Two months ago, Georgia's Professional Standards Commission (PSC) - the committee that is responsible for "certification, preparation, and conduct of certified, licensed, or permitted personnel employed in the public schools of the State of Georgia" - quietly launched an investigation into "diploma mill" teachers. Evidently, at least 10 teachers in the Peach State "have bought bogus advanced degrees from an online university based in Liberia." St. Regis, the Liberian "university" from which the teachers "earned" their degrees, allegedly sells degrees without requiring any coursework. This is particularly troubling given that, in Georgia, the PSC awards increasing levels of certification based solely on the level of education of its teachers. (A teacher with a Bachelor's degree, for example, is certified at level three, those earning a master's at level five, those who have completed everything but a doctoral dissertation at level six, and those with a Ph.D. or Ed.D. at level seven.) These levels are then used by school districts to determine their teachers' salary levels, generally rewarding those teachers who have earned a higher certificate level with a higher salary. Upon learning of the scam, "the PSC has advised these teachers that their upgraded certification has been recalled and they also face sanctions if a PSC ethics board finds they bought a degree they knew they didn't earn."
"Bogus degrees land teachers in woodshed," D. Aileen Dodd, Atlanta Journal Constitution, March 19, 2004