William_Potter/iStock(NEW YORK) — The massive college admissions scam that snared 50 people in a federal indictment, including two high-profile actresses, has prompted a class-action lawsuit filed by two California college students.
The suit was filed Tuesday in a Northern California federal court by two students at Stanford University, one of the eight elite colleges named in the lawsuit, all of which had associated individuals implicated in the bribery case.
In the suit, students Erica Olsen and Kalea Woods claimed they both went through the legitimate and rigorous admissions process to Stanford and were “never informed that the process of admission was an unfair, rigged process, in which rich parents could buy their way into the university through bribery.”
The suit also names as defendants the University of Southern California, UCLA, the University of San Diego, the University of Texas, Wake Forest University, Yale University and Georgetown University.
The college admissions scam investigation said that people associated with various athletic teams at each of those schools were involved in getting students admission.
Olsen, according to the lawsuit, applied to Yale University in 2017, submitting “stellar standardized test score, and a glowing profile that including being a talented athlete and dancer.”
Olsen noted that she paid an application fee of approximately $80, according to the suit.
“Had she known that the system at Yale University was warped and rigged by fraud, she would not have spent the money to apply to the school,” the lawsuit states. “She also did not receive what she paid for — a fair admissions consideration process.”
Olsen contends she had been damaged by the admissions scandal because her degree from Stanford “is now not worth as much as it was before, because prospective employers may now question whether she was admitted to the university on her own merits, versus having parents who were willing to bribe school officials.”
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