Our story last week on a special faculty report that drew more attention to the connection between UNC-Chapel Hill athletics and what appears to be the worst case of academic fraud in recent memory cited an issue regarding the process of admitting athletes with subpar academic records.

The issue, as the report said, appeared to be the fact that Admissions Director Stephen Farmer had yet to reject a recommendation by a special advisory committee that reviews such athletes for potential admission.

"It appears that Admissions can override decisions of the subcommittee, though a recommendation by the subcommittee has never been overruled since Farmer has been director. What criteria or influences would be used in such cases?" the report said.

Jan Boxill, chairwoman of the Faculty Senate Council at UNC-CH, later contacted us and said that issue is a minor one, because the special advisory committee is made up of faculty members who are concerned about academics. The issue, she and authors of the report said, pales in comparison to the good work Farmer has done to ensure that athletes who have little chance of surviving the academic load at the university do not get admitted.

The report points out such efforts: "According to Stephen Farmer, his office and the Athletics Department have increased efforts to discourage teams from presenting candidates that represent exceptionally high risks in terms of their ability to succeed academically at UNC. There is evidence that these efforts are working. In addition his office is accumulating data on the academic performance of admitted students so that looking forward, they will have an approved basis for assessing and managing risk."

The first clue of no-show classes at UNC-Chapel Hill came when rival N.C. State fans in early July 2011 found plagiarism in a Swahili paper by a former football player. The paper listed Julius Nyang'oro as the professor.

We thought it was newsworthy, and sought to find Nyang'oro for a story we published on the Swahili paper on July 17. We contacted his office and the department, and ultimately, we got this emailed comment from Kim Weaver Spurr, who is a spokeswoman for the College of Arts and Sciences:

"He is traveling in Africa right now. His unc email account is the best way to reach him while he is traveling."

The date of the email is July 14.

Fast forward to May and June of this year. UNC officials announce academic fraud in 54 classes, and say they can't verify that dozens of other independent studies were conducted with academic rigor. One of those no-show classes was AFAM 280, which Nyang'oro sought to place on the academic calendar two days before the 2011 summer session began. It was almost immediately filled with 18 football players and a former player.

According to UNC-CH's academic calendar, that session was supposed to have been held from June 16 through July 19, last year, with exams scheduled July 21-22.

The upshot is if Spurr's email is correct -- and according to an earlier email, it was information she had double checked -- that means Nyang'oro was in Africa for at least some chunk of the summer session in which he was supposed to be teaching a class.

These sessions, by the way, compress a typical three-and-a-half-month semester into little more than a month. So not being around for even a small part of it creates a larger problem.

We pointed out Spurr's email and the summer class schedule to UNC officials two days ago. We have also previously asked whether Nyang'oro was in Africa at the time of this class. When we get clarification from UNC officials -- or from law enforcement officials who are investigating -- we will let you know.

The Daily Tar Heel has a scoop today on the UNC-Chapel Hill academic fraud case  -- the first published interview with a student who took one of the no-show classes.

It turns out one of the student paper's staffers had taken AFAM 428, Bioethics in Afro-American Studies -- in the summer of 2009. The staffer, Nate Harrison, a nonathlete, tells the DTH that a friend characterized it as an easy class and a grade-point-average booster. Harrison also said the class had been described to him as an independent study.

Harrison told the DTH the class never met, and at the end of the session, he emailed professor Julius Nyang'oro a 20-page paper. Nyang'oro was the longtime chairman of the African and Afro-American Studies department until he stepped down as the scandal began to surface. He has since been forced into retirement.

"I never once saw Nyang'oro," Harrison told the DTH.

A university review found 54 classes within the African and Afro-American Studies department over a four-year period that had little or no instruction. Nyang'oro either taught or graded at least 45 of them. The State Bureau of Investigation is now conducting a criminal probe.

A spokesman for the state Secretary of State says that a probe into agent-related activity surrounding UNC-Chapel Hill's football program remains open nearly two years after it began.

"It's still active," said George Jeter, a spokesman for Secretary of State Elaine Marshall.

He acknowledged that no public action has been taken against any agent.

