It isn't their fault, they had no other choice, they were victims of the system, they did it for their children,
someone else made them do it, etc. etc.

Her daughter came from a white, rich, entitled and privileged family.
Her future was bright without her mother committing crimes.

She could get into college and study whatever she wanted depending upon her interests,
ambition and intellect.

Most mothers do not think they are bad mothers if they don't break the law for their kids.

Definitely not some vicarious adrenaline rush or bragging rights to her circle of friends.

She should have done it the old fashioned way and directly bribed the director of admissions or vice president.

Taking prep classes would have cost a whole lot less and given the daughter a sense of achievement if she got a good score all by her little self.

She also is a poor role model and not a good mother. If she wanted to be a good mother she would have encouraged her daughter to go to community college or a lesser ranked school, work very hard, and then try to transfer to the "school she wanted to go to."
Engaging in a criminal scheme not only was breaking the law, it was also teaching her daughter that she didn't need to actually earn her way into the "school she wanted to go to." and it also sent the message to her daughter that she would never be able to achieve it on her own.

the many private colleges. She could've just accepted that her daughter, apparently not one of the brighter buibs, needed to get her grades up or just go to a CSU school and forget about Stanford or Cal, and the Ivies, no way.

And actually Hoffman got off easy with just a 15k fine and 11 days in jail. Others paid the grades broker 6 figure fees and got much longer sentences.

The story doesn't say what the judge charged her for a fine. She had 11 days in jail and a lot of community service days. Plus she lost her day job on the Housewives series.

Not every American kid gets accepted to the college of their "choice." In fact a lot of them don't. Sometimes a gap year is the best idea, get some work experience, then start thinking about what they love most for their life's calling. Parents can't do this for their kids, they need to figure it out for themselves.

Boo fucking hoo. Welcome to the real world. These people are just wow.

would no doubt drop out of her chosen college anyway.
If she didn't have the grades to get in there, she most probably couldn't get the grades to remain there. Unless of course Mommy and Daddy were going to pay someone to take all of her exams for her.
White privilege? What white privilege?

...Huffman broke the law. I did a little Googling to see what happened after all that.

I find it interesting that, after the scandal was revealed, Sophia was accepted to Carnegie Mellon's theater program. If her SAT scores were low enough that her mother saw no alternative but to cheat, how did Sophia then get into a school where "Half the applicants admitted to Carnegie Mellon University who submitted test scores have an SAT score between 1490 and 1570(max 1600) or an ACT score of 34 and 35 (max 36)." (from US News and World Report).

Did her parents endow a building? Neither of them attended there.