KWU, From Diploma Mill to unaccredited

It's a big win for the owner of KWU if he's allowed to victimize people in Oregon now. It's a wash for people that hold degrees from KWU because if they do use their degree in Oregon they must specify that it is unaccredited which will indicate to most people, I believe, that KWU is a degree mill.

 

Re: With Due Process

KWU is not a degree mill. In addition, it is a wash because KWU is going to be the CO – Author of the Brand New Law.

 

Re: Re: With Due Process

I wouldn't hold your breath on that one! The Oregon Legislature is a bit more independent than that. Hardy Meyers is simply the Attorney General. He can give opinions to the Legislature but he has no power over it. His position is elected.

 

I doubt K-W will begin marketing to Oregon. The owner generally seems very business savy even if he does lack morals and ethics.

 

The agreement was with KWU specifically. However, the implication is that the use of all unaccredited school degrees are now legal in Oregon as long as a disclosure is made concerning their unaccredited status.

Anyone care to measure the compliance rate and format variances for disclosure? Anyone venturing a guess as to the number of prosecutions the ODA will be willing to pursue on compliance issues?

 

Several people have asked me privately for the exact language that The Entity Called KWU agreed to and which we expect to become part of Oregon law this spring. Here it is:


(a) A person who has been awarded a degree from a school that does not meet the requirements of subsection (1) of this section may claim or represent that the person possesses an academic degree if the claim or representation is accompanied by a disclaimer that states: “(Name of school) does not have accreditation recognized by the United States Department
of Education and has not been approved by the Office of Degree Authorization.”.

(b) The disclaimer shall be made in any resume, letterhead, business card, announcement or advertisement in which the person is claiming or representing to have an academic degree
from a school that does not meet the requirements of subsection (1) of this section.

(c) This subsection does not alter any requirement for obtaining a license, admission into a school, teaching or employment or for other areas in which a degree from an accredited school is required.


Now you may understand why I am not too concerned about the outcome of the suit. It is now illegal in Oregon for any Entity-Called-KWU degree-owner to fail to include such disclaimers ALL THE TIME.

I also feel obligated to point out that "Dr." Latin Juris, despite his cute electronic accent, is obviously very well connected to the ownership of The Entity Called KWU, because his most recent post includes material that was known only to the parties and their lawyers. Also, he has intentionally sent false information to this list and anyone who wants to check the settlement agreement, a public record will find that I am right. See as follows:

"The State of Oregon's (Justice) acknowledgment that its law is

1- Unconstitutional WE WOULD HAVE HAD A TOUGH CASE

2- Infringe the constitutional rights of alumni by denying them their rights to due process. NOT PART OF SETTLEMENT, NOT AGREED TO BY OREGON.

3- Go against the rights of alumni by denying freedom of speech. WE WOULD HAVE HAD A TOUGH CASE

4- Violate the rights of former students by denying interstate commerce. NOT PART OF SETTLEMENT, NOT AGREED TO BY OREGON.


5- The enforcer of the Law needs to take some curriculum. WITH OR WITHOUT SUGAR?

6-ODA officials are to refrain from making critical or disparaging comments about KWU in any public forum or to the media. NOT PART OF SETTLEMENT, NOT AGREED TO BY OREGON. KWU's LAWYER REQUESTED THIS BUT WE REMINDED THEM THAT THE FIRST AMENDMENT IS AVAILABLE TO ALL. THEY ALSO ASKED ODA TO REMOVE FROM OUR WEB SITE ALL LINKS TO THE U.S. SENATE HEARINGS! WE REJECTED THIS ARROGANT OVERREACHING BY THE ENTITY CALLED KWU.

7- The supplicant (KWU) is going to be the Co- Author of the State Law" WRONG. IT WAS DRAFTED BY LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL. THE ENTITY CALLED KWU CAN TESTIFY IF IT WANTS TO AT THE HEARING, AND HAS HIRED A REPUTABLE OREGON LOBBYIST, PRESUMABLY TO DO SO. SO CAN ODA. SO CAN ANY FEDERAL OFFICIALS WHO CARE TO WEIGH IN....


