Remember Auburn's directed reading sociology program....
I don't know the facts behind the UNC thing, but Auburn's was a problem with the Socialogy Department. They created easy classes to keep the Department going because it was on the chopping block by the administration - not as a way to help athletes. The classes were taken by a significant number of non-athletes trying to pull up their grades. Word gets around, and athletes start doing the same.
It was not a good look for academics, but, in Auburn's case, it was NOT an NCAA issue, despite what rivals say. However, the one complaining about it knew the only way to get visibility beyond the water cooler was to tie it to SEC football.
http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2008/09/ncaa_finds_no_academic_fraud_w.html"The NCAA opened its investigation after former Auburn sociology professor Jim Gundlach said Thomas Petee, chairman of the sociology department, allowed regular students and student-athletes to receive grades for little work. Auburn found only 18 percent of the students taking these courses were student-athletes. Only 7.5 percent were football players.
Auburn's 2006 investigation determined did not find an inordinately large number of players were ``clustered'' into specific easy courses. Gundlach has said his research suggested athletes were clustered in certain courses.
A committee of Auburn academic administrators said in late 2006 the school did not offer athletes special treatment."
