State Rep. Dave Dobos, R-Hilltop, never graduated MIT as he has claimed for decades
Dave Dobos, a state representative since January and a longtime Republican politician from Columbus' Hilltop who once served as Columbus City School Board president, never graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as he has publicly claimed for decades.
The claim of holding an MIT degree has been repeated by Dobos often dating back some 30 years, in everything from political campaigns to casual conversations.
An MIT spokesperson, Sarah McDonnell, said that Dobos' claims of holding a degree from the prestigious research institution in Cambridge, Massachusetts, are incorrect.
“Dobos attended MIT as an undergraduate student in economics from September 1973 – August 1977; February 1978 – January 1979; and February 1980 – May 1980,” McDonnell said in an email to The Dispatch. “No MIT degrees were conferred.”
Dobos, 68, has claimed publicly to be an MIT graduate at least since the early 1990s, when he ran for the Columbus Board of Education, and continued the claim consistently through the years up to the present.
Even up until early Tuesday, his official state website biography as a member of the Ohio House, a seat to which he was elected last November, said he was an MIT graduate.
"A graduate of West High School and MIT, Dobos used his education and training to start a small business," his state website said earlier Tuesday.
But later Tuesday afternoon – after news of his false claim was first reported by Cleveland.com – the wording had been changed to say only that Dobos had "attended" MIT. However, his campaign website continued to say he graduated from MIT – as did dozens of news stories dating back decades.
A call left with Dobos' office was not immediately returned.
Dobos defeated Democrat Russell Harris, a longtime government relations consultant and lobbyist for the Ohio Education Association, 53% to 47% in the race for Ohio's new 10th House District, which includes most of southern Columbus.
The latest revelation follows Dobos failing to correctly report his campaign finances last year.
Dobos said he was in "error" when he did not include on his July campaign financial report two creditors who claim he owes them $1.3 million as the result of a decade-old business dispute.
In the lawsuit, former business associates accused Dobos of using their name and money to obtain credit and create companies that they claim defrauded them of more than $25,000. The lawsuit accused Dobos of covering up his dealings and using their money for personal purposes.
In March 2014, Delaware County Common Pleas Judge W. Duncan Whitney ordered Dobos to pay nearly $329,673, plus interest, as well as $989,018.58 in punitive damages. Dobos filed for bankruptcy, but a federal judge in October 2014 ruled that Dobos still had to pay the full $1.3 million.
In March 2015, Dobos asked a Delaware County court to keep him from having to pay, but Judge David Gormley denied the request.
The Ohio General Assembly's Joint Legislative Ethics Committee contacted Dobos last year after a letter to the Office of the Legislative Inspector General claimed Dobos failed to disclose on his financial report the $1.3 million that a Delaware County Common Pleas judge ordered he pay. Dobos then filed an addendum acknowledging the debt.
Dobos was first elected to the Columbus City school board in 1993. He left the board of Ohio's largest school district at the end of 2001, after having served a stint as president.
wbush@gannett.com
@ReporterBush
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: State Rep. Dave Dobos never got MIT diploma as he's claimed for years
