32 ENTERTAINMENT
“Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal” gives new insight into famous scandal BY EMILY HELMUTH co-editor-in-chief The college admissions world was rocked two years ago when an investigation that involved several wealthy Americans got their under qualified children admitted into top universities became public. The FBI investigation, code named Operation Varsity Blues, made national news as it involved several notable celebrities such as Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman. Netflix’s recently released documentary, “Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal,” divulges into this enticing scandal. It centers around the ringleader of the entire operation: college counselor Rick Singer. The film reenacts several phone calls and conversations used as evidence in the case and shows viewers just how Singer created his “side door” into these notoriously exclusive universities, such as Stanford and USC. Singer’s career began in the late 90s, as while working as a college counselor he used methods such as over exaggerating details in college essays and lying about race on applications to further his clients’ chances of getting into these schools. He evolved his deceptions into a self made approach that he called the “side door.” This approach involved his clients paying millions of dollars for Singer to help get their kids into schools. Singer would manipulate these kids’ way into schools by presenting them as recruited athletes for
less popular sports, as he had connections and deals with many coaches of these sports. Oftentimes he would compensate these coaches to “recruit” his clients. As the film continues, the immortality of these actions by Singer, the parents and the universities involved becomes increasingly obvious and is painful to watch. It is made clear multiple times that the parents and the universities involved know that their actions are wrong, as many of Singer’s clients go
through extensive efforts to ensure their kids do not find out about their meddling. Besides the phone calls and reenactments, clips of real life high school and college students, including CPHS’ own senior Anne Gregg, are incorporated into the documentary as well. These clips are well placed and do an excellent job of capturing the emotion, hard work and dedication students put in when it comes to college admissions. This film is very eye opening for many reasons. At
the end, it reveals what legal punishment these families and universities faced, and, needless to say, I do not feel it is fairly distributed. In my eyes, it seems as if many of the wealthy people involved in the scandal only got a small slap on the wrist when it comes to being punished for their wrongdoing, especially in comparison to other lesser involved parties. Another take that I have from this film is that the college admissions process keeps elitism alive in society. This system is the perfect example of the wealthy throwing money at a problem instead of working to solve the problem. As someone who worked hard to get into my first choice university, the fact that people like Olivia Jade, Lori Loughlin’s daughter, who expressed little to no interest in furthering her education, were accepted over students who worked hard to achieve the test scores, grades and extracurricular success needed to get into prestige universities; it is frankly frustrating, and it delegitimizes the entire admissions processes at these universities. The documentary definitely achieved its goal: it got people talking. Hopefully, the conversations started by this documentary will revive the frustration felt by people when this scandal first came out, which will result in real life action being taken by evening out the college admissions playing field. The wealthy, legacies and athletes, such as the ones created by Singer, should no longer be given this unfair advantage for college admissions.
