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Small firms known as 鈥渃redential evaluators鈥� help states and school districts detect educators who present phony or flimsy academic credentials from overseas institutions鈥攁 safeguard that is becoming more important with the growth of online education.

But experts say the little-known credential-evaluation industry may itself be vulnerable to unethical operators, judging from a recent credentials scandal in Georgia.

鈥淭his is an alarm going off in a lot of [state officials鈥橾 heads鈥� 鈥楬ey, if we got degrees from foreign countries, we need to not only look at the university but at the credential-evaluation service,鈥欌�� said Roy Einreinhofer, the executive director of the National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification, a Mashpee, Mass.-based group that represents state professional-standards bodies and departments of education.

The Georgia Professional Standards Commission is now investigating, for possible ethics violations, a dozen educators in five districts who said they had earned advanced degrees in education from Saint Regis University, which claims to be based in Liberia. Commission officials believe the credentials presented by the 11 teachers and one principal were obtained by doing little more than describing their 鈥渓ife experiences鈥� and paying $995 for a master鈥檚 degree or $1,500 for a doctorate.

But last year, the Georgia officials accepted those credentials because of letters they received from a credential evaluator, Career Consultants International, of Sunrise, Fla. CCI said the credentials were equal to those from a regionally accredited U.S. university.

The officials now suspect that CCI was not giving independent evaluations, according to the commission鈥檚 executive secretary, F.D. Toth.

鈥楧iploma Mills鈥� Go Virtual

Saint Regis is a 鈥渄iploma mill,鈥� a substandard or fraudulent provider of worthless credentials, according to Alan L. Contreras, the administrator of the Oregon Office of Degree Authorization, an independent state agency.

Oregon is aggressive in policing degrees from so-called diploma mills. In fact, the use of one in obtaining a job in the state is a crime.

Saint Regis is one of 200 diploma mills listed on the Oregon agency鈥檚 Web site, . And Mr. Contreras said hundreds more diploma mills may exist in the United States and overseas.

Though the term was coined in the 1920s, diploma mills have in recent years gone virtual, as online learning has become a popular way for Americans to access legitimate graduate programs from around the world, according to Mr. Contreras and other experts.

鈥淚t鈥檚 very, very easy to market the [fake degree] now on the Internet,鈥� he said. 鈥淎lso, [the Internet] makes it very practical to have an entity licensed outside the U.S.鈥攁 corporate entity that is capable of pretending to be a college.鈥�

State and district officials can reliably verify U.S.-based degrees through the college or university鈥檚 accreditation by a recognized body, or from the federal government鈥檚 list of accepted accreditation organizations, said Judith Watkins, the vice president for accreditation services of the Council on Higher Education Accreditation. Based in Washington, the council represents universities and accreditation groups.

But credential-evaluation services play a key role when degrees come from overseas, where accreditation systems vary widely, Ms. Watkins said. The U.S. government doesn鈥檛 monitor overseas universities, except to check on recipients of federal education loans.

The fact that CCI did not flag Saint Regis as a problem is suspicious to Mr. Contreras.

鈥淎ny professional evaluation firm that would treat Saint Regis University as a legitimate postsecondary entity has not done its research,鈥� he said.

Mr. Toth of the Georgia Professional Standards Commission said he believed CCI was a qualified credential evaluator because of its membership in the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, a respected higher education group located in Washington.

He said he has since learned that the AACRAO membership meant little, because it was purchased with a fee without any screening.

Early this year, the Georgia commission downgraded the certification levels of the 12 educators who had received boosts in their certification ratings for their Saint Regis degrees, which had qualified them for higher pay.

The five districts have responded in various ways. Some have conducted investigations of their employees; others are awaiting the outcome of the commission investigation, probably by the commissioners鈥� meeting early in June, according to Mr. Toth.

He said some of the teachers have maintained that they were unwitting victims of Saint Regis.

A Ben Hill County school district principal who received a Saint Regis doctorate has shown academic papers he submitted to Saint Regis that were from uncompleted doctoral studies at another institution, said John Key, the superintendent of the 3,240-student Ben Hill district. Mr. Key said he would await the standards-commission report before deciding what steps to take.

Six of the educators, all from the 128,900-student Gwinnett County schools, paid back their raises, totaling $25,054, and resigned, according to Sloan Roach, a district spokeswoman.

Financial Ties

Mr. Toth said the commission received letters from CCI for 11 of the 12 educators, stating that their Saint Regis degrees met the same rigor and content standards as do those from regionally accredited U.S. colleges and universities, which is the standard for Georgia鈥檚 recognition of degrees.

CCI is part of National Success Marketing Inc., based in Sunrise, Fla., and owned by William H. Danzig and Sheila Danzig.

Sheila Danzig said in an interview last month that she runs CCI under the business name of Elizabeth or Liz Ross.

Ms. Danzig described a relationship with Saint Regis that throws into question the company鈥檚 objectivity as an evaluator of credentials.

She said her company receives a fee, paid by Saint Regis, every time CCI evaluates the academic credentials of one of its students. She also said she was a paid consultant to Saint Regis as recently as two years ago.

Web sites also link Saint Regis to her company, which is involved in a variety of business enterprises and Web sites related to business consulting, direct marketing, and online higher education.

As recently as last December, CCI鈥檚 Web site, , stated, 鈥淒egrees from Saint Regis have been evaluated as equivalent to U.S. regionally accredited universities.鈥� That reference has since been taken off the Web site.

Saint Regis has promoted CCI on its Web site, listing the company and 鈥淟iz Ross,鈥� Ms. Danzig鈥檚 business name, as one of two recommended credential evaluators. Ms. Danzig said the online students pay the university a fee, part of which is sent to her.

