Harvard Cheat Suspects Taking Leave to Dodge Penalty: Reports

It sounds a little like ... cheating. Some of the Harvard students being investigated in a cheating scandal plan to take a leave of absence—to duck the possibility of being suspended for a year, insiders are telling the New York Times. Harvard isn't saying how many students are taking a voluntary leave before the school year gets officially underway—or how many of them are varsity athletes. Sports Illustrated reported yesterday that senior basketball co-captain stars Kyle Casey and Brandyn Curry were likely to be out this year because of the scandal. Casey has already withdrawn voluntarily, and Curry is expected to follow, in order not to lose their final year of playing college hoops, which they'll do next year instead, according to the magazine.

The school's football team also may be impacted, reported the Harvard Crimson, which noted that that some athletes were encouraged by coaches to skip a year to protect their eligibility to play. Close to 125 students are being investigated for possible cheating after a teaching assistant noticed answer similarities on a take-home test last year for an Introduction to Congress class taken by 279 undergrads. The university is probing possible "inappropriate collaboration to outright plagiarism" in a cheating scandal that one dean called "unprecedented in its scope and magnitude." (More cheating stories.)