This scandal blew up because one of her classmates posted a lengthy rant about her lies on a /r/askreddit thread. The post was widely shared on Korean media and was eventually picked up in the states, as you can see from the original link.
For closure, it appears school officials met with her and her parents and decided on expelling her.
The classmate deleted the post shortly afterward, but you can read a copy of it below.
I found the original post entirely depressing and sad. I could never imagine putting my own children through the level of stress that would cause them to do this. I am glad to read the fathers reaction in that last link
"In a press release later on Friday morning, Sara's father, an executive at global online gaming company Nexon, apologized for causing a stir with the fabrication. "I'm responsible for all the mistakes and sorry not to have taken better care of this poor kid," he said. He promised to look after her better since she apparently suffered from extreme stress due to academic pressures. He allegedly had no idea that the story was false."
It's often the kids who put themselves through this pressure. I can't speak for all families, but I went to a Whitney HS, a southern california version of TJ, and the peer pressure is quite a lot stronger than what most parents say or do.
This isn't helped by an admissions process that seems to penalize Asian Americans due to their ethnicity.
From the development documented by her classmate, it seems like it started with a small lie about an extracurricular math activity that spiraled out of control when she tacked on one lie after another to convince others that she was accomplished. If people didn't call her out on the first lie and just ignored it, I wonder if she would have gone as far.
For closure, it appears school officials met with her and her parents and decided on expelling her.
The classmate deleted the post shortly afterward, but you can read a copy of it below.
[Archived Post] - https://archive.is/pYQeg
[Original Post] - http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/395g6c/what_is_th...
[Korean coverage, including forged admission letters] - http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2015/06/12/2015...