We, like many in the Dartmouth community, were stunned by the news that former member of the Class of 2010 Mohammad Usman had pled guilty to fraudulently claiming $18,615 in College grants and federal work study funding ("Former Dartmouth student pleads guilty to financial aid fraud," April 3).
Although the full details of the case have yet to emerge, it is clear that Usman lied, forged the signature of former Dean of the Tucker Foundation and current Associate Provost Stuart Lord, and may have falsified time sheets in order to avoid detection during a period of fraudulent activity spanning from winter 2007 to fall 2008.
In the words of Hanover Police Captain Francis Moran, Usman "manipulated the system and manipulated people to get what he wanted" ("Usman pled guilty to separate charge in 2007," April 9).
No matter how distasteful, however, the actions of a single student should not be interpreted as a referendum on the culture of our college, nor on the level of oversight currently exercised by its administration.
Dartmouth is defined by the sense of trust shared by the members of its community, and has long been a place where students feel comfortable leaving their dorm rooms unlocked, where professors trust their students to take exams unattended and where administrators have confidence that applicants will make appropriate use of awarded grant and scholarship money.
We cannot allow that sense of trust -- one of the things that makes Dartmouth the place that it is today -- to be undermined by an isolated, if unpleasant, occurrence.
Clearly, Usman's recent actions represent the exception, not the rule, when it comes to student integrity at the College. His case is certainly an indication that the College's oversight practices may need some revision -- but it should not be seen as an indication that our current culture of trust is flawed. As Lord said in an interview with the Dartmouth, "We have learned how to tighten up our systems, but we also have to be careful when we work with students that we continue to demonstrate the level of trust that almost all other participants have deserved."
Usmans' actions may well lead to a revision of the Tucker Foundation's funding practices, and to the overall system by which the College doles out scholarships and grants.
We, however, have yet to lose faith in this campus' sense of trust.
