Katie Barnett flew more than halfway across the country to attend a review class taught by Flynn Warren Jr., a University pharmacy professor accused of giving out test questions to students, according to court documents.

Now a pharmacist in Seattle, a graduate from the Wisconsin School of Pharmacy raved in an e-mail about the class she took from Warren in South Carolina and wrote that the pharmacy community would be enhanced with more teachers like him.

As part of her gratitude, court documents show she then supplied Warren with general topics from her North American Pharmacist Licensure Examination, a test used by each state’s boards of pharmacy, as well as exact questions to the test.

“What does- p-value mean if p= 0.04 does that mean 4% due to chance? – had this twice,” she writes.

In the same document, Jeff Bruce, a pharmacy student from Creighton University, cites Warren’s guidance for his “inflated score.” He wrote that he scored a 130 out of 150 on the NAPLEX, which requires a score of 75 to pass.

“About one-third of the questions were either word-for-word, or very similarly worded to those in the practice test you went over with us in Athens,” he wrote to the professor in the document.

Warren retired from the University this July but still teaches elective classes at the College of Pharmacy.

The National Association of Boards of Pharmacy has accused him of copyright infringement, alleging that he asked students to memorize test questions and share what they could remember with him.

And now students who have never met Warren are unable to take their licensure tests, at least for the foreseeable future.

The NABP suspended administration of both the NAPLEX nationally and Georgia MPJE on Saturday.

The organization has not revealed when students will be able to take the test again.

The Red & Black scheduled a meeting for Thursday afternoon with Svein Oie, dean of the College of Pharmacy, but the appointment was cancelled that day by college officials.

Tom Jackson, vice president for public affairs, said no plans have been made to keep Warren from teaching this fall. He is scheduled to instruct in the spring, Jackson added.

Alan Ray Spies, an assistant pharmacy professor at Samford University, said in an affidavit that he learned in May 2007 Warren was giving NAPLEX questions to students.

A senior administrator at Samford’s School of Pharmacy, who did not want to be named due to the pending investigation, said he was aware students at the school used Warren’s review course.

The news began to reverberate at universities nationwide this week.

Michael McKenzie, a senior associate dean for professional affairs at the University of Florida’s College of Pharmacy, said to his knowledge none of the college’s students had participated in Warren’s review course. He said he recognized the potential effect of the investigation.

“I would suspect they’ll have to make new questions and throw out ones that may have been compromised,” he said.

Authorities seized materials from Warren’s computers Aug. 6 and found a copy of an electronic receipt used to purchase electronic shredding software, which is used to purge files from a computer so they cannot be recovered forensically. The court documents state the software was purchased just before the seizure.

A recent graduate from the pharmacy school at The University of Colorado at Boulder, who requested not to be identified, was unable to take the licensure test he scheduled for Monday. He said he has $130,000 in student loans and a baby due in November.

“I’m just a pawn in the game,” the graduate said. “My career and profession hang in the balance.”

UPDATE: From the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy:
NABP announced to its member boards of pharmacy on Thursday, August 30, 2007 that the NAPLEX and Georgia MPJE will be reactivated as soon as possible when NABP is confident that both examinations are able to validly assess the entry-level competence of pharmacists to safely practice pharmacy. NABP cautiously estimates that the examinations will be reinstated by early November 2007, following review and approval by NABP. Upon reactivation, the NAPLEX and Georgia MPJE programs will provide valid, psychometrically sound assessments of candidate competence and will embody the highest standards of testing that characterize and define NABP and its programs. This rapid reactivation timeline is possible thanks to the strength of the programs and processes that NABP has in place and despite these programs having sustained significant damage that may have completely destroyed other programs.