UMC suburban college student lied about background to become prestigious Rhodes Scholar

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So to summarize -

1. Her mother is a doctor
2. There was some kind of incident between mother and teenage daughter that led to abuse charges (later dropped)
3. The daughter was actually in foster care for a period of time
4. The daughter definitely embellished significant parts of her origin story

Wow, that's a lot. Fierceton sounds like she has a few screws loose, but maybe so does her mother?

And the bio mom ratted out the daughter after she had won the Rhodes (BTW Ivies, in particular, spend a lot of time selecting and grooming Rhodes' candidates - of course Penn would take it away, and diploma, if she faked her story, which her bio mom says she did).

You left out the 22 days in the hospital after her mother physically abused her.

22 days in the hospital with a feeding tube and no injuries says mental illness to me. Psych ward. Pediatric.

Most psych wards won’t take someone with a feeding tube- try again

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another point I'm not understanding is if the home life was as bad as she claimed, where are the therapists and such? It makes no sense that there was no professional help involved with this supposedly long running family dynamic. It's standard fare for the UMC to put at least the kid into therapy.

why do you feel entitled to know that information?

Mackenzie, relax. It's all public spectacle now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another point I'm not understanding is if the home life was as bad as she claimed, where are the therapists and such? It makes no sense that there was no professional help involved with this supposedly long running family dynamic. It's standard fare for the UMC to put at least the kid into therapy.

why do you feel entitled to know that information?

Mackenzie, relax. It's all public spectacle now.

np. how do you know she didn't have a therapist?

[Anonymous]

Yeah, all the records are going to come out now. Then we will see what actually happened.

[Anonymous]

why didn't her mom take her to the hospital or doctor? why did her high school have to do so? and did the state remove her from her mother's care just for funsies?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another point I'm not understanding is if the home life was as bad as she claimed, where are the therapists and such? It makes no sense that there was no professional help involved with this supposedly long running family dynamic. It's standard fare for the UMC to put at least the kid into therapy.

why do you feel entitled to know that information?

Mackenzie, relax. It's all public spectacle now.

np. how do you know she didn't have a therapist?

Well she's been so freely & dramatically sharing her victimhood. Rich kids with issues always have therapists. Quite odd that this one doesn't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another point I'm not understanding is if the home life was as bad as she claimed, where are the therapists and such? It makes no sense that there was no professional help involved with this supposedly long running family dynamic. It's standard fare for the UMC to put at least the kid into therapy.

why do you feel entitled to know that information?

Mackenzie, relax. It's all public spectacle now.

np. how do you know she didn't have a therapist?

Well she's been so freely & dramatically sharing her victimhood. Rich kids with issues always have therapists. Quite odd that this one doesn't.

how do you know?

[Anonymous]

What do you suppose is more likely: 1) that she grew up with a loving mother and decided to fabricate completely violent stories about abuse, estranging herself from her mother (she literally changed her last name)? or 2) that her mother did abuse her and then lied about it to investigators, which abusive parents do all the damn time?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:why didn't her mom take her to the hospital or doctor? why did her high school have to do so? and did the state remove her from her mother's care just for funsies?

She said/she said. Someone is a liar.

[Anonymous]

I will say that a an interviewer for med school applicants - people feel tons of pressure to emphasize any trauma or hardship they have had. People respond to incentivizes and I wouldn’t be surprised if they embellished aspects of their narrative and it works- it helps set you apart in a very competitive landscape. Don’t get me started on all the suddenly Latinx individuals and Native American applicants who are white and otherwise don’t identify with that culture …better believe on interview day they play up that identity (moms mom born in Argentina …) i don’t blame them, gotta work with what you’ve got.

[Anonymous]

Is the big trial blog that someone linked above a plaintiff lawyer blog? It seems weirdly reported as compared to the much cleaner and more neutral story in the Chronicle of Higher Education. The big trial story is so over the top that it’s hard to credit it much.

[Anonymous]

I read the Chronicle article--the case is a bit less cut-and-dry than it might seem. The student seems to have exaggerated about as much as most high school students applying to university, but there is a lot of truth there. She talked about suffering abuse and living in foster care--which she had. She didn't mention that her mom, whom she accuses of abuse, was well-off. She says her hair was caked in blood, which sounds extreme, yet the nurse recalls washing blood out of her hair. The university is saying that being a first generation college student clearly means that nobody in the family has a college degree, yet in other places the university counts degrees from colleges that aren't 'elite' as the same as getting no education at all. Also, if you're living in foster care and have broken off contact with your mother, does that change things?

[Anonymous]

It's kind of hard for me to feel a certain way about this without knowing how much she embellished her essay. I find it interesting that she changed her name, like maybe she was trying to hide a past that didn't align with the narrative she was portraying. Or maybe she was emotionally traumatized and want to make a clean break with a rough childhood.
It seems pretty obvious to me that Penn was retaliating. Even if this young woman was a total fraud there was no reason for them to go digging into her past after she had already been accepted as a Rhodes Scholar. And then the alerted to Rhodes council to torpedo her scholarship. That smacks of payback to me.

My big takeaway from this is this; What kind of world are we living in where our most prestigious and sought after academic opportunity require some kind of hardship as a prerequisite? Wouldn't society be so much better off if we gave these opportunities to the most intelligent and industrious students regardless of their upbringing?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What do you suppose is more likely: 1) that she grew up with a loving mother and decided to fabricate completely violent stories about abuse, estranging herself from her mother (she literally changed her last name)? or 2) that her mother did abuse her and then lied about it to investigators, which abusive parents do all the damn time?

But she kept lying all the way through the Rhodes application, until she decided to withdraw it! This is not a good way to convince people that you tell the honest truth.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's kind of hard for me to feel a certain way about this without knowing how much she embellished her essay. I find it interesting that she changed her name, like maybe she was trying to hide a past that didn't align with the narrative she was portraying. Or maybe she was emotionally traumatized and want to make a clean break with a rough childhood.
It seems pretty obvious to me that Penn was retaliating. Even if this young woman was a total fraud there was no reason for them to go digging into her past after she had already been accepted as a Rhodes Scholar. And then the alerted to Rhodes council to torpedo her scholarship. That smacks of payback to me.

My big takeaway from this is this; What kind of world are we living in where our most prestigious and sought after academic opportunity require some kind of hardship as a prerequisite? Wouldn't society be so much better off if we gave these opportunities to the most intelligent and industrious students regardless of their upbringing?

Do you have children? Is this behavior you would find acceptable? Maybe you do. End justifies the means & fraud is an acceptable way to make sure you get where you want go. Way to diminish the value of a Rhodes scholarship.