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The Significance of Fraudulent Educational Claims

Dear Source:
The recent article about my poll results by the Source reporter Eddie Huffman does a great disservice to the people of the Virgin Islands. The report of the poll was accurate in that I showed Foncie Donastorg moving into second place, and while I did ask a question about Foncie misrepresenting his academic credentials, care was taken to insure it would not influence the results.
In reference to Foncie's reported academic credentials, Madison University is licensed by the State of Mississippi as a commercial enterprise yet the Mississippi Commission on Collegiate Accreditation includes Madison University on their list of diploma mills offering non-accredited and worthless degrees.
The Source reporter seemed to imply that Madison was not on any list of Degree Mills or Diploma Mills and nothing could be further from the truth. If you Google the words "Madison University Degree Mill" the search engine returns 1.55 million references. The very first reference is from the State of Oregon government site where Madison University is on the list. It also makes lists of worthless degrees on the State sites of Michigan, Maine and Oregon and is listed by Wikipedia as a "diploma mill."
In the State of Oregon, misrepresenting yourself as a college graduate by use of a degree mill diploma is a Class B Misdemeanor and it is also illegal to some extent in North Dakota, New Jersey and Indiana. Other states that place a value on education are considering similar legislation. Therefore, as Governor of the Virgin Islands, Foncie would have to remove all academic claims from his biography or face arrest on his trips to America for the various conferences. In America, his false claims do matter and he is engaging in criminal activity.
John A. Boyd
St. Croix

Editor's note: We welcome and encourage readers to keep the dialogue going by responding to Source commentary. Letters should be e-mailed with name and place of residence to source@viaccess.net.

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