WVU, Manchin's Daughter Under Fire Over MBA Degree

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is questioning whether a daughter of Gov. Joe Manchin earned the master's degree in business administration that West Virginia University has awarded her.

Heather Bresch, now the chief operating officer at drug maker Mylan Inc., "completed only about half the credits needed to earn the degree," the newspaper reports.

But WVU revised its records to reflect that she completed her degree in December 1998, the article said.

"An Oct. 22 letter advising the admissions and records office to award Ms. Bresch the degree retroactively was signed by R. Stephen Sears, the Milan Puskar Dean of WVU's business school," the article said. "As a result, six classes were added to her record and grades were awarded for two other classes for which she had received 'incompletes,' according to sources inside the university."

(Update: A WVU spokeswoman tells The Associated Press that "Bresch's records were corrected, but only after an investigation showed that information contained in the College of Business and Economics files was not properly recorded in WVU's admission's office a decade ago." Also, " similar problems were discovered in the records of a couple of other students," spokeswoman Amy Neil said.)

The newspaper said it began researching the school record of Bresch, 38, when she was promoted earlier that month at Mylan. It notes that the company is chaired by Puskar, considered WVU's most generous donor and a supporter of Manchin.

The research "suggests high-ranking officials revised her university records despite a lack of solid evidence to support the reconstruction," the Post-Gazette reports. "Moreover, it suggests officials did so in a way that violated WVU's internal procedures and those used by other accredited universities."

The article's cast of characters includes WVU President Mike Garrison, who took office Sept. 1 and is described as "a high school classmate of Ms. Bresch and longtime friend of the Manchin family."