Dr. Juris is playing games with the truth, to put it with the utmost delicacy. Just what is your game, "doctor," and by whom are you paid, surely not The Entity Called Kennedy-Western University? Art thou a graduate of Shill U?

The Entity knows where I may be found and likewise knows the names and addresses of the state's attorneys.

 

Hi Alan

Dr LJ seems to share a great many opinions with Dr. Evans along with a need to twist things in a way that is at least slightly untruthful. I think his post can accurately be called games.

 

Yes, that clearly was the weak point of the Oregon legislation: the fact that outlawing "use" was (arguably) over-broad. What if a guy talks about his unaccredited degree at a party? Is that 'use' or 'free speech'? What if somebody at the party is impressed and offers him a job? But I think that the law might still work if the nature of the prohibited 'use' was defined more carefully.

Unless you are very careful here, the fact that the source of a degree isn't accredited will be accompanied by written or spoken rhetoric about how accreditation is unimportant or inapplicable, sending the Oregon employers, clients and consumers the exact opposite message to the one that you intend.

If you are suggesting that this settlement applies only to K-W and that the old laws continue as before for those with degrees from other non-accredited schools, I'd say that seems to unworkable at this point.

If participants on Degreeinfo can't reach agreement about accreditation, state approval, foreign mystery schools and all that stuff, what makes you think that it's a victory to put all that in the lap of the Oregon consumer?

 

We surmise at this point that the terms of the agreement with The Entity Called KWU will apply to any unaccredited degree provider that is operating legally in a U.S. state. It would not apply to degrees issued by entities that do not have such approval because from Oregon's point of view they don't exist and therefore their degrees are inherently fraudulent, that is, they are simply pieces of paper with the word "degree" printed on the front. We are confident that we do not have to allow their use as degrees at all.

Foreign degrees are a slightly blurrier situation, but our law requires that a foreign school show that it has the equivalent of U.S. accreditation. If we have any cases come up we'll have to figure out how to classify foreign providers of bogus degrees, but of course they have no commerce clause protections. I think we are on pretty solid ground in requiring that a foreign degree have meaningful approval from its own government before becoming legal here.

By the way, has anyone on this forum mentioned that The Entity Called KWU is apparently now quietly offering tuition refunds to former students who sued subsequent to the U.S. Senate hearings? An interesting sidelight. Looks like they are afraid of what would be discovered were they actually to go to trial. Or perhaps it is just a business decision to save the cost of litigation. Hard to say. Perhaps "Dr." Latin Juris could enlighten us?

 

I forgot to mention in response to Rod Kirkland's post that Oregon thinks that any citizen or employer who gets a whole heap of wriggling wording about accreditation dumped in their lap would, at the very least, stop in their tracks and say "what the heck is all this about?" while various lights flash and flags run up poles.

 

First, Contreras JD, nice to meet you in this first-class electronic Forum. But, no Alan, you are erroneous. The complete information is in different web pages,Glance

1- Oregon officials are also obligated under the settlement agreement to refrain from characterizing KWU as a diploma mill or substandard school on the Office of Degree Authorization website or elsewhere.
http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20041221005728&newsLang=en

2- The Attorney General's office also agreed to provide ODA personnel with a training session on defamation law.
http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20041221005728&newsLang=en

3- The settlement agreement includes Oregon's acknowledgment that its law regulating non-accredited universities in the state is unconstitutional and must be revised such that it will no longer violate the rights of alumni by denying them their rights to due process, freedom of speech and interstate commerce.
http://www.kw.edu/news_sub6.asp?active=media

4- KWU will participate in developing the new legislation. Specifically, new legislation will decriminalize the use of a degree from a non-accredited university and require graduates to disclose their schools' non-accredited status when promoting their credentials
http://www.kw.edu/news_sub6.asp?active=media

5- Oregon officials are to refrain from making critical or disparaging comments about KWU in any public forum or to the media.
http://www.kw.edu/news_sub6.asp?active=media

6- A high-quality description of Due Process. The idea that laws and legal proceedings must be fair. The Constitution guarantees that the government cannot take away a person's basic rights to 'life, liberty or property, without due process of law.' Courts have issued numerous rulings about what this means in particular cases.
http://www.lectlaw.com/def/d080.htm
Due Process (Law 101)

I am happy to meeting you Alan and keep in mind attorney, FIAT JUSTITIA, RUAT COELUM, but with a first-rate Due Process.

