Studying? Why bother?

In the 10+ years that I worked in the higher education sector, it never occurred to me that bribery was a skill students could practice in school and actually use to advance from year to year and eventually graduate with a degree. By this, I mean that it didn't cross my mind even once that anyone among my co-workers was ever likely to take—or even receive—a bribe. Also I'm pretty sure that if anything like a bribe had ever been suggested by a student, they would have immediately been reported and the student would have been in for a very unpleasant chat with the members of the disciplinary board...

But maybe I'm naive.

I did receive letters and emails from students. Typically they would ask me to allow them to submit a mid-term paper even though they had been too busy to come to school after week 1, or they would beg me to give a couple of extra marks to their term paper so they would not have to repeat the class. However, those letters never suggested that their authors were ready to give me anything in exchange for a favor that, in any case, I was never ever going to grant them.

So, when once in a while an email like the following somehow caught my attention, I'd dismiss it as yet another scam:

WHAT A GREAT IDEA!

We provide a concept that will allow anyone with sufficient work experience to obtain a fully verifiable University Degree.

Bachelors, Masters or even a Doctorate.

For US: 1.845.709.8044
Outside US: +1.845.709.8044

"Just leave your NAME & PHONE NO. (with CountryCode)" in the voicemail.

Our staff will get back to you in next few days!

What a great idea indeed! It looks like a similar "concept" has been put in practice in Toulon, France. I don't think "sufficient work experience" was even a pre-requisite. A nice fat bundle of banknotes was, instead. See here (Le Monde article, in French), or here (France 24 article, in English).

Despicable.