The Ethics of Quid Pro Quo

A few weeks back I brought you the story of a man in Texas who has donated a significant amount of money to the private high school he attended with the understanding that his own son would be admitted to the school. It’s not unusual for private schools to solicit donations from alumni, and from parents of current students, on the principle that if the school becomes more prestigious, you automatically benefit from having graduated from it successfully – or your offspring does. But it’s generally considered ethically questionable to either solicit donations in return for admitting a future student, or to accept such a deal if offered; the ideal of only admitting the best possible candidates (and only accepting positions and honors you have actually earned) lies at the heart of the system. Certainly, the prestige of any educational institution will decline if it becomes common knowledge that you can buy your way into the place, and the prestige of an individual will decline if it becomes common knowledge that he or she paid for his or her academic achievements rather than earning them. The real question is whether this process is also inherently wrong…

Consider, for example, the case of a small institution which admits 100 students each year. If you like, you can imagine that the 100 students are divided into groups of 20 for the purpose of any particular class. Under such conditions, it would be difficult to argue with any conviction that the addition of a 101st student would in any way lower the quality of education received by the students. In fact, if the extra student’s credentials are reasonable (if not actually superior) there shouldn’t be any noticeable effect on the others. Now suppose that that one extra student is present because his or her parents contributed badly needed operating funds (and the others did not); is that wrong? You could argue that the extra teaching capacity (if you actually have it) would be better spent on a more deserving student, but would that really be better than having the extra funds – which theoretically benefits all of the other students as well?

If we take this argument to its extreme, we could legitimately ask if it would be better to have 101 students and a new library (or a new field house, or an entire new campus, if you like) or 100 students with no library or other inadequate facilities? Are we really best serving the needs of the remaining students by guarding the moral and ethical purity of our admissions process but denying them the use of new facilities, new equipment, or new opportunities? Does that answer change if we have 400 students and 1 extra who is only present because of his or her parents’ generosity? How about if we are a university of 40,000 students? Does our answer change if the “extra” student proves worthy of our institution, graduates valedictorian, and goes on to a career so illustrious that it actually raises the prestige of our institution just to claim that individual as one of our alumni?

No one is suggesting that actual degrees – or diplomas, in the case of high schools – are or should be for sale, despite the fact that rumors persist that they are sometimes given in exchange for athletic performance or very large donations. But assuming that an institution has the capacity to admit an additional student, and that the individual is subsequently able to handle the expectations of the institution and graduate honorably, is it actually wrong for the school to accept a donation in return for admitting that student in the first place?

It’s worth thinking about…