A Los Angeles Times investigation uncovered how the University of Southern California courted wealthy families, offering an “alternate path to admission” for subpar students whose parents made large donations.
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Only about 9% of undergrad applicants are accepted to USC. However, according to the report, university administrators manipulated the sports recruitment system to offer well-connected families another path to admission with an 85 to 90% acceptance rate.
Documents reviewed by the L.A. Times show that between 2008 and 2018, some students were admitted as walk-on athletes after their families made large donations. In some cases, USC employees explicitly linked the admissions to large donations.
Many of these supposed student-athletes never even made it on a team roster.
During court proceedings in the 2019 “Varsity Blues” case, in which dozens of parents were accused of bribing college officials for admissions, USC denied that the walk-on system was used as a tool for fundraising.
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