District records confirm that a Rick W. Singer graduated from Niles West in 1978. The 58-year-old and alleged ring-leader of the pay-to-play college admissions scandal found himself in hot water after it was revealed that he accepted payments from wealthy and celebrity parents to get their children admitted into highly-rated universities.

While district records cannot confirm that the two Rick W. Singers are the same person, the Niles West News received confirmation from multiple 1978 graduates who positively identified the West alum.

As owner of the Edge College & Career Network and chief executive of The Key Worldwide Foundation, Singer has been managing and profiting from the college cheating scheme. Allegedly, the Key Worldwide Foundation was a non-for-profit organization that Singer used to disguise payments from parents as donations to the charity. He helped facilitate unethical college admissions for 761 families.

His methods included bribing ACT and SAT test administrators to correct answers after the tests were taken, bribing college coaches to certify students as athletic recruits and also lying about ethnicities to take advantage of affirmative action.

Singer joins a growing list of notable Niles West alumni, including Merrick Garland, George Papadopoulos, Rashard Mendenhall, George Kontos, Bart Conner, and Jewell Loyd.