Transcript fraud: How a private school and educational consultancy deal landed a Ghanaian Student in US jail

On September 9, 2023, 21-year-old Cyrilstan Sowah-Nai laced up for his routine morning jog around Lehigh University’s campus in Pennsylvania in the United States. That was the last time he would enjoy his freedom of movement in the US.

Immediately he got to his hostel, two police officers came to pick him up. He was arrested on charges of forgery of transcripts and theft of services. The arrest followed a review of his academic records by Lehigh University officials who identified discrepancies in his academic records.

Cyrilstan was held in police detention for close to ten months, followed by a series of legal battles. Securing legal representation proved to be a challenge. His mother, Linda Nyuur, domiciled in Ghana, thousands of miles away from her beloved son, was at her wits’ end.

In her bid to prove her son’s innocence and secure his freedom, she poured her entire life savings into hiring an attorney to defend her son in court. Her efforts were bolstered by financial support from family, friends, and the student community of Lehigh University, who set up a GoFundMe account for Cyril. But the one they managed to hire did little to help the case.

“I am getting tired”, she said.

Both mother and son insist that they know nothing about the transcript which landed Cyrilstan in trouble. All they know is that the transcript in their hands from Cyrilstan’s exams is different from the one used to apply for admission on his behalf by an educational consultancy contracted by his alma mater, Our Lady of Grace Senior High School (OLAG).

They have been demanding answers from both OLAG and the consultancy, Wise Consult, since Cyrilstan’s arrest, but no answers have been forthcoming for several months, with both the school and the consultancy leaving mother and son to their own fate.

It all started in 2021, when the headmaster of OLAG, Rev. Father Sylvester Frimpong, introduced Wise Consult, owned by Suleman Iss-haq, popularly known as Mr Wise, to the students. It was explained to the students that the consultancy would prepare them for the American Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT). It would also help with their applications to universities and colleges in the United States.

Cyrilstan, then in Form Two, was among 24 students who signed up for the SAT classes. Each student paid a monthly fee of GHC750. But the promised lessons rarely happened. Instead of three classes a week, the consultancy only conducted three mock tests for the students before they took the SAT. When the results came in, most of them had performed poorly. Wise Consult then opted to use their cumulative records (or continuous assessment transcripts) for their US college applications.

After his West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), Cyrilstan gained admission to study Biological Sciences at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST).

He said he was doing well and content with where he was until he received a letter from Lehigh University, offering him admission to study Population Health and Molecular Biology. Cyrilstan therefore abandoned his studies at KNUST and headed to the US, full of dreams and hopes for a brighter future.

In the US, the former boys’ prefect of OLAG continued to excel academically. He made the Dean’s list, a list of top-performing students, twice, impressing both his lecturers and fellow students. But his world came crashing down when he was told that some of the documents uploaded on his behalf by Wise Consult were forged. It was based on these documents that he gained admission into Lehigh University. 

“My [cumulative] grades were good enough. I had no reason to forge anything,” he says. “I thought Wise Consult uploaded the original documents. But what we have seen now is that what they uploaded and the original ones we gave to them are completely different.”

Discrepancies in the transcripts

The Fourth Estate obtained three different transcripts issued in Cyrilstan’s name by OLAG. All were fraught with inconsistencies. The transcript submitted to Lehigh University was signed by the school’s administrator, Felix Tengan Dassah.

A second transcript carried the signatures of both the assistant headmistress and the administrator, while the third bore the signature and stamp of the headmaster.

The transcript signed by Felix Tengan Dassah contained grades that were significantly better compared to the others. In addition, Cyrilstan’s mother, Linda Nyuur, confirmed that some of the personal information on the transcript signed by Felix Tengan was inaccurate.

Of the three, only the one signed by the headmaster, Rev. Fr. Sylvester Frimpong, is the official one they subsequently received from the school. 

Students who escaped Cyrilstan’s ordeal

Nurudeen (not his real name) also applied for admission into American Universities through Wise Consult. Nurudeen, also a former OLAG student, obtained admission to most of the schools he applied for, but as his family couldn’t afford to pay the fees, he opted to pursue his first degree in Ghana. If he had gone to study in the United States, he probably would have been arrested, detained, and prosecuted on the same charges as those Cyrilstan faced. It was only after he got news of his former mate’s ordeal that Nurudeen discovered that the documents uploaded on his behalf by Wise Consult were forged. His transcripts also bore only the signature of the OLAG school administrator, Felix Tengan, with better grades than what was on the original transcript.

Dela (not her real name), another old student of OLAG, said she was shocked when she saw the results on her transcript, which was used to apply for universities on her behalf.

“Up till now, I don’t even have the original copy of my transcript because the one [Mr. Wise] sent me [is] the forged one. When I looked at my transcript, it was all As; I was expecting to see some Bs and Cs, because I was struggling [with a course], but it was all As,” Dela recounted.

The alumni tell The Fourth Estate that the application process was carried out on an app known as the Common App. It is a single point of application for almost all colleges in the United States, and every student who was being aided by Wise Consult was given logins which were generated by the consult. However, the students themselves had limited access to this CommonApp. This is because Ghanaian high school students applying for admission into American universities using the platform are required to do so through a school counsellor. And in the case of Cyrilstan, Nurudeen and Dela, it was Mr. Wise, the apparent owner and manager of Wise Consult, who uploaded their documents on the CommonApp.

OLAG, Wise Consult deny involvement

When contacted, Father Sylvester Frimpong denied that the school had any partnership with Wise Consult. He, however, declined a request for a full interview.

Mr. Wise, on the other hand, confirmed his consultancy’s partnership with OLAG. He also confirmed obtaining soft copies of the transcripts from the school’s administrator, Felix Tengan Dassah.

“OLAG gave me the entire transcripts of the students, so I forwarded the transcripts to the students,” he said. “It was a soft copy. I think we identified some problems with the transcript later on. The transcripts did not have a signature or a stamp. I got it from the administrator.”

He, however, denied involvement in the application process, stating that he only helped the students prepare and sit for the SAT exam.

“I never touched anything on Cyril’s application. He did everything himself; that is how I later got to know that my name was being used to write a recommendation. Wise Consult did not handle any of their [sic] applications. No OLAG student can tell us that,” he insisted.

Before The Fourth Estate’s interview with Mr. Wise, his consultancy’s website was active, with OLAG listed as a partner institution. But days after the interview, the website became inactive and has remained so to date.

The future of Cyrilstan and other OLAG students who used the services of Wise Consult now remains uncertain, as questions linger over how transcripts in the custody of school authorities and the consultancy led to Cyrilstan’s legal woes.

“He is just a victim of circumstances,” his mother laments. “Very young boy. Young, promising boy. Why? What has he done to deserve this?”