Malawi Government Vs Columbia Commonwealth U.fraud Or Deception ?

Yes, this is a public forum, anyone can jump into a thread whenever they feel like it. As for "covert", I don't know what you're referring to.

That would be a great argument if this was a court of law, but it isn't. Timmy has posted some information, which if correct (and I don't know if it is or is not), would be extremely damaging to CPU/CCWU alumni and/or students. He provided a contact name & phone number with which to verify this information. You still refuse to make a long-distance phone call to verify or disprove your assertion that Timmy's information is no good. That strikes me as either stubborness, laziness, or a fear of what the answer may be.

If I made a reference to an article in the Harvard Law Review in one of my posts, would you simply look it up, or would I have to send you a .pdf file of the actual article to satisfy your "standards"?

No, you'd tell them to look it up on the web, which would take about as much time as making a phone call to the Malawi Embassy. Would you send a .pdf file of your thesis to someone who claimed that was their standard?

Posting the name and contact phone number of the Education Attache for Malawi is unaccountable, irresponsible, and covert? Earon, I have no idea what comprises your "standards", but they don't make any sense to me.


Bruce

 

My beloved Earon,

I am sorry to have caused these many pains, agony, grief, anguish discomfort confusion depression etc.. etc.. That was never my intent. Reading through your postings I can see that you are certainly angry and frustrated about the situation that your alma mater finds itself. But you can hardly fault me for exposing what is deceptive at best, and fraudulent at worst.

I really don’t want the saga of ccwu accreditation vis avis the Malawi Govt. to degenerate to unfriendly exchanges between us. After all I considered you a friend at least until now.
In fact you are one of the very few people on this forum that I have exchanged private emails with, Therefore I will try as much as humanly possible to make this my very last response to you on this issue. (Ccwu & the Malawi Connection.) Even then, let us examine (in no particular order) some of your observations.

My credibility & that of Dr. Chipasulla : That is not the issue at hand, the issue is the credibility of your alma mater and those of the folks that are helping it to negotiate some sort of legitimacy around the Globe. The Cat has been let out of the bag, Malawi seems to be out, and thus the last string that WAS holding whatever credibility ccwu had left.

Information passed to Dr. Carr: Well I say good job, that is exactly what I expect from a good alumna / alumnus. I hope he has enough political connection to save some people’s job in Malawi, and at the same time secure at least a three paragraph letter of accreditation now from the appropriate ministry of education as opposed to the 2 paragraph letter from the office of human Resources development (or something like that) that is currently paraded on the ccwu web page. But may I warn you that you are not telling Dr. Carr anything He did not already know. I mean are you as naive as to think that a P.HD holder (From Vanderbilt u) who has taken two schools through accreditation does not know what is involved in the process? Does Dr. Carr really believe in that 2 paragraph letter signed by Mr. Banda? Does he really take that to mean real accreditation? Common Earon You must be in denial. Perhaps you need to take the advice given you by Ike i.e. give it up as stop being fanatical about a barren exercise.

Alleged attaché? ..Well as Bruce, Ike and Dave have pointed out, I have given you all you need, just make bold to call and be brave to come back and tell us your findings. i.e proof me wrong and let us move on or forever stare at your CCWU DIPLOMA.

Playing games? : The only party playing any game is the ccwu folks, and needless to say that they seemed to have found willing and happy audience in a pool of their blind loyalists and fanatical alumni group. Earon, IMO you’ve got 2 choices (1) Keep up the poor spin job and keep asking for proofs and validation of other people’s credibility
Or (2) follow up on what you got so far in addition to getting your group of the ccwu alumni to put enough pressure on Less Carr and his team (if any) to tell you the real truth about the situation of things. Speaking of “real” I am real, Timmy is my real name, Dr. Chipassulla is real, is the supposed accreditation of CCWU by the Govt. of Malawi real? Well find out and let us know.
Going public with private email: I sought and got Dr. Chipasulla’s consent before doing that You are free to check with him, You see I am not like you.

My own private email to you: I have no regret I still think you are a nice fellow? Your first name confuses me I am not sure if you are He or she.
Backing up my assertions: I have more than done that, take the various advises given you and try and save what is left of CCWU if you can. You see I have no vested interest in CCWU I do not care what happens to them. I hope you’re not one of the ex students that had to buy Malawi accreditation to enhance their CCWU diplomas.

