Follow the Money | AS STUDENT LOAN SCANDAL SPREADS, DAY HALL PLAYS IT COOL

iN MAY, THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS, AUSTIN, FIRED ITS associate vice president of student financial services. The move came as no surprise--Lawrence Burt had been on leave for six weeks since a wide-ranging investigation of student loan practices by New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo turned up improprieties. As news of the scandal spread, the Department of Education launched an investigation of forty-four institutions, and the New York State Legislature passed the Student Lending Accountability, Transparency, and Enforcement Act--the first law of its kind in the country. On May 9, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a similar bill, the Student Loan Sunshine Act, three Republicans shy of a unanimous vote.

As Cuomo turned up the heat, even schools that appeared to be above reproach were getting jumpy. At Cornell, associate provost for admissions and enrollment Doris Davis prohibited financial aid staff from speaking to Cornell Alumni Magazine in person or by phone, and the University's press office responded to inquiries with a three-sentence statement. "We have reviewed our own performance in this area and can report that Cornell University does not receive any favorable considerations from any institution providing financial loans to its student body," the e-mail read, in part. "To ensure transparency and greater efficiency, the university administration is evaluating initiatives to streamline the current processes by which the university and its fourteen colleges and schools interact with financial lenders." Beyond that, details were tough to pin down. "I can assure you that we conducted an internal investigation," vice president for financial affairs and university controller Joanne DeStefano, MBA '98, wrote in an e-mail. "In addition, our audit committee of the Board of Trustees also discussed this at our last meeting."

Unlike reporters, students--50 percent of whom have University- administered financial aid--received no such assurance. "I would like to have heard from Cornell," says Amy Saltzman '07, an Iowa native who graduated from the Arts college with about $10,000 in debt. "I understand they're not implicated in these investigations, but it would have been nice to receive any communication." Administrators say they've heard little from students or parents since the scandal started making headlines; most inquiries have come from the media and Cornell's senior staff. Furthermore, they say, because most Cornell students receive direct federal loans, and only a small percentage pursue funding from private lenders, there were fewer concerns on the Hill to start with.

Grayson Fahrner '08, a Syracuse native enrolled in the Ag college, receives more than $7,000 annually in a private loan from Key Bank. As soon as Cuomo's investigation hit the media, the development sociology and applied economics major called the University's ethics hotline, inquiring into the status of the financial aid office. In particular, he wondered whether Cornell had held itself to a higher standard than its peer institutions--including Columbia, whose financial aid director, David Charlow, was fired after it came to light that he owned stock in Student Loan Xpress, a company that had received preferred lender status.

A month later, the junior was still waiting for a response. "I'm comfortable with the ethical conduct that I see," says Fahrner, a student employee in Cornell's office of alumni affairs who ran this spring for a spot as a student-elected trustee. "The quality of leadership at Cornell with regard to ethics is good, but they've been really quiet. If there were impropriety it should be publicized immediately. Even if there was no wrongdoing, that should be absolutely clear. It's an opportunity to stand out compared with other schools that have screwed up."

Preferred lender list practices have received the most scrutiny in the ongoing investigation, due to a variety of lucrative revenuesharing agreements, expensive golf junkets for university administrators, and other high-profile ethical improprieties. Until the end of the 2006–07 school year, Cornell's preferred lender was Key Bank, a relationship that grew out of a competitive bidding process close to a dozen years ago. Administrators say the University never received shared revenues from the arrangement. "In November of 2006, we began to hear rumors of rule changes regarding preferred lenders and legislative proposals regarding ‘sunshine laws,' " director of financial aid Tom Keane wrote in an e-mail, referring to laws providing open access to information. "In an effort to stay ahead of any concerns, as we planned our awarding practices for 2007–08, we decided to eliminate any [single] recommended lender." Instead, he wrote, students are directed to a list of alternative financing sources.

The elimination of preferred lender programs may address the ethical concerns associated with free travel and questionable stock holdings, but it also comes with a cost, says Keane. "Not unlike the telephone or utility deregulations," he wrote, "more choices mean more research on the part of consumers." Fahrner says that wouldn't have been an issue for his family--his parents have the financial savvy to have assessed his options. Saltzman says her family would have foundered."My parents haven't taken out lots of loans in the past," she says. "They don't deal with large amounts of money." Fahrner suggests a competitive service modeled on online reservation services might be the way to go. "I'm not sure if there's an Expedia.com for student loans out there," he says. "That's a business idea, maybe."

Calvin Selth '07, a Los Angeles native who plans to spend the next two years with Teach for America at a bilingual charter school in Long Beach, California, racked up almost $50,000 in debt over the last four years. The outgoing Student Assembly representative says Cornell provided far more information about financing options than many of the schools he considered as a high school senior. But there's still room for improvement, Selth says, and while the S. A. didn't tackle the topic this past semester, it will when it reconvenes in the fall. "Cornell needs to strengthen its position on such a public issue," says Fahrner. "The campus discourse is not as loud as it could be."

