Sad if true.
Recruits with Division I & I-AA offers should be assigned a serial number for academic clearinghouse issues before they sign LOI's, and the board that reviews this should have no knowledge of the recruit name, high school name or school planning to attend. The board should only have data regarding the student, the high school and state the high school is located in.
The clearinghouse should do a first review of all recruits in the November before they enroll give each a list of requirements to clear so they know what to complete in the spring semester. The report should be updated by the end of February based on results of the fall semester.
If additional investigation of courses taken prior to January is needed then that should be done asap by the NCAA at the high school, with all the players papers and grades anonomized with the same serial number. Any investigation into courses or exams taken before January must be completed prior to the end of the high school academic year or the player is automatically cleared of anything Pre-January. I'm sure they do some of the above to get ahead now but doing all of this would eliminate a huge number of cases that they need to review in the summer because they would be ahead of the curve and very little rumor of what you noted above would be possible.
Also, High schools participating in any academic impropriety should be reported publicly and included on the HS data sheet the board is given on future recruits as a past violation. That way future students, board reviewers and coaches know schools where risks lie and schools will be less likely to do it given the possible public perception punishment that would hurt their programs.