Earon this may very well be the last bus stop for me on this issue. Let us know your own findings. Now don’t make me come back to this. I am happy for you on your pending academic work with real schools & real accreditation. Good Luck. it is 3:15 AM here in GA. Do you know where your Diplomas are ? Mine are well secured. Love and let peace reign in Malawi and on Degree info.

Timmy Ade who still wants to be a friend of Earon but may have played Dr. Bear too much. For that to happen.

 

Timmy,
Put a stop to the passive-agressive patronising, please. I will most certainly let you and your fellow cult members know what I find out. I have drafted a letter to the supposed attache's bosses and will get the story from them as to his antics. You might want to warn him to get into damage control (if he's for real in the first place); he might need an asbestos suit because things will be getting hotter. If your allegations are correct you can rest assured I will cop to them publicly. This conversation is finished (for now).
As always,
Earon

 

Without trying to throw gasolene onto a raging fire, can I suggest that this isn't really a valid argument? The difference between the Harvard Law Review and the document being discussed is pretty major: one is a publicly accessible journal that can be examined in libraries all over the world (or via the web, etc.), the other is, I understand, a private document.

If we're talking about proving the validity of an assertion, it is usually the person who makes the claim that is asked to supply the supporting evidence. Generally, a reference to materials that are publicly accessible is adequate because people can then go and locate the material cited. If a source is cited that is not accessible to the public, then it is usually the responsibility of the person making the assertion to ensure that it is available to those who might question it.

All of this goes towards answering the question posed: you would not need to send out a .pdf file to satisfy anyone (because, as has already been said, the article could be obtained from the web, libraries, etc.) but might choose to do so for the sake of convenience.

 

The name, title and telephone number of the source was provided.

Isn't all this stuff a red-herring meant to divert attention away from the messege and onto the messenger? The relevant text from Dr. Chipasula's communication has already been posted. Everyone is free to read it and to comment on it (oddly, nobody has). If there is any question about the text's authenticity or content, wouldn't the next step be to speak to the gentleman?

 

The name of the Education Attache and the phone number of the Malawi Embassy are certainly not private. They've even been posted in this very thread, and it would take much less time to make a phone call than look up an academic source.


Bruce

 

Hi Bill,

I agree with you - it is a red herring. Now, do you accept it as a red herring, ignore it and move on or do you try to do something about it? If you ignore it, other people probably won't and the same argument will recur over and over again. If you do something about it, the attempt to distract succeeds this time but maybe not again.

Personally, I think these things need to be ironed out so that they don't keep cropping up. It's all too easy to start arguing about relatively trivial matters and lose sight of the real issues. In this case, I was trying to make the "common sense" argument for two main reasons:

(a) so that the debate over who should prove what can be closed and the discussion can move on;
(b) so that the issue is dealt with and need not crop up again.

Regards

 

It's been a longstanding procedure at a.e.d. and here to simply do a third-party verification of anything posted that seems questionable.

When somebody posted about a guy teaching at Cleveland State with a Columbia State Ph.D., it didn't sound correct, so I emailed the guy, who claimed it was from Columbia U. in NYC. I called their registrar's office, verified that the guy had graduated, and verified that there was a dissertation on file with UMI from the same year.

Timmy has provided information and a source to verify it. Anyone can call the guy (I'd suggest doing a double-verify and reach him by looking up the number for the embassy directly and being transferred) and see if it's on the level. I would be very surprised if it isn't.

Why is it so incredibly difficult to believe that Carr, who has a long history of questionable claims (the Native American accreditation, the "bursting at the seams" offices in Montana that have one person who wasn't there in the office, the moving from California to Montana to Wyoming, not to mention the problems with California) could have pulled another scam with Malawi officials?

Why assume that the "renegade" is the education attache to the embassy, and not the guy who wrote the original letter attesting to the accreditation? My guess is that the person who wrote the original letter claiming that the school was accredited has a lot more to gain by writing such a letter (in the form of monetary inducement, if such was provided) than would the guy saying "this is a bunch of crap."