-- Sharon Tregaskis '95

Second Act | A HALF-CENTURY LATER, MILT KOGAN '57 FINALLY GETS HIS SHEEPSKIN

fOR MANY COLLEGE STUDENTS, the second semester of their senior year is haunted by an unrelenting question: "What are you going to do with your life?" But Milton Kogan wasn't a typical senior. He already knew what he was doing with his life--in fact, he'd lived most of it. A family doctor in Beverly Hills and an accomplished actor (his many TV appearances include the recurring role of Officer Kogan on the series "Barney Miller"), Kogan graduated from Cornell at the age of seventy-one, two weeks before his fiftieth class reunion.

Encouraged by his wife, Susan--and inspired by his daughter's graduation from the Hotel school in 2006--Kogan returned to the Hill this spring to complete his bachelor of science degree, fifty years after he dropped out for financial reasons. Kogan left the Ag college in 1957 at his father's insistence, having been accepted to osteopathy school after three years of undergrad. "Initially, it was hard for us to review his petition," says Pamela Torelli, advising records coordinator for the college. With a fifty-year gap in his studies, the admissions office had to dig his records out of microfiche files. "We have had people return after twelve or fifteen years, but this was the biggest jump I've ever seen."

After transferring fifteen credits of German he had taken at a community college in California, Kogan was twelve credits short of a degree. In January, he and his wife, as well as their cat and their chocolate Lab, moved from their Beverly Hills home to a rental in Cayuga Heights to complete his senior year. "It's been a long time since I tried to think like this," says Kogan, sitting on the Willard Straight patio, clad in the classic student uniform of jeans and a baseball cap. "As a physician, people treat you with such reverence. Now I'm like a putzy freshman."

As an interdisciplinary studies major, Kogan took a wide range of classes, including two communication courses, an introductory animal science course, a horticulture course, and a graduate level education course in science and democracy. "He actually took fifteen credits--more than he needed," says Kogan's adviser, Toni DiTommaso, an associate professor in crop and soil sciences. "It does not surprise me; he made it clear that learning never ends."

In addition to his osteopathy degree, Kogan holds an MD from the University of California, Irvine, and a master of public health in epidemiology from UCLA. Yet after medical school, Kogan was unsure he wanted to be a doctor. He began taking acting classes from Leonard Nimoy, best known as Mr. Spock on "Star Trek." "He got me interested in acting as an art form, an emotional way of touching myself," says Kogan. "I'd been studying in white walls. It was so sterile. Acting was just the opposite. It really hit a chord for me."Kogan soon made his way into commercials, television shows ("Sanford and Son," "Kojak"), and eventually films, including The Sunshine Boys, The Lady in Red, and E.T.

But Kogan says that earning so much money as an actor made him feel guilty, prompting him to serve three years as a Peace Corps physician in West Africa. After returning to the U.S., he joined the National Health Service, becoming a doctor in a small Montana town before settling in Los Angeles. Despite all that life experience, Kogan still felt competitive pressure when he returned to the Cornell classroom."Intellectual study is rigorous," he says. "These kids are so bright. I have all these degrees and sometimes I didn't know what the twenty-one-year-olds were saying in class. And they were thinking, This guy's a doctor--he must know."

Following his graduation and reunion, Kogan and his wife moved back to L.A. to await the birth of their second grandchild. Though he has returned to his medical practice and Hollywood career, he also plans to grow grapes and make wine, skills he learned in horticulture class."Maybe I was getting too routine," he says of his L.A. existence. "There are other things to do in life; that's one of the reasons this has been so exciting for me."

When Kogan decided to return to Cornell, the partners in his medical practice called him crazy. His kids--even daughter Millay Kogan '06--thought it was a joke at first. "If there's one thing I learned here in my sixteen weeks, it's how rich it is just to listen without having to critically comment or give your opinion," Kogan says. "Processing what other people think and say is something I haven't been doing enough of over the last thirty years."

-- Sherry Stolar '07

Talk Therapy | CORNELL COUNSELING DIRECTOR GREG EELLS ON THE VIRGINIA TECH TRAGEDY, AND WHY ANTIDEPRESSANTS ARE ALMOST AS POPULAR AS ACNE MEDS

CAM: Let's get it on the record. Is Cornell really the suicide capital of America?

GE: It's not. The data nationwide says the suicide rate is about one college student per 10,000 per year, so about two at a university of our size--and that's where we've been.Historically, some suicides at Cornell have involved the gorges; they've impacted the community in public ways, which perpetuates the myth.

CAM: Do you think it's harder to be a college student today than it was a generation ago?

