Felner Stink Sticks to Deasy

Deasy's $375,000 Ends Up in

Felner's Bank Account

On this week's Comment on Kentucky, WHAS reporter Adam Walser recaped the story of Robert Felner and his wide-ranging toxic effect on the University of Rhode Island, UofL, several of the country's school districts and many tainted individuals.

But who were the victims, and who were the co-conspirators?

One of the affected school districts was the Santa Monica-Malibu (CA)public schools during the time that John Deasy was the superintendent. Deasy recently resigned his position as Superintendent in Prince Georges County (MD) schools to join the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation - which hired him with some knowledge of the controversy.

Walser told host Ferrell Wellman,

...what we found in this federal indictment was that the entire $375,000 that came from the Santa Monica-Malibu public school system (John Deasy had given that contract to Robert Felner) the entire amount went to this shell corporation and went into Robert Felner's bank account ultimately.

Deasy, you will recall, was the Felner colleague (from URI) who - after awarding Felner the $375,000 grant - was gifted a suspiciously quick doctorate under the guidance of Felner. Deasy's dissertation is dated seven months before he even enrolled at UofL. Felner supervised no other doctoral students during his five years at the university.

This sweetheart deal appeared to have the full support of UofL President James Ramsey since he recommended that the Board of Trustees approve John Deasy as an Alumni Fellow Award winner in 2007.

The Fall 2007 issue of UofL Magazine says, “The Alumni Fellows are awarded to graduates who are exemplary ambassadors for their UofL schools or colleges through their contributions to their professional fields and their communities.” On his application for the award, Deasy did not list any contributions.

Bloggers and other media questioned how Deasy was able to receive a doctorate of philosophy in education in 2004 after taking only nine credits at the school.

Deasy immediately claimed that,

If the university finds that it did not follow its own policies and procedures when conferring my doctorate, that is of course its right to make any decision thereafter.

That must have seemed like a great deal if it meant Deasy would not be pulled into the rest of the allegations surrounding Felner, and another URI colleague and indicted co-conspirator, Thomas Schroeder.

The university quickly declared the doctorate to be proper.