct impact on low-income students. "Financial aid resources are not unlimited," he says. "Whether we're talking about the federal government, the state government, or even institutional aid — there's only so much to go around."
Because federal and state Pell Grants are distributed on a first-come first-served basis, many low-income students don't receive the funds they qualify for. According to ProPublica, last year about 82,000 qualifying Illinois students did not get their $5,000 MAP grant for this reason. "When a family who has the ability to pay, but maybe not the willingness to pay, goes down this route they are taking money away from low- and middle-income families," says Borst.In addition to families, Borst says that private college counselors are also to blame. "There are some reputable counselors," he says, but warns families not to "follow the direction of someone who appears to be an expert, when in fact they are helping them manipulate the system.
Unethical college counseling was central to the Varsity Blues scandal. The case brought forth by the Justice Department alleges that William Rick Singer, founder of Edge College & Career Network, a for-profit college counseling organization, helped students cheat on SAT and ACT exams, bribed athletic coaches and administrators to pretend that students were athletic recruits and used a charity he had established to funnel the funds.
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