USC Recruit Under Scrutiny : Academics: SAT score of running back Saladin McCullough is being challenged, placing his standing with university in jeopardy.

USC, which hopes the return of Coach John Robinson signals a revival of the school’s power-football glory days, could lose a key part of its plan--running back recruit Saladin McCullough--because of questions about the validity of his Scholastic Aptitude Test score.

McCullough’s SAT score has been challenged by the Educational Testing Service (ETS), the Princeton, N.J., group that oversees the test.

More recently, McCullough’s test score has attracted the scrutiny of the NCAA. According to sources familiar with the matter, an enforcement representative visited Pasadena Muir High School two weeks ago, in a preliminary attempt to get information about the circumstances surrounding McCullough’s test score.

A prep All-American at Muir, McCullough will not be admitted to USC if he fails to meet minimum standards set by the NCAA on either the SAT or the American College Testing (ACT) exam.

The ETS became involved last winter after receiving two letters from Muir faculty members expressing concern that McCullough’s SAT score did not match his academic performance, said Michael Harrison, the player’s uncle and guardian.

McCullough took the test in June of last year. He scored about 1,200 out of a possible 1,600, Muir Principal Gary Talbert said. The score is about 300 points above the national average for 1991 and ‘92, said Kevin Gonzalez, an ETS spokesman.

NCAA academic standards for initial eligibility--commonly known as Proposition 48--require athletes to score at least 700 on the SAT or 17 on the ACT to be eligible as freshmen.

An athlete who fails to meet Prop. 48 standards can, under NCAA rules, still be admitted to a university, but cannot play, practice or receive athletic scholarship aid as a freshman.

The McCullough situation is complicated by USC’s policy denying admission to athletes who fail to qualify for initial eligibility under Prop. 48 regulations.

“The situation is, we just have to wait and see if he is admitted,” Robinson said. “If he’s not (admitted), he has to consider the alternatives that would be there for him.”

Those include obtaining an Associate of Arts degree from a junior college--a process that normally requires two years--or attending a prep school and then retaking the SAT after a year or so.

Retaking the SAT before next season is not an option for McCullough, said Harrison, a Muir history teacher who coaches baseball and junior varsity football.

“We don’t feel it is appropriate that he should have to take the SAT again when there is no reason to indicate there was any wrongdoing,” he said.

Ray Nicosia, an ETS spokesman, said company policy forbids him from commenting on individual cases.

When the ETS challenges a score, he said, the student is given five options: retake the test, supply ETS with information to show the score was valid, allow the testing service to cancel the disputed score, send the case to college admissions officials to let them decide, or ask for outside arbitration through the American Arbitration Assn.

According to Harrison, an arbitrator is expected to decide soon whether McCullough’s SAT score is valid. Two other arbitrators have offered differing opinions as to whether samples of McCullough’s handwriting match that of his signatures on the test, Harrison said.

Several other factors also could affect McCullough’s college eligibility:

--He cannot graduate from Muir until he passes the Pasadena Unified School District proficiency exam, which is geared for eighth-grade competency. Harrison said the player needs only to pass the essay segment of the three-part exam. Results are expected before the school year ends in mid-June.

--He is scheduled to take the ACT on Saturday, leaving open the possibility that he could satisfy Prop. 48 requirements even if his SAT score remains in dispute.

--He was picked by the Kansas City Royals as the 1,545th selection in last week’s baseball draft and could forgo college for a professional baseball career, although, according to Harrison, football is his first choice.

McCullough gained 2,142 yards and scored 36 touchdowns as a senior at Muir. He averaged 8.7 yards per carry in leading the Mustangs to the semifinals of the Southern Section Division II playoffs, where they lost to eventual co-champion Anaheim Esperanza.

Harrison would not allow his nephew to be interviewed for this story and declined to discuss the disputed test score except to say it showed an improvement of more than 250 points from the Preliminary SAT, which McCullough had taken previously.

The PSAT is a guide to help students measure their abilities before taking the SAT. Most students score about the same on each test.

Harrison said McCullough improved his score with the help of a computer software program geared toward teaching students how to take the SAT.

ETS’ Gonzalez said some computer programs are advertised to help students improve SAT scores by as much as 150 points. But he said such claims are inflated, and most students improve by 35-50 points after using the programs.