In March, an NCAA report formalized sanctions against the university that were caused, in part, by agents or those connected to them providing benefits to players. The report detailed lodging, trips, money and other things of value that were provided to the players in violation of NCAA rules.

The state's agent law says that agents seeking to sign up players shall not provide anything of value to an athlete unless they have a signed contract. Violations are a felony.

The NCAA report detailed expenses by an agent, Gary Wichard of California, who has since died. Wichard is identified in the report only as "sports agent 1."

But the NCAA report describes other agent activity and the university has identified other agents as having provided benefits.

One of them, identified as "sports agent 2" in the NCAA report, gave money to former star Marvin Austin. In 2010, the agent "deposited $1,000 into (Austin's) bank account..." the NCAA report says.

In 2010, the NCAA report says, Austin "traveled to Miami three times between March 8 and May 31, with all expenses paid by sports agent 2. He also made trips to Washington D.C. in 2009 and 2010 that were paid for by sports agents."

Austin was held out of the 2010 football season as the NCAA probe mushroomed.

The NCAA said UNC failed to monitor information about Austin and "did no follow-up" or even a "cursory review" that would have helped the university discover NCAA violations.

The Secretary of State's office has issued warrants seeking bank records and other information. Jeter would say only that the probe is ongoing.

As our Sunday story reported, we now have the data from UNC-Chapel Hill regarding how many former athletes were among the students enrolled in the 54 suspect classes in the academic fraud case. The former athletes bring the total percentage of athlete enrollments in the classes to 64 percent, or nearly two of every three seats.

You can find the data at the end of this post.

There is one element missing in this data that the university had provided in the past and that's a breakdown of how many football and men's basketball players are among the former athletes. University officials said they could not make that information public because the numbers may be small enough -- say, one former basketball player in a particular class -- that it might identify that person.

The university is citing a federal law known as the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which often is described as FERPA, for denying the information. You can read about FERPA here.

One of the more interesting findings in our story is that athletes, including former athletes, on average took more suspect classes than nonathletes. The ratio was roughly 2 classes per athlete, and one per non-athlete.

After seeing that, I took another look at former UNC-CH football player Marvin Austin's partial transcript. We had reported the B-plus he received in one suspect class, but the transcript shows he was also signed up for another: AFRI 520 -- Southern Africa, in the first summer semester of 2009. The transcript does not show a grade, possibly because he had not taken the class yet.

That class had six enrollments. Of those, five were football players, the other a nonathlete.

Documents:

Gov. Bev Perdue on Thursday took her first swipe at a $336 million tax break that state lawmakers added to last year's budget.

It was billed by House Speaker Thom Tillis and Senate leader Phil Berger, both Republicans, as a break for small businesses, but in reality it is open to anyone who is an owner or partner in a business that is not your standard corporation. As we reported June 3, lawyers in the state's top money-making firms, for example, will be eligible to collect the roughly $3,500 tax break.

What's interesting about Perdue's attack on the tax break isn't what she says now, but what she didn't say when we thrice asked her whether she supported it -- twice while reporting the June 3 story and a third time when we did a reaction story a few days later.

Perdue, a Democrat not seeking re-election, could not be reached in person, but Mark Johnson, her deputy press secretary, issued this statement regarding the tax break:

"The Governor supports tax relief that helps businesses create jobs."

After receiving that non-answer answer, we asked again.

Johnson's response: "You have our answer."

After the story ran, we sought reaction from the gubernatorial candidates, Perdue, Tillis and Berger. Perdue, like the others, relied on her spokesman for a comment.

Said Johnson: "The Governor supports tax relief that helps businesses create jobs."

The latest position -- after some Democratic lawmakers unsuccessfully sought to limit the tax break to small businesses -- is a bit different. A news release listing the "Top 20 Budget Flaws" says this:

"It's worth noting that, despite all of these failings, the General Assembly manages to lavish $336 million of tax breaks to lobbying firms, lawyers, and other wealthy businesses. Budgets are about values, priorities, and choices. The General Assembly chose tax breaks to wealthy businesses, while other pressing needs went unmet."

This morning, Perdue said she is vetoing the Republican-led General Assembly's budget. It's unclear whether she will go to the mat on the $336 million tax break in the days ahead.

