N&O: Dan Kane leaks audio that may break UNC case open

Below is our take on the article that Dan Kane just posted on the N&O. It potentially could be a big break in the UNC scandal. We strongly suggest that you head over to the N&O’s page and read that article (and listen to the full audio) to get the full story.

The facts are all there. UNC has admitted to administering fake classes, however, those classes weren’t ALL athletes. Therefore, they argued that the NCAA couldn’t punish their athletics programs based on the (poorly written) by-laws.

While many will disagree with the ruling, the real meat of the story is that UNC sacrificed their standing in the academic community to clear their athletic program. Again, they admitted to giving fake classes and stood by the story that they were not put in place to help only athletes. So if not only athletes, who were the fake classes put in to help? I guess the answer has to be ‘all students.’

So what does that mean? I guess it means that UNC was charging people for a full education and a degree, but wasn’t requiring the full workload to be put in to get that degree. Is that allowed?

Spoiler alert: It’s not,

The group that polices these things is the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges. They decide which institutions can be accredited as universities and which can not. There is a certain standard that these schools are forced to hold up.

Dan Kane, the investigative journalist who has been dropping bombshells for years now on this case, just leaked the audio from his conversation with the President of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, Belle Wheelan.

The full audio is on the N&O’s page, ( and we REALLY advise you listen to it) but the gist of it is this:

Wheelan and the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges made an agreement with UNC that they could keep their accreditation as long as those credits were not counted towards a student’s degree.

However, Kane brought up the fact that what UNC told Wheelan and company was in direct contradiction with what they told the NCAA.

Here is the back and forth:

“You guys stipulated this to the university in order to not hit them with something worse than continued monitoring,” Kane said.

“Probation. Right. Right,” Wheelan replied.

“And so they agree to that,” Kane continued. “But then they go to the NCAA and they tell them the grades counted towards a degree, and that’s what I’m getting at here. This does not jibe with … ”

“It doesn’t pass the smell test, yeah, I hear you,” Wheelan replied. “I don’t know what they told the NCAA. All I know is what they told us, and apparently whatever they told us, they did, and we were happy with it. That’s the best I can do.”

Kane continued: “You wouldn’t look at this and say, ‘Wait a minute, you know, the university wasn’t being truthful with the NCAA?’”

Wheelan replied: “If you print it, then we will look at it because we have a policy of unsolicited information. So if it hits the media and raises a question, then, yes, we would go back and review it again. So you are going to have to write about it first or somebody is going to have to bring it to our attention first. I’m not just going after the university.”

After this exchange, Kane comes back and tells her that he is bringing the contradiction to her attention and Wheelan then repeats that only if he prints it will she look into it.

Wait, what? Is this real? Is the President of the group that is supposed to police academic fraud, literally saying she’s not willing to go after academic fraud until the media points it out in print? So should the media be cashing a check from The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, because obviously, Kane is doing her job for her here.

Anyways, there is a lot more to the story and at the end, there are some pretty telling quotes from Wheelan that suggest there could be sanctions put on UNC. We won’t quote it on here because we really want you to go over there and read the full story.

TLDR:  UNC skirted the NCAA by saying it was an academic issue. Now it’s the public and the media’s job to make sure that very academic issue is punished.

Educate yourself on the details of Kane’s piece and then take this to social media and let it be heard.

Could this audio end up breaking the UNC case back open?