Harrison said the dramatic improvement was the result of McCullough’s determination.

“You can be an F student and still do well on the SAT if that’s what you decide you want to do,” he said. “I don’t see any correlation (between) the test (and) his classroom performance.”

Although McCullough’s mother, Mabel McCullough, lives in the Pasadena area, Harrison said he became Saladin’s legal guardian upon the death of the athlete’s father, Bruce McCullough, in 1986. Harrison and Bruce McCullough were half-brothers.

The controversy surrounding McCullough’s SAT score started last winter, when copies of an anonymous letter questioning McCullough’s academic abilities were sent to the Pasadena Star-News and Judy Codding, Pasadena High principal and president of the Pacific League.

Codding said she passed a copy of the letter on to Talbert, the Muir principal, because it did not involve league issues. She said Talbert already was aware of the matter by the time he received the letter.

The ETS became involved shortly thereafter, its scrutiny of the situation triggered by two letters from Muir faculty members--one signed, one unsigned--Harrison said.

“How these (letter writers) got information on (McCullough’s) test scores is beyond me, because that is supposed to be a private matter between Saladin and his counselors,” Harrison said. “In terms of breaching teacher ethics, that’s a scandal.”

Harrison also was angry about the test score becoming an issue after McCullough had finished his recruiting trips and announced that he would attend USC. McCullough chose the Trojans over Washington, Brigham Young and San Diego State.

Said Harrison: “(Saladin) took the test last June, and the letter surfaces in January, which is pretty shaky. The whole thing boils down to maybe some jealous people, for whatever their reasons, they didn’t like the kid.”

Some Muir teachers say Harrison has accused them of contacting the testing service, a situation they say has made teaching at the school uncomfortable.

One teacher, who denied involvement in the matter, said Harrison confronted her.

“It’s a nasty mess, an ugly one,” said the teacher, who asked not to be identified.

Some faculty members raised questions about McCullough’s score because he did not take the exam at Muir.

Harrison said he does not remember where McCullough took the test, noting only that the testing center was a “small school in the mountains.”

Harrison said McCullough was assigned to that testing site because he returned his application fee too late to guarantee a seat at Muir. Harrison said Muir was overcrowded with students from Los Angeles whose original sites were closed after the 1992 riots.

Koko Williams, a Muir counselor, said she has no knowledge of Muir being inundated with students who were transferred to alternative sites because of the riots. But she said students who are late in filing their fees often do not receive their first choice of a testing site.

Another twist is the involvement of the NCAA, which has investigated numerous cases of alleged test fraud involving recruits since Prop. 48 went into effect in 1986.

Asked if he had been contacted by the NCAA, Harrison declined comment.

Chuck Smrt, an NCAA enforcement director who deals with matters regarding the standardized tests, would neither confirm nor deny that the NCAA is studying the McCullough matter.

Speaking generally, Smrt said that NCAA inquiries into disputed test scores focus on two issues: whether athletes obtained eligibility through fraudulent test scores and whether NCAA schools were in some way involved in such fraud.

At the least, according to Smrt, the NCAA seeks to determine whether schools have been vigilant in dealing with abnormalities in the test scores of athletes or prospective athletes.

USC administrators and coaches, however, say there is little they can do at this point in the McCullough case other than wait to see how the ETS challenge of the athlete’s SAT score is resolved.

Said Robinson: “(The matter) has nothing to do with us. We have no involvement whatsoever. We get (test) results off the transcript. . . . You go on the results and what’s given to the school and the testing services, and you submit that to your admissions office and find out whether the kid can get in school.”

USC recruiters were concerned enough last January to contact Muir’s track and field coach, Clyde Turner, regarding McCullough’s situation.

Turner, a security guard at Elliott Junior High in Pasadena, said he advised Trojan assistant coaches Mike Sanford and Charles White to encourage McCullough to concentrate on academics.

“Otherwise, you’re going to lose him,” Turner said he told the USC assistants.

As for McCullough’s feelings about the controversy, Harrison said his nephew is disappointed that his SAT score has been questioned.

“But he is not going to let it deter him from the issue at hand,” he said. “He has a lot of things in his favor. He wants to graduate and get out of high school.”

Times staff writer Eric Shepard and Times correspondent Richard Winton contributed to this story.