The Web referral on the Saint Regis site has been removed.

Separate from her CCI business, Ms. Danzig owns two Web sites, and , according to the Internet鈥檚 鈥渨hois鈥� database. Those two Web sites have recommended Saint Regis to prospective students.

As of mid-April, degree.com listed Saint Regis as 鈥淣umber 3" in a ranking of 17 鈥渢op distance learning degree programs,鈥� along with accredited programs in the United States such as Walden University and the University of Phoenix. One day after a reporter mentioned the listing to Ms. Danzig, the Saint Regis recommendation was removed from the site.

It is not clear, meanwhile, whether Saint Regis University has any physical connection to Liberia.

For example, a check by officials at the U.S. Embassy in Monrovia, Liberia鈥檚 capital, on the university鈥檚 purported street address found nothing there resembling a campus or even an office, Mr. Contreras of the Oregon degree-authorization office said.

And George Gollin, a prominent diploma mill sleuth who has analyzed the Internet headers of e-mail correspondence he and others have received from Saint Regis officials, concluded that 鈥渢he day-to-day operations of correspondence, marketing, financing, and Web site maintenance are based in the U.S.鈥�

The research of Mr. Gollin, a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, is presented on the Oregon state government Web site.

鈥楢bsolutely Unethical鈥�

The practice of receiving a fee from the institution whose degrees are being evaluated violates the ethical standards of the National Association of Credential Evaluation Services, a trade group of 16 U.S-based credential-evaluation firms, according to Josef Silny, a NACES member based in Miami.

When informed of Ms. Danzig鈥檚 financial relationship with Saint Regis University, Mr. Silny said that such ties are against the standards of the industry.

鈥淭here鈥檚 an obvious conflict of interest,鈥� he said. 鈥淣ACES members would be dropped from membership if they would do that. This would be absolutely unethical and unprofessional.鈥�

He said his company, Josef Silny & Associates Inc., only accepts fees directly from the students involved, or from an institution or employer reviewing a student鈥檚 application.

鈥淓ven though the client pays us, we don鈥檛 really work for him,鈥� Mr. Silny said. 鈥淲e are trying to come up with an accurate professional evaluation, whether we make him happy or not.鈥�

CCI is not a member of NACES. The association, which has a headquarters that rotates among its members and is now based at Mr. Silny鈥檚 Miami firm, conducts screenings of its members, which must abide by a code of ethics.

CCI does, however, tout its membership in the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers.

Dale Gough, a spokesman for the registrars鈥� group, said that his association鈥檚 members are primarily accredited colleges and universities, but that vendors such as CCI can join for $350 annually. 鈥淚f you鈥檙e not an institution, but a vendor, there鈥檚 not any sort of membership criteria to join,鈥� he said.

But he said that because there is no screening, 鈥渧endor members are told they aren鈥檛 supposed to say, 鈥榃e鈥檙e a member of AACRAO.鈥� 鈥�

Evaluation Methods

Mr. Toth of the Georgia standards commission said its officials had assumed mistakenly that CCI鈥檚 membership in AACRAO implied that the company was reputable.

鈥淲e are going to have to make a decision about which credential agencies we鈥檙e going to use, and narrow our list to a very few that we have worked with for several years, and are above board,鈥� he said.

Still, Ms. Danzig of Career Consultants International defends her evaluation of Saint Regis, noting that other credential evaluators have also reviewed its degrees favorably. In fact, one of the 12 Georgia educators was evaluated by Foreign Credential Evaluations Inc., based in Roswell, Ga.

In an interview, Beth Cotter, FCE鈥檚 president, said that when she first received a request to evaluate a Saint Regis degree last fall, she was fooled by 鈥渇raudulent documentation purporting to be from the ministry of education in Liberia.鈥�

鈥淣obody鈥檚 ever done that to me before,鈥� she said. 鈥淚鈥檓 not the FBI or the CIA, that I鈥檓 going to expect that I need to investigate when a document is presented, and signed and sealed.鈥�

However, she became suspicious soon afterward, when she received two more credentials from Saint Regis students. 鈥淭he transcripts were identical; 鈥� everybody had straight A鈥檚, and were taking the exact same courses,鈥� Ms. Cotter said. She said she returned them to the applicants.

Mr. Toth said he has received an apology from FCE, but not CCI.

Ms. Danzig said CCI, which has two employees, made its evaluations based 鈥減rimarily鈥� on whether the Liberian government recognized Saint Regis as a valid higher education institution. 鈥淚 called the Liberian Embassy in D.C. and asked if Saint Regis was recognized by the [Liberian] government,鈥� she said.

Saint Regis University is on a list of accredited higher education institutions on the official Web site of the Liberian government.

But Liberia, which is being run by an interim government under a United Nations-brokered settlement of a bloody civil war, is a 鈥渒leptocracy, in many ways,鈥� cautioned Joseph T. Siegle, an Africa expert who is a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington. As for the country鈥檚 education system, he said, 鈥渢hey do not have the capacity to run a legitimate accredited university.鈥�

Officials at the Liberian Embassy in Washington were unavailable for comment.

But Ms. Danzig said she has reviewed the Liberian standards for higher education, which she called rigorous. She said she told Georgia officials that the degrees were based on experiential learning, and said she would not have issued a favorable judgment if she thought Saint Regis was a degree mill.

Mr. Silny, the NACES member, said the evaluation steps Ms. Danzig described fell far short of the industry standard, however. Even if an institution is recognized by its national government, he said, his firm tries to 鈥渟ee if the school is truly accredited or if it is a scam.鈥�

Coverage of technology is supported in part by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.