An Indianapolis Star report two years ago on basketball team graduation rates is catching attention today in light of  the academic fraud case at UNC-Chapel Hill.

The report notes that seven of the players on UNC-Chapel Hill's 2005 championship team who had graduated by the time the story was published all received the same degree -- a bachelor of arts in African and Afro-American Studies.

The Star interviewed Sean May, who was the center for the team, and his comments have a particular resonance today, with the university now acknowledging a major academic fraud case in that department involving classes with little or no instruction. Many of these classes have high enrollments of athletes in the two big money sports -- basketball and football.

According to the Star: 'May said he started as a double major with communications, but dropped it so he could graduate faster after leaving for the NBA.Afro-American and African studies, May said, offered "more independent electives, independent study. I could take a lot of classes during the season. Communications, I had to be there in the actual classroom. We just made sure all the classes I had to take, I could take during the summer."'

May left the school for the NBA following the 2005 championship, but collected his degree four years later. It's unclear what classes he took or who taught them. The academic fraud centers on the former chairman, Julius Nyang'oro, who is being allowed to retire effective July 1.

The Star's report said the high number of African studies graduates on the basketball team raises issues of "clustering," in which athletes are steered to a particular course of instruction because it's easier to accomplish. But John Blanchard, UNC-CH's senior associate athletics director in charge of student-athletes services, told the Star that wasn't the case.

"The question is whether they are getting a good education," he said, "and the answer is a resounding yes."

May is one of more than a dozen prominent athletes listed as Facebook friends with Deborah Crowder, the former administrative assistant for the department who has declined to be interviewed by university officials investigating the academic fraud.

The Star's report can be found here.

July 1: Football player Michael McAdoo files a lawsuit against UNC-CH and the NCAA after being kicked off the team because a tutor had provided footnotes and a bibliography for a term paper. The paper turns out to have several plagiarized passages that were missed by university officials and NCAA investigators. The paper identifies Julius Nyang’oro, chairman of the African and Afro-American Studies Department, as class professor. Chancellor Holden Thorp in a subsequent interview tells The News & Observer he is not going to question Nyang’oro about the paper.

Aug. 21: A partial academic transcript for another football player, Marvin Austin, shows he took an upper level African studies class in the summer of 2007 before taking a full slate of introductory courses in the fall that included remedial writing. Austin received a B-plus in the African studies class. UNC-CH records identified Nyang’oro as the professor.

Sept. 1: Nyang’oro resigns as chairman. University officials launch an investigation into “possible irregularities” in the African studies department after The N&O requests data on independent studies and other courses in which no class is held.

Sept. 16: UNC-CH officials confirm the investigation is targeting independent studies in the department. Data released to The N&O shows that football players are accounting for more than one in five of the enrollments in those classes.

May 4: UNC-CH’s investigation finds 54 classes in the department in which there is little or no evidence of instruction. Among them are the classes McAdoo and Austin took. Nyang’oro is directly connected to 45 of the classes. The report also finds evidence of forgery and unauthorized grade changes, but law enforcement officials decline to investigate, saying there is an apparent lack of financial motive. Data later released to The N&O shows 36 percent of the enrollments are football players and another three percent are basketball players. Nyang'oro is allowed to retire.

May 10: Records requested by The N&O show Nyang’oro received $12,000 in additional pay to teach a summer class in 2011 that the internal probe found to have no classroom instruction.

May 14: Orange County District Attorney Jim Woodall announces a criminal investigation in light of the summer pay, but said the probe would also look into forgery and other allegations related to the case.
 
June 8: New information released to the N&O shows the summer class under criminal investigation had been created just days before the start of the semester, and quickly  filled with football players. Of 19 enrollments, 18 were current players on the team and the other a former player. The information also showed that academic advisers for the players knew the course did not meet, but still helped them enroll in it. The university says it is seeking the return of the $12,000 Nyang'oro received.

Our series on hospitals began today. There's one online element that we couldn't put in the newspaper. Go here to see a hospital bill that shows how charges range all over the place at Triangle hospitals. A day in a cardiac intensive care room can bring a charge of $730,  or $3265, depending on what hospital you're in.  A chest x-ray? Anywhere from $98 to $394.