 

Hence, my question regarding compliance.

 

It is a great question. It is also one that I think may be impossible to answer at this point. The K-W or other unaccredited school graduate is left with either listing the nature of their degree and likely ruining any benefit from said degree or breaking the law. The latter could come back to plague them at any time. It seems like a pretty good balance between the rights of legitimate unaccredited degree holders and protection from the same who would let others misunderstand the nature of their degrees.

 

Well, I take back what I said about The Latin Doctor having inside information. Instead, I thank him/her/it for pointing out that The Entity Called Kennedy-Western University has posted false information about the settlement on its web site. We have called this to the attention of our legal counsel.

The statement on the KWU web site that I or ODA agreed not to make disparaging comments about KWU is a lie. L, I, E, lie. We expressly refused to do this and KWU backed down once they rediscovered the First Amendment, which they apparently mislaid after filing their briefs.

The statements on the KWU web site attributed to KWU's legal counsel that strongly imply that Attorney General Myers or any other state official recognize KWU as academically sound or a viable career option for Oregon residents are utterly baseless. I am astonished that KWU's lawyer would let them include such statements in a public forum.

We continue to advise Oregonians that KWU degrees are invalid for use in public and licensed employment in the state. We have never seen any evidence to support the statement that the Entity is academically sound, and there was plenty of evidence to the contrary presented in the Senate hearings last spring.

What bizarre drivel these people put out. I suspect that they are afraid that more of their degree owners will ask for full refunds - they have already given out several to people who asked for them.

 

I have argued in the past that if the federal or state prosecutors became interested enough in KWU and investigated deep enough that they might find that KWU misleads their students to point of being fraudulent. Perhaps mitigating this would be if they are actually now making refunds to graduates that saw the Senate hearings? I mean if they are making refunds then perhaps the law would look upon their behavior in a more positive light? After all, there has been multiple people that have posted on this forum that KWU refused to give them refunds after just a few months and taken only a class or two.

 

We are told that The Entity Called Kennedy-Western University is now issuing refunds even to degree-holders. A bunch of them hired a lawyer and KWU paid. KWU apparently required that they not tell anyone that they got refunds, but they are flapping away to various agencies.

We have shared this information with appropriate interested parties, but we don't expect much action at the federal level. In general the feds are only interested in drugs, terrorism and organized crime of the more traditional variety.

By the way, it looks like the senate committee is going to get back into this set of issues pretty soon.

 

To graduates? Does that say something about K-WU or what? How many holders of legitimate degrees would turn them in for a refund? Seriously, how many? None? After you weigh in the blood, sweat, tears, and time, the money becomes one small factor. And when you look at the utility of your degree, the money remains a small one. That is, unless your degree is worthless and you feel ripped off.

It's enough to start a poll.....

Oh, and another thing, if a legitimate school was doing this, it would make the news. Imagine, a school accepting returns and refunds on degrees! People would have a field day with it!

 

Apparently, the ODA/Alan Contreras and KWU/David Gering are not on the same page, or there has been some miscommunication between the lawyers, or the lawyers and their clients because you both seem to see things differently.

Maybe you should read this by David Gering.

 

I'm very pleased that KWU is giving some of their victims their money back. It is sad if they're requiring them to get a lawyer first, though. I think what needs to be done is to get some sharp lawyer to file a class action suit against this place. Do a mass mailing after getting a court order to get the mailing list for all students and ex-students.

If the Senate continues their investigation, I hope that they continue to concentrate on this degree mill. If visibility can be maintained for a national news story or two, I think the class action suit might become a viable option. I'm not a lawyer but KWU appears very vulnerable to this kind of action.

 

The Oregon Department of Justice has informed us that the entity called Kennedy-Western University has agreed to replace the inaccurate material on its web site media release with the correct press release about the settlement agreement. They say they mistakenly posted the wrong material. Watch that space in the days ahead.