In spring 2004 interviews were conducted with 43 rectors, vice rectors, and administrators at five private universities. A consensus emerged that successful licensing or accreditation applications, with few exceptions, required some form of bribery. Licensing might require a bribe of US$ 200 about two months' salary for a typical academic - while accreditation might call for a 10 or 20 times greater "gratuity."

Compton community college lost its accreditation from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges in June. The regional accrediting body cited poor governance, lack of education plans, lack of student support services, and an inadequate administrative staff as reasons for revoking the schools accreditation. The school is now being taken over by the state, despite California's highly decentralized system.

The news of examination leakages has rocked the West African Examination Council. The leaked papers have forced the council to cancel and reschedule the papers. Both staff and auxiliary workers are now under probe. The leakage occurred despite various measures to eliminate cheating. The council has designed a website and introduced the embossment of passport photographs on certificates to avoid impersonation of candidates.

The University Council of the University of Ghana has given the Vice-Chancellor a week's grace before stepping aside as the administrative head of the University. The decision followed in the wake of massive examination malpractices that have threatened the integrity of degrees awarded by the country's premier university. The Vice-Chancellor is also responsible for nepotism.

Corruption is today a big problem in Kazakhstan's higher education sector. Lecturers often collude, i.e. if one teacher pass a student as a favour for one colleague, then he/she can count on assistance from the colleague if he/she needs to pass one of his/her students. In exams, some lecturers ask very difficult, even nonsensical questions making the tests impossible to pass without coming to an "arrangement". Also falsification of records happens after request from heads of departments, deans of faculties etc.

Since February 2004, the Centre for Legal Assistance in the Fight Against Corruption, has received over 3,500 complaints on its toll-free number. Over 40% of the total calls, refers to the work of the local administration bodies, while in 25% of the cases, corruption was reported in the education system. The problem is particularly prominent in the higher education, since they receive complaints from both professors and the students.

A well-known obesity researcher will plead guilty to making material false statements in a 1999 grant application worth $542,000 from the US National Institutes of Health. The researcher, who held various research positions at the University of Vermont (UVM) College of Medicine in Burlington could go to jail for up to 5 years.

Due to new reforms, high school graduates applying to college will take a standardized assessment exam for universities in order to resolve the issues of corruption and select the best-suited students. According to the Transnational Crime and Corruption Center, American students applying to Tbilisi State University faced fees from USD 5 000 to 15 000 for entrance-exam preparation classes taught by the same professors administering the tests.

The legal advisor to the Eduardo Mondlane University has denied that there was anything improper in giving scholarships to people who do not work at the university. In 2003 alone, over 147,000 US dollars, money that should have been used to send teachers to take further degrees abroad, in order to build up the institutional capacity of the university, were allegedly spent instead on the Vice-Chancellor's daughter, two children of the head of the universities public relations and 16 others.