If they are going start examing all college Presidents then
by wpkirish (2024-01-04 11:52:54)

In reply to: The NYT has stated Harvard was first approached by  posted by Barrister

Cannot Reply Return to Political

I would agree with you but I doubt they are going to do that.

Harvard, as probably the most prestigious and well-known
by Barrister  (2024-01-04 11:57:33)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

university, should not be a surprising first target.

I'm all for people digging into academic misconduct - if there's nothing there, then it doesn't matter who does the digging.

When academics and activism/politics mix, this is going to happen.

I just don't see why people leapt to excuse what seems to be pretty clear misconduct because they don't like the politics of the people who uncovered it. That seems to be counterproductive.
I get that of course I also find it ironic that the person
by wpkirish  (2024-01-04 12:54:10)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

leading the charge (Ruffo)claimed to have a masters from Harvard when in fact he attended the Harvard Extension School.

I think this issue is an extension of cancel versus accountability. I may be wrong but suspect many of th folks who believe the good Dr. should have been fired do not believe the similar allegations against Justice Gorsuch were fair and should have been a part of his evaluation.

Is her demotion / firing justified based upon the issues discovered? I would say it probably is but I would also say she was not targeted for her plagiarism.

She wasn't fired, was she? I don't know much about Rufo
by Barrister  (2024-01-04 13:03:46)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

other than he's an anti-DEI pot stirrer and propagandist.

In this instance, however, the guy who went to the extension school did a better vetting job than the Harvard Corporation and its presidential search committee, and in less time.

And granting for the sake of discussion that the digging into Prof. Gay's publications was not motivated in the first instance by plagiarism concerns but by opposition to her real or perceived politics, it does not change the fact that real academic misconduct was found. The professor has nobody to blame but herself for that.

The lesson here may be that sometimes assholes are right.

All of this started back a few years
by Raoul  (2024-01-04 22:21:31)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

Christopher Brunet (at the time a substack blogger and investigative journalist who follows academic stories - fraud, plagiarism, disputes on firing people, etc) was the one who raised it well before this fall. He was on to her flaws back when she was merely a Dean. But no one cared. A guy like Rufo simply expanded on and amplified what he had already done (Rufo probably now has access to significant resources). Brunet is a conservative Canadian, but not a widely read guy like Rufo. Ackman amplified what Rufo and Brunet subsequently collaborated on.

Interestingly, Ackman's current wife (2nd one) is Neri Oxman, a well known design guru / beautiful person who dated Brad Pitt before marrying Ackman in the last few years. Just today she was accused of plagiarism in her 2010 MIT PhD by Business Insider - problematic for her since she is currently a professor at MIT. [Edit: She left her MIT role in 2020, now running a design start-up...she has written her own response to Business Insider that people can review if they like]

The reality is that academia is rife with plagiarism and faulty data. Professors have the same cravings - fame, power, glory, etc - as anyone else and they cheat, lie, defraud, sexually harass at minimum at the same rate of the general population. Probably much higher given their ambition - so more like that of Wall Street types, Corporate Execs and high level Military and Religious figures.

The good news is the we are getting a bit of a Martin Luther moment here in terms of academia. Or at least we can hope. Time to clean out the Augean Stables of academia as they are rather polluted.


Presumably Stanford who granted her tenure
by fontoknow  (2024-01-04 17:27:20)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

Should have done a better job vetting her tenure file ...

Once she was granted tenure based on the articles in question, it was off to the races.
I think where I am on this is "both sides" of this post are
by wpkirish  (2024-01-04 17:12:19)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

likely correct.

She likely plagiarized and the effort to have her removed was not motivated by the plagiarism it was only an excuse. If the groups really care about plagiarism, they can look at a lot of folks but we know they dont.

She should have been fired after her visit to DC *
by airborneirish  (2024-01-06 12:23:38)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

if Stefanik could be cast out too, that would be great
by ravenium  (2024-01-07 17:25:24)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

I won't defend the people being questioned, but she is a clown who apparently got her pod person implant in the past few years. As usual, ken white probably said it better.

If I recall
by AquinasDomer  (2024-01-04 14:15:28)     cannot delete  |  Edit  |  Return to Board  |  Ignore Poster   |   Highlight Poster  |   Cannot reply

The academics I follow said the stuff Rufo released wasn't that concerning. It was stuff that got released after that Rufo hadn't released.

I think Harvard was looking to get rid of her, but didn't want to look too beholden to donors. Then stuff from the ongoing investigation got leaked.