I couldn’t find a list of USCandals that was comprehensive enough so I made my own. Presented with links to sources and brief descriptions. Last updated: 11/18/24.
CW: sexual violence, abuse, racism, discrimination.
Note 1: While LA Times’ articles are usually the most comprehensive on these matters, I picked no-paywall articles for the sake of free and accessible knowledge. If a reader were to use their free articles on any one article, the best by far is the investigation on the Qatar prince.
Note 2: Initial attempts to categorize these incidents chronologically proved futile, as there were constant updates. Most incidents were discovered in the last 5 years but spanned back to the last two decades.
2024 Graduation
4/16/24 — Valedictorian Asna Tabassum was supposed to give a speech at commencement but USC canceled her speech due to “security concerns” and her Pro-Palestine views. What should have been a campus issue sparks national debate and outrage, with many calling it the “Streisand Effect”.
4/20/24 — USC cancels keynote speech from alumnus Jon M. Chu and all speakers over the scandal.
4/24/24–Protests on campuses all across the US erupt to protest war. USC’s protest is also fueled by the valedictorian speech cancellation. Officers in riot gear arrest 93 people after dispersing the rest of the crowd.
4/25/24 — USC cancels main graduation ceremony altogether.
It’s worth noting that the Class of 2024 also missed their high school graduation ceremonies in 2020 due to covid.
2023 NFL Draft
Two students from the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism were arrested in Kansas City for stealing three jerseys worth $1050. According to security footage, they trespassed areas of the NFL Draft that were not open to them and their credentialed passes. They were charged for second-degree burglary, first-degree trespassing and stealing of $750 or more.
David Agus
LA Times found 95 instances of plagiarism, many from Wikipedia, in a new book published by David Agus, a highly awarded oncologist and professor at USC Keck School of Medicine and Viterbi School of Engineering. The Book of Animal Secrets: Nature’s Lessons for a Long and Happy Life was supposed to be published 3/7/23 but was exposed by LA Times on 3/6/23 and subsequently recalled. LA Times then found 120 more instances of plagiarism in his three previous books. Later articles blamed Agus’ ghostwriter Kristin Loberg, who also ghostwrote and plagiarized many books in nonfiction medical space.
USC Chan Division of Occupational Science & Occupational Therapy
The former Director of Admissions for the OT program, Dr. Arameh Anvarizadeh, was abruptly demoted to Associate Professor while on protected medical leave after her pregnancy. Anvarizadeh was credited for the most diverse classes in the program’s history. Students formed the USC Chan Justice Collective, to protest the demotion and question the school’s actual commitment to DEI.
USC Rossier School of Education
The National Student Legal Defense Network filed a class action lawsuit against Rossier and 2U, a contractor that runs USC’s online programs, alleging that falsified information was used to pad the online program’s rankings. Attorneys are looking for students to join the class action lawsuit.
Dean Pedro A. Noguera and USC Provost Charles F. Zukoski had previously self-reported that the school had been providing faulty data to US News & World Report’s graduate school rankings for at least the last five years and withdrew from the rankings.
USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work
Dean Marilyn Louise Flynn agreed to plead guilty to bribery for funneling $100,000 payment to secure LA County contracts with politician Mark Ridley-Thomas.
Ridley-Thomas’ son Sebastian was awarded scholarship & professorship while attending the school, after resigning as State Assemblyman after a sexual harassment investigation.
Bonus 1: LA Mayor Karen Bass received $100k in scholarship from Dean Flynn, before she even applied. The scholarship was unlisted in the former congresswoman’s disclosure forms until 8 years later.
Bonus 2: They took their degree program online with 2U, and developed demeaning marketing profiles of potential students, targeted low-income students of color and recruited candidates with low grades to meet enrollment targets. Graduates were left with staggering debt.
Bonus 2 Update: On 5/4/23, graduates of the online program filed a class action lawsuit against the program. The lawsuit alleges that USC presented the online program as equivalent to the in-person program, despite being outsourced to 2U, a for-profit edtech company. USC is being accused of misrepresentation, false advertising, and other illegal recruitment practices and graduates are seeking refunds for tuition.
Operation Varsity Blues
Dozens of individuals were involved in a nationwide criminal conspiracy that facilitated cheating on SATs and the admission of students to elite universities as purported athletic recruits. Athletic coaches from Yale, Stanford, USC, Wake Forest and Georgetown, among others, are implicated, as well as parents and exam administrators. Two dozen students at USC were admitted under false pretenses over the years while USC admin Donna Heinel received $1.3M in bribes.
George Tyndall
Gynecologist George Tyndall sexually abused thousands of women for over 30 years and only when a nurse reported him to the school’s Sexual Violence Prevention Services, was he asked to resign. Previous complaints had been ignored. USC paid a record-breaking $1.1 billion settlement to 700+ survivors. Pulitzer-winning coverage here.
He was found dead in his home the first week of October 2023 while awaiting trial in 2024 relating to 16 patients.
Dennis Kelly
Former campus physician Dennis Kelly sexually abused male students over decades and discriminated against them based on their sexual orientation and gender, all of the students identifying as LGBT+. Previous complaints were ignored. USC reached a settlement with 80 students.
USC Marshall School of Business
Marketing professor CW Park targeted and sexually assaulted Korean-American undergrad student assistants. Lawsuit victim claims USC knew of previous complaints about Park and still allowed him to hire and supervise young female student employees.
