UNC Chapel Hill chancellor Carol Folt admitted Thursday at a Board of Trustees meeting that the school had offered fraudulent African studies courses mostly to student-athletes.

Folt, who is six months into her tenure, said this practice can be dated back to 1997 and included no-show classes, forged signatures and unauthorized grade changes, the News and Observer reported. She said the university would fully accept responsibility and should "absolutely" be held accountable.

The school's former African and Afro-American studies department chair Julius Nayang-oro was recently indicted on charges of academic fraud for holding courses mostly made up of athletes that rarely or never met. These charges come at a time when the school is also battling a report saying UNC's student athletes have an alarmingly low literacy level.

Since the mid-1990s, the African studies department held at least 200 lecture-style courses that investigators said likely met rarely, if at all. More than 50 percent of the classes enrollees were student-athletes, who received a collective total of more than 500 grade changes over that time period.

"All of those students who were involved in those courses deserved better from us," Holt said at the meeting. "We also accept the fact that there was a failure in academic oversight for years that permitted this to continue. This, too, was wrong and it has undermined our integrity and our reputation, and created a very unhealthy atmosphere of distrust.

"I think we all know that to move forward we have to make sure that everyone understands that we absolutely feel accountable and we're going to learn from that painful history."

The school is still disputing the CNN report by Mary Willingham stating a majority of the school's at-risk student-athletes in major Division I sports like football and basketball cannot read above an eighth grade level. Earlier this week, the school challenged Willingham's findings with the school's own admissions office data and applied it to CNN's literacy scale.

"I have personally taken the time to speak with a number of student athletes," student body president Christy Lambden told the Daily Tar Heel. "Students feel hurt, betrayed by what they see as unmerited accusations."

Willingham was barred from using UNC's data for her research unless she receives special permission from a review board. She has expressed she intends to continue her work in this manner and has not backed off her initial findings.

The scandal revolving around Nayan'oro and the African studies department may only be a piece of the troubles UNC is facing, but Folt is still determined to save the school's integrity.

"It has undermined our integrity and our reputation and has created a very unhealthy atmosphere of distrust," Folt said at the meeting. "Moving forward, we have to make sure everyone understands that we do feel accountable and we're going to learn from that painful history."

(Correction: the author of this article changed a sentence to read: a "majority of the school's at-risk student-athletes in major Division I sports like football and basketball." The sentence previously stated the majority of all UNC student-athletes had poor reading skills, which would not reflect Willingham's research.)