California’s community colleges are grappling with a surge in fraudulent enrollments, with 1.2 million fake applicants in 2024 accounting for nearly 30 percent of new students, blocking real students from classes and costing millions of dollars in stolen financial aid, according to college officials.

The problem, exacerbated by the shift to online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic, affects at least 90 of the state’s 116 campuses, according to Marvin Martinez, chancellor of the Rancho Santiago Community College District, and Jeannie Kim, president of Santiago Canyon College.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, most classes were taught in person, making fraud more difficult, according to Martinez. But with 80 percent of courses now online, bots and fake students can enroll from anywhere, including other states or countries.

“It’s happened on a massive scale,” Martinez told EpochTV’s “California Insider” host Siyamak Khorrami. “What’s made this situation of fraudulent enrollment so different than anything that I’ve seen before in my 36 years in higher ed is that it’s happened in almost 80 percent now of the campuses.”

At Santiago Canyon College, fall 2024 enrollment initially spiked by 10 percent to 13 percent, Kim said, but faculty discovered that many registrants were fraudulent. In one anthropology course, administrators raised the enrollment cap by 30 daily, only for bots to fill slots instantly, leaving just 12 to 15 genuine students.

Faculty identified fakes through nonengagement, identical assignments, or invalid contact details, such as phone numbers tied to businesses or defunct entities. Removing fraudulent enrollments cut the college’s headcount by 10,000 to 12,000 spots, with some bad actors enrolled in up to five classes each.

The fallout is severe. Real students are denied access to required courses, delaying graduations, certificates, and transfers to four-year universities.

“Counselors saw the crestfallen faces of students unable to get classes they needed to graduate,” Kim said.

Among faculty, morale has gone down as classes shrink to single digits, making them cost-inefficient yet necessary for student progress.

“Faculty teach because they love their discipline, but it’s devastating to see classes dwindle,” Kim said.

Low-enrollment classes were allowed to run, doubling the budgetary strain to prioritize student needs. Financially, colleges face significant losses. California funds community colleges based on enrollment, but removing fake students can cut revenue by up to 23 percent, according to Martinez.

“You can’t get paid for fake enrollments,” he said. “It’s better to make that cut up front than face audits later.”

In 2024, scammers stole $8.4 million in federal aid and $2.7 million in state aid, with losses since 2021 exceeding $18 million, state reports show.

The colleges reported 20 to 25 identity theft cases, requiring notifications to victims and reports to the U.S. Department of Education.

Fraud motivations include exploiting Pell Grants, with “Pell runners” collecting up to $7,400 before vanishing, and harvesting personal data such as Social Security numbers for identity theft, according to Martinez.

Perpetrators, often international, use artificial intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT to mimic students, targeting no-prerequisite courses such as accounting or business.

To combat the issue, colleges are deploying LightLeap.AI, an AI platform from N2N Services initially developed for course predictions but adapted for fraud detection.

Santiago Canyon adopted it for less than $100,000 after Kim discovered it at a conference, and it is now scaled to 80 campuses statewide at about $75,000 per institution.

Processing nearly 3 million applications and flagging 360,000 suspected fraudsters, LightLeap.AI uses machine learning to analyze shared phone numbers, IP addresses, minimal application data, and suspicious course-taking patterns, achieving a 99 percent accuracy rate at Santiago Canyon.

“One art faculty member was ecstatic, saying, ‘I have a clean roster; they’re all real,’” Kim said.

LightLeap.AI’s triangulation method cross-references application data with student information systems and proprietary blacklist/whitelist databases, identifying patterns such as multiple applications from one IP address.

Operating in three stages—application, registration, and financial aid—it catches twice as many scammers as manual methods, freeing 7,500 seats for real students at Santiago Canyon. Its network effect allows fraud detection at one college to flag bad actors across 83 campuses, with a 92.3 percent effectiveness rate in the West Valley–Mission Community College District. The system adapts to evolving tactics by incorporating geolocation data and reducing false positives through continuous learning. Since its intersession rollout, it has been applied across spring, summer, and fall terms, with updates to counter fraudsters’ use of generative AI.

Implementing LightLeap.AI presents challenges.

“We need tech-savvy staff, but community colleges can’t compete with tech industry salaries,” Martinez said.

Budgets, unchanged in 20 years, hinder hiring, and manual verification tools such as ID.me are voluntary and inadequate.

A proposed $10 application fee, discussed in 2025, aims to deter fraud but risks burdening vulnerable students, such as the homeless or asylum-seekers, who struggle with ID verification.

Online education is essential for working adults, who now outnumber recent high school graduates enrolled at community colleges.

“Adult students—parents with jobs and bills—rely on online classes,” Martinez said.

To support this shift, he urged Sacramento to increase funding for technology and staffing.

“If it doesn’t happen, we’re going to keep losing money,” Martinez said.

A 2025 state audit is evaluating fraud trends and mitigation effectiveness to guide future funding.

“We’re easy prey because bureaucracies react slowly,” Martinez said.

Kim, emphasizing ethical duty, said,  “We’re public servants with a moral obligation to protect taxpayer dollars.”

California Community Colleges serve about 1.8 million students annually, offering low-cost pathways to degrees and jobs.