West Virginia University President Michael Garrison watched his provost and his business school dean resign this week over WVU's short-lived attempt to give Heather Bresch, his friend and former business associate, a phony M.B.A.

The president, however, has refused to quit over the scandal, letting his underlings take the fall and denying his university the chance to restore its good name. If Michael Garrison truly cares about WVU, he needs to go, too.

The case began last October when Post-Gazette reporter Patricia Sabatini did a routine background check on the claim by Ms. Bresch, the chief operating officer at Cecil-based Mylan Inc., that she received a master's degree in business administration from WVU in 1998. Ms. Bresch is not only a friend of President Garrison, but also the daughter of West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin. Her boss and chairman of the generic drug company, Milan Puskar, is WVU's biggest benefactor.

The registrar's office initially told the newspaper that records showed Ms. Bresch did not finish the work to obtain an M.B.A. Then the university reversed itself, saying that, after a review, officials found she had completed the 48 credit hours needed for the degree.

That lie was exposed by the five professors who later investigated the Bresch case and issued a scathing report last week saying that WVU officials made a "seriously flawed" decision to award the degree retroactively, an act that reflected "failures of process and failures of leadership" at the university. The investigators' report and Post-Gazette news stories have shown that President Garrison was represented at key points along the way.

• The panel concluded that Mr. Garrison's office "reacted immediately" after Ms. Bresch called him and chief of staff Craig Walker to object to the registrar's statement on Oct. 11 that there was no record of her completing the degree. Between Oct. 11 and Oct. 15, records obtained by the Post-Gazette under the Freedom of Information Act indicated that Ms. Bresch and the president's chief of staff traded nine phone calls.

• Mr. Garrison's chief of staff was also present at the Oct. 15 meeting -- along with Provost Gerald Lang, business school Dean R. Steven Sears and others -- when university officials decided to create a transcript that would give Ms. Bresch credit for courses she didn't take, work she didn't do and grades she never earned. The investigators said the grades themselves were "simply pulled from thin air."

The panel said that "the prevailing sentiment" at the meeting "was that a way should be found to justify the granting of the degree, if at all possible" -- even though the Bresch transcript, as the Post-Gazette reported, was 22 credits short of the 48 required. The report also said that "the actual or perceived pressure to go along with this decision, not to 'rock the boat,' was palpable" at the meeting.

Since the panel's findings were released on April 23, President Garrison has bobbed and weaved. The day it became public, he said "the report speaks for itself." It took him five more days to apologize for the "failures" that led to the bogus degree, but he refused to step down.

At a news conference Monday, he said in his defense that "I removed myself from this process immediately. I don't know why the decision was made or how it was made."

Yet he clearly did not forward Ms. Bresch's call in October to an academic officer independent of his office. His chief of staff conversed with her repeatedly about the case and attended the meeting that concocted the bogus M.B.A. If a chief of staff isn't doing the bidding of the chief, then whom is he working for?

West Virginia professors, staff and students -- who deserve integrity in their university -- would like to see this go away. WVU alumni, who feel embarrassed and humiliated by this case, would like to see it go away. The tarnished university president, who claims he wants the best for his institution, no doubt wants it to go away.

But none of it will, unfortunately, until Michael Garrison does.