Romanian universities investigated for fraudulently granting diplomas to foreigners

The General Prosecutors’ Office carried out searches on Wednesday, July 26, at two universities in the Western Romania city of Arad in a case concerning several fraudulent university graduations. The case is called Diplome de licenţă fără studii (B.A. Degrees without Studies). The case looks at a network at two universities in Arad that helped foreign students graduate by providing the exam answers beforehand or ready-made research papers. The members of the network - professors, secretaries, IT staff or former students – received money to help the students, who could not speak Romanian, graduate. The IT staff allegedly accessed the universities’ IT system to change the grades the students had received. The searches are being carried out at the public Aurel Vlaicu University and at the private Vasile Goldiş University. Most of the targeted students were Medical School and Dentistry graduates, of Arab and Italian nationalities, according to sources quoted by News.ro. Several other searches took place in campuses, but also with professors and students in Timiş, Hunedoara and Caraş-Severin counties. More than 100 searches have been carried out in the case. editor@romania-insider.com