After all, it's pretty well known that in many developing countries, one can achieve something such as a letter of accreditation simply by paying a few bucks to the right person... and now that Carr knows that the cat's out of the bag, you can bet that *if* money was paid, he's already on the phone to his contacts to arrange to try and salvage the situation. Unfortunately, in countries where annual incomes are very low, it's quite possible that he'll succeed in reviving his "accreditation", at least temporarily, simply by providing the appropriate incentive. While I have no knowledge of what transpired between CCU and Malawi, I really have a difficult time imagining any other scenario than bought or rented credibility in this case.

And why on Earth would a school with no students in Malawi, and precious little, if any, connection to Malawi, suddenly seek accreditation there, particularly when they're busy playing musical states in the US?

I think that Timmy's scenario is the one that makes sense. And I suspect that almost any rational person, who isn't busy trying to be an apologist for a once-promising school that went bad, could pretty much see that.

If no one has reported on a call to verify the situation by Monday, I'll plan to make a call myself and report what I find.

 

Chip,
Go for it. But don't his word (either Timmy, or the poet) for it either. Try also calling his boss the ambassador to the USA. I'm also placing calls and have had some conversation and I will report back as soon as I have something in writing.
Earon

 

Chip and all,
I have just acquired 4 (four) different but related documents on the Malawi accreditation of Columbia Commonwealth University. I am currently scanning them and will post them later tonight or tomorrow.

The documents are signed by:
1. The Malawi minister of justice and solicitor general
2. The Secretary for Human Resource Management and Development in the Office of the President and Cabinet
3. The Chief Parliamentary Draftsman (for the Solicitor General and Secretary for Justice)

This is not the document I am requesting from the Malawian authorities, on behalf of CCWU alumni, pertaining to Timmy Ade's recenent allegations. If I get that statement I will also post it here.
Earon

 

I would take any Malawian document with a grain of salt. The Malawian government has a reputation as one of the most corrupt on earth. A few articles:

• Aid to Malawi axed on corruption suspicions
  Malawian ministers say goodbye to first-class
  Malawian lawmakers in R100m fraud
  Malawi president implicated in fraud
  Graft blamed for crash in Malawi fish exports
  Malawi president angered by state corruption
  Malawi cabinet sacked 'to stop corruption'
  Malawi finance chief in corruption probe (this guy was also Education Minister for a while)
  
  etc.

Malawian corruption has been renowned for decades, from the days of despot Hastings Banda. I personally believe that the native American accreditation had more credibility than the Malawian accreditation.

Gert Potgieter (who lived for two decades about 250 miles from Blantyre)

 

Gert,
I don't have much commentary on your culinary habits (figurative of non figurative), but the Columbia Commonwealth Accreditation documents will be posted (if the administrators have no objection to that).

Now.... let's pretend (and this is a big "IF") that CCWU charted its strategic course and eventually attained UNESCO inclusion and membership in the Association of Commonwealth Universities. Would you then claim that UNESCO and ACU are also corrupt (because they admitted CCWU on recommendation of the Republic of Malawi government)?

Despite it's internal political struggles over the course of its history, the Republic of Malawi is a recognized member of the Commonwealth of Nations, and enjoys the rights and privileges accorded all Commonwealth members. Those rights and privleges include the context of education. Can Malawi politicians be any more corrupt than those of the USA (or Canada for that matter)? I think not.
Earon

 

The UNESCO list and ACU membership are flawed. Which is why they cannot (in my opinion) be used as the ultimate criteria of legitimacy. I think the essence of GAAP is that institutions that meet those guidelines can be assessed on the basis of the country's educational quality control systems (rather than assessed individually on an institution-by-institution basis). So if CCWU were to meet GAAP guidelines, we should then consider the level of legitimacy this implies in a country where the Education Ministry in particular has been involved in corruption scandals. Here's another article related to this: Malawi president denies corruption.

People working in Malawi often said that anything could be done with a sufficient bribe (and nothing without it). I must have missed this aspect of life in the U.S.

____________
Gert Potgieter, whose opinions on GAAP should be taken with a grain of salt (since he's ignorant on matters educational) but who knows something about Malawi.

