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By Clint Hamilton
clint@piedmontgazette.com
MOBILE - By now, everyone knows the two Mobile area football players that signed on to play football for Auburn University had grades changed on their high school transcripts. The Mobile Press Register is reporting Ryan Williams of B.C. Rain High School had ten grades changed and Nick Fairley of Williamson High School had seven grades changed.
Principals of both schools are saying the grades were changed long before either player committed to Auburn, but according to one school official who asked to remain anonymous for this piece, grade changing is a practice Auburn has employed for several years; especially within Mobile.
“Everyone around here knows exactly how it works. The player informs Auburn of his intentions to commit to them well in advance. Auburn coaches then inform the player to keep his commitment quiet so they can have a chance to have his grades changed and no one will suspect them because no one is aware of where the player intends to play college football. This gives Auburn and the school the perfect alibi”.
School superintendent Harold Dodge says Ryan Williams’ grades were changed on one computer at B.C. Rain High School that was left unattended.
“Have you ever heard of a bank leaving piles of money unattended? That is exactly what Mr. Dodge is saying we did. To get into the high school transcripts, you have to have a user name and three different passwords. There are only 4 people that have user names and passwords, and there aren’t any computers within B.C. Rain left unattended that have access to the transcripts.
“They are making it seem like it would be easy for someone to change the grades, but are you hearing about any other student having their grades changed? If changing the grades was so easy, wouldn’t there be multiple cases of this happening? The only problem is implicating Auburn in this scandal. This thing goes much deeper than one or two players. This thing is too big for you, don’t you know that? Who changed the grades?” Williams asks.
“It’s a mystery! It’s a mystery wrapped in a riddle wrapped inside an enigma. The people involved in this don’t even really know who changed them. It might have been me. It could have been a secretary. The point is, Auburn has been doing this for so long, and they know how to not leave fingerprints on their work”.
So, how exactly did the grades get changed? For a moment, let’s speculate. A player with significant grade problems secretly commits to Auburn. People within Auburn then begin working on getting the player eligible. An Auburn official, maybe a coach, or maybe even someone that can’t be connected to Auburn, makes a trip down to Mobile under the guise of checking out the player’s academic standing.
Once the official is in the school, he happens to find a computer unattended. This computer just happens to have the player in questions transcripts pulled up. Ten minutes later, the grades are changed and the player is now eligible. Auburn has the alibi of the transcripts being changed before the player even knew where he wanted to attend college, and the school has the alibi of the grades being changed on a computer that was left unattended.
Everyone is as clean as a bar of Ivory soap. Maybe that is how it happened, or maybe someone within the school system just made a mistake. Maybe they made 17 mistakes on two players that just happened to choose to play football for Auburn University. I guess anything is possible.
What is evident is that someone, whether it is the SEC, the NCAA, or some other outside entity needs to investigate the shenanigans that seem to be taking place within the Mobile County school system. Not only was a disservice done to the entire student bodies of B.C. Rain and Williamson high schools, but also to the two student athletes in question, and that is something that will never change.
Clint Hamilton covers the University of Alabama for the Piedmont Gazette
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