CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — North Carolina athletic director Bubba Cunningham is hopeful the school is finally near the end of its long-running academic fraud scandal. The school is a month away from its 90-day deadline to respond to the NCAA’s latest Notice of Allegations (NOA), which outlined five serious charges that include lack of institutional control. In an interview with the Associated Press, Cunningham said that UNC will meet that deadline — there had previously been an eight-month hiccup in the process — in a case that hung over a strong 2015-16 sports season. “I think we have positive momentum going,” Cunningham said. “I think we have more confidence. I think our campus community has healed and is continuing to heal. … I think there’s also some anxiety about what the future holds, but I don’t think it’s nearly as acute as it was 24 or 48 months ago.” The case, an offshoot of a 2010 NCAA probe into the football program, centers on independent study-style courses offering GPA-boosting grades in the formerly named African and Afro-American Studies department. A 2014 review by former U.S. Justice Department official Kenneth Wainstein estimated more than 3,100 students were affected between 1993 and 2011, with athletes across numerous sports making up roughly half the enrollments. The NCAA first sent an NOA outlining five potentially top-level charges in May 2015. UNC was near its response deadline in August when it reported additional information for review, pausing the…
Continue Reading: College athletics | Tar Heels see light at end of tunnel of academic fraud