Dean James Ellis was abruptly removed due to his handling of harassment and discrimination claims regarding Marshall faculty, timing was aligned with CW Park’s lawsuit but direct relation is still unclear. The Board of Trustees didn’t clarify, resulting in public outcry and complaints that the process lacked transparency and due process.
USC Keck School of Medicine
USC cardiology fellowship (jointly run by LA County-USC Medical Center) lost national accreditation based on the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education’s investigation. ACGME put both USC and LA County, which jointly run 60+ medical student programs, on probation. Unclear if this was connected to 3 former medical residents’ lawsuit about a physician sexually assaulting them.
Former Dean Carmen Puliafito was using drugs at fundraisers, keeping a mistress, supplying her with drugs (resulting in her overdose), paying for her rehab, & sneaking drugs to her at rehab.
Dean Rohit Varma was Puliafito’s replacement but turns out there were sexual harassment allegations against Varma in the past, resulting in USC paying $135k in a settlement to the victim.
USC Athletics
Nov 2024: NCAA fined USC football $50k and placed them on a one-year probation. The football program exceeded the number of coaches by six from 2022–2023.
May 2023: USC Athletic Director Mike Bohn resigned suddenly 5/19/23, though he negotiated USC’s move from PAC-12 to Big Ten beginning 7/1/24. LA Times reported that USC retained an external firm to conduct a review of the department and found that staff had concerns about Bohn’s management, namely that he made inappropriate remarks about female staff and missed important events and meetings.
Sep 2021: Former Song Girls coach was found to have been body-shaming, harassing and retaliating against spirit squad members in a USC Title IX investigation.
Apr 2021: USC Basketball assistant coach Tony Bland violated NCAA ethical conduct rules by accepting bribes, resulting in minor NCAA sanctions.
Apr 2016: A hot mess of scandals with USC Football coach Steve Sarkisian and USC Athletic Director Pat Haden. Key words: addiction, nonprofit embezzlement, firing, retiring, etc.
Sep 2010: Reggie Bush and OJ Mayo forfeited amateur status by receiving gifts from agents. Bush returned his Heisman trophy.
Jun 2010: USC’s football, men’s basketball and women’s tennis programs were investigated and punished for violating NCAA rules.
(tbh I don’t care enough about sportsball to look into it any further but here’s a good timeline)
USC Fraternities
USC suspended all fraternity social events after multiple reports of sexual assault, drugging, and battery. In response, most fraternities disaffiliated from the school to forego proposed safety precautions and school oversight.
(if anything, this speaks more about fraternities and the national trend of disaffiliating from universities, than USC)
USC Title IX Office, Office of Conduct, Accountability & Professionalism, Center for Work & Family Life
US Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights investigated USC’s Title IX procedures and found it failed to protect students from George Tyndall. OCR promises to closely monitor USC’s Title IX restructuring.
A lawsuit claimed Conduct office administrators systematically destroyed or hid records in cases against top officials, kept “shadow files” on employees, used the office to retaliate against professors who spoke out, and deleted files related to George Tyndall.
Lawsuit was brought by an attorney who was originally hired as senior investigator for the Conduct office. The attorney was placed on retaliatory administrative leave for investigating John Gaspari, director for Center for Work and Family Life and romantic partner of Gretchen Gaspari, the director of the Office of Equity & Diversity, Title IX, and Office of Conduct. The attorney’s investigation found that John Gaspari had previously pleaded no contest of sexual misconduct involving nonconsensual sexual photography.
Professors request independent investigation into alleged reports of faculty “shadow files”.
LA Coliseum
For background, a grand jury indicted six people for 29 counts of conspiracy, embezzlement and bribery for stealing millions from the LA-County-owned stadium. (LA Times keeps a tab on the documents they’ve collected and pieces they’ve written about the former Coliseum Commission’s financial scandals and rave-related deaths.)
As a result of the Coliseum’s troubles, USC successfully lobbied in ethically questionable ways to take over the LA Coliseum. They then signed a 99-year lease at $1 million/year in rent for a taxpayer-owned venue. While the lease originally included $100 million in renovation commitments over 50 years from USC, it’s unclear how much United Airline is now paying for a 10-year naming deal.
Qatar prince
Sheikh Khalifa Bin Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani was awarded a Bachelor’s and Master’s from USC without attending classes or turning in assignments. He is said to have bribed professors and staff, lived a lavish lifestyle surrounded by a host of employees, including a graduate student as an academic “sherpa”. His mom previously met with former USC President Max Nikias and both parties deny any donations from Qatar or the royal family.
Additional Resources:
Concerned Faculty of USC — group of USC faculty who want to be involved in creating better governance at the university in light of recent debacles.
USC Commitment to Change — USC’s website for previous issues and attempts to do better.
Profile on Max Nikias— USC President & prodigious fundraiser, but his leadership of relentless growth and no transparency laid the groundwork for a lot of these scandals. Finally left because of George Tyndall with a $7.6 million exit package.
Bad City: Peril & Power in the City of Angels — book by Paul Pringle about corruption and cover-ups in LA’s biggest institutions, starting from Carmen Puliafito.
USC Publications — Daily Trojan and Annenberg Media don’t shy away from reporting on any of the issues mentioned above but their links were not included for potential conflict of interest.