 

Hi Bruce,
I don't claim any experiential or book knowledge of Malawi. but I have done considerable travel in some countries and usually have gone native with the locals (to the degree that a white guy from North America can do such a thing). I've encountered the 'nothing without a bribe' in every place I have been to outside of North America and Western Europe. Just last, year, when I was in a northern east europe country I was told I could marry my wife (she's from there) for $200.00 placed in a white envelope and hand delivered to a private attorney on the front steps of the civil government marriage center. The attorney would deliver the envelope to the local director of vital statistics.

Six months later, on another visit, the local police station tried to charge my wife $250 for security clearance documents. After calling the former KGB, who offered the same service for $25.00, I made a huge fuss through my wife, and ended up getting the documents free of charge. It seems that word got out that my wife is married to a wealthy Canadian (wealthy by virtue of living in Canada, where ALL people are believed to be wealthy).

Then, last Christmas, we received an invitation to attend a Christmas Eve dinner at the home of some acquaintances of my wife. The day before Christmas Eve my wife came to me acting very upset. She told me, with some embarrassment, that I was to bring $100 to cover our share. I promptly cancelled our attendance at her acquaintance's home. This was a unique case - all others who have invited me into their homes in that (and other countries) treated me as a welcome guest with no strings attached. And I have always contributed in some manner to those whose company I have shared.

I have received the reverse bribe invitation in other countries as well, with anything to do with public/civil needs.

I was chatting on the phone with Dr. Les Carr of CCWU just yesterday (I've been looking into the recent Timmy Ade allegations). We discussed the distinctions sometimes prevalent in transactions with foreign governments. Carr mentioned, without any elicitation from me, that there has never been any expectation of private monetary compensation displayed by any of the Malawi officials he has dealt with. Carr was very pleased with this, as a sign of a promising and ethical relationship CCWU would have with the Malawi authorities. I took his statement at face value.
Earon

 

Gert,
My apologies ... I addressed you as Bruce.
Earom

 

U.S. Dept. of State has a brief but informative "background note" about Malawi.

 

Earon

Your quote;

"Can Malawi politicians be any more corrupt than those of the USA (or Canada for that matter)"

Canadian politicians aren't corrupt, they are just stupid. You must know that.

An ex BC premier is being tried for influence peddling because he allegedly received a new deck for his house or cottage in exchange influencing a licensing decision which his government denied. Corrupt or just stupid?

This is the biggest corruption scandal to hit Canada in a long time. We're mere amateurs compared to Malawi.

 

Suppose that we have an unambiguous degree-mill. No question, it simply sells degrees like our "prestigious non-accredited universities" do. Now suppose that it is "accredited" by island X, a fully independent nation, a member of the UN, with every legal right to manage its educational system as it sees fit.

Presumably our hypothetical degree-mill will get a listing from UNESCO because that body doesn't want to offend any of its members. It will show up in the IHU. It will be eligible for an American student financial aid number. Lazy credential evaluators will simply verify the school is "accredited" and declare it "equivalent" to RA.

The issue here is what the meaning and purpose of accreditation is.

Is accreditation simply a formal matter of appearing on certain lists, regardless of how those listings came about?

Or should accreditation tell us something that we can depend on regarding the educational standard of the accredited school?

 

It seems as if Malawi has indeed accredited Columbia Commonwealth, for whatever reason.

It seems reasonable to wonder why a poor African nation would accredit only one school on earth, that being a university operated from an apparently tiny office in Jackson Hole, Wyoming whose resident dean conducts business from a nearby coffee shop, and whose president lives in California.

And even if the reasons turn out to be clear and reasonable, the basic question for any degree-seeker is "Will this degree meet my needs, present and predictable future." If any of the 3,000+ accredited colleges and unversities in the US have a policy of accepting CCWU degrees, I would be most surprised.

Dr. Carr has announced his intention of applying for regional accreditation. I have mentioned earlier his success in shepherding three other schools through this process. But his last time (as president of New College) was more than 25 years ago.

It's a fascinating situation, and I am enjoying sitting on the sidelines watching.

 

Accredited or not, who is going to take serious a degree from an American university accredited by a tiny nation in Africa. It is really absurd, it is like the whole thing with Trinity College that has some kind of accreditation or legal status in Spain but the company is set in Delaware and the address is in the UK. Too many red flags to pass without notice by an HR person, I can imagine telling my employer that my degree is from an American university but they have to check its accreditation with the Malawi government.