GE: It's more complicated. So much is coming at you, it's hard to step back and ask, "What is important to me, what are my values, what really matters?" And technology has a way of making us think we can control what happens to us. If you don't like the world around you, put on your iPod; if you're lonely, talk on your cell phone. That's not very good conditioning for life.

CAM: Is it true that psychoactive medications are among the most prescribed drugs at college clinics?

GE: They're third, behind allergy and acne medication.

CAM: How many students did Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) see in 2006–07?

GE: We don't have all the data yet, but we had about 2,700 the previous year and it will probably go up to 3,000. Ten years ago it was 1,500.

CAM: So demand has doubled over the past decade.Why?

GE: Stigma has decreased, so people are more willing to seek care instead of thinking, I'm gonna suck it up and deal with it on my own. And psychiatric treatment has gotten better, so people are able to attend Cornell where fifteen or twenty years ago they may not have--yet they still need support. Maybe they were able to excel in a high school that gave them a lot of structure, and then they come to a university where the attitude is more like,"Navigate the system. Good luck."

CAM: What are students being treated for these days?

GE: Most are diagnosed with some spectrum of depression. Anxiety is pretty big, as are eating disorders and substance abuse. Attention deficit seems to be getting more common. More students have suicidality as a symptom. Self-injury, like cutting, is also something we've been seeing more of in the last ten years.

CAM: Is there a limit to the number of counseling sessions?

GE: No, we base it on need. If someone feels, "I'm pretty stable but I need years of therapy to work through stuff with my mother," that's not really our model, so we'll refer to private practitioners in town.

CAM: What was your reaction when you heard about the mass murder at Virginia Tech in April?

GE: My first thought was, thirty people-- how can that happen? And I thought, our work will never be the same.We'll wonder, any time someone is crying or angry: are they going to be the next Seung-Hui Cho?

CAM: Some people blamed the murders in part on violent films and video games.

GE: Nobody does what Cho did because of a movie. However, there's good evidence that those things can desensitize somebody. Exposure to violent images is like getting the flu. You're stressed, your immune system is weakened, you're exposed to a bug--if you have enough of them, you get sick. It's similar with violent behavior. If there's hazing or bullying, someone is socially awkward, there's isolation, disconnection, exposure to violence, availability of weapons--it all contributes to what happened.

CAM: So how can you prevent that kind of tragedy?

GE: The reality is, you can't. You can do things to reduce the risk, to reach out to students, but we live in a society that values individual rights. Until someone acts out, you can't just lasso them and take them to a hospital. There are hundreds of kids on every college campus that counselors and academic advisers are concerned about--their behavior is a little odd, they make other people uncomfortable-- but they're not violent.

CAM: What about the case of the George Washington student who sued after he was expelled for admitting he had suicidal thoughts?

GE: It's the other end of the spectrum. But if you kick out people because they're depressed or struggling with mental illness, you're going to drive them underground. If you look at the data, 70 percent of the suicides on college campuses are people who never sought counseling. A lot of time people in the most serious pain are the ones who are never going to share it.

-- Beth Saulnier

Calling Fouls | AN ECONOMIST TRADES SHOTS WITH THE NBA

most graduate students hope their work will see the light of day, perhaps be published in an academic journal or scholarly book. Many never make it that far--let alone become the subject of a media frenzy. But that's what happened to economist Joseph Price, PhD '07, when he and a colleague did a study that found that racial bias by NBA referees affects the number of fouls called--and, ultimately, a game's outcome. "To have LeBron James call you stupid or Kobe Bryant call you an idiot just aren't things you ever expect to happen to you," says Price, recently hired as an assistant professor of economics at Brigham Young University.

Since Price's co-author--Justin Wolfers, an assistant professor of economics at Penn's Wharton School--presented their findings at conferences last spring, both have been busy defending the study in the media. After it was featured in the New York Times in May, it became a hotly debated topic in athletic and economic circles, prompting NBA commissioner David Stern to state in a press conference, "Racism doesn't exist in the NBA. This is a bum rap, that's all."

The authors used NBA data from 1991 to 2003 to determine the racial make-up of the three-person referee crews; they found that players got about 4 percent more fouls when all referees are of the opposite race. Some have criticized their methodology, claiming that because they did not know which referee made which call, their findings are inconclusive; the NBA--which refused to identify the race of individual refs--published its own study refuting the bias claims. Price attributes the vehement reaction to the league's status as a diverse organization. "We've always thought of the NBA as the paragon of racial equality," he says. "It's a place where a lot of the referees, coaches, and stars are black. If anywhere, this is an organization where racism shouldn't be occurring. For us to say these implicit biases still exist is upsetting."

Although Price is glad that their findings have been so widely debated, he wants the discussion to expand beyond sports. He hopes to conduct more studies on how subconscious biases affect decisions in settings like the classroom and workplace. "This reaction only proves how important these studies are," he says, "because we can't get rid of the 4 percent if we're not willing to acknowledge it's there."

-- Liz Sheldon '09