12 ms·
I'm a College Professor Who Faked Dissertation Data on the Side
- socrates1998 7y agoSadly, it's insanely common to have advanced degrees plagiarized. I worked as a high school teacher and the number of co-workers who phoned it in for advanced degrees just to get the pay increase was insane. I can't think of one person who did it to actually learn anything. The worst was a couple of "Doctors", who essentially bought their way to getting EdD's. It was just disgusting. Our admins and leaders CHEATING their way to getting advanced degrees and then expecting us to respect them as educators. And they had the gall to make people call them "doctor". One of the many reasons why I quit working for them.
- tvanantwerp 7y agoWhen I was in high school, the county's highest paid teacher (on account of the credentials) worked there. She taught typing. TYPING! And she wasn't even very good at it! I don't think a single student really respected her. I was friendly with the school's IT guys. One of them told me the story of her mouse "breaking", and him going to fix it. Somebody had just put some scotch tape over the sensor. He silently removed it, told her it was fixed, and went back to his office for a good laugh.
- povertyworld 7y agoPeople only get the EdD because it's required to be a superintendent in most places. I'm scraping by on a part time higher ed gig, and it's just depressing how the full time staff just see degrees as an obstacle to getting a raise not a path to growth and learning. The average American already thinks higher ed is a scam. At least the people who work in it could try to believe in their own product, but even they don't.
- linuxftw 7y agoThis is a symptom they believe they're under paid. Plus, you don't need an advanced 'degree' to learn much of anything anymore. The wealth of human knowledge that is available online, for free, is astounding.
- povertyworld 7y agoAs someone who has worked in higher ed, part of the degree requirements are to reduce corruption. Otherwise low tier state schools and community colleges would just be packed with the top administrator's buddies. Requiring a doctorate at least means you can't give the job to your pal Joey from Bayonne or whatever. Well, you still can, but he has to grind a mail order doctorate first.
- linuxftw 7y agoState-level certification exams would fix this. You either pass the exam, or you don't, doesn't matter how you acquired the knowledge.
- povertyworld 7y agoBut then people will just memorize for the test. We've all seen the IT guys who crammed for some certification, but don't know anything.
- rootusrootus 7y agoThat is a problem with particular certification exams, not insurmountable at all. E.g. memorizing brain dumps for Microsoft MSCE is one thing, but that trick does not work for the CCIE.
- barbecue_sauce 7y agoIs the CCIE one of the "hands on" exams, like the Red Hat and Kubernetes exams?
- BurningFrog 7y ago> it's just depressing how the full time staff just see degrees as an obstacle to getting a raise not a path to growth and learning. The average American already thinks higher ed is a scam I think an unbiased look at the evidence might say they're right.
- bachmeier 7y agoWould that be the evidence that college educated workers make more money than those without[1,2], or the evidence that the unemployment rate is lower for those with a college degree than for those without[3,4]? [1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LEU0252918500A https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LEU0252918500A [2] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LEU0252917300Q https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LEU0252917300Q [3] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU04027662 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU04027662 [4] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS14027660 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS14027660
- BurningFrog 7y agoThat certainly confirms degrees as an obstacle to getting a raise!
- SkyBelow 7y agoDoes something have to have no value to be a scam or just a value less than what is being advertised? I do feel lumping all higher education together is a bit unfair and a breakdown would be far more telling where scams are and aren't.
- linuxftw 7y agoTeaching should be qualified on certifications only, of which a degree is not a qualifier. Good teachers are under paid, bad teachers are over paid, why support the system? Don't use public schools. I would say that most 4 year degrees are mostly 'useless' knowledge. I would say most high schools are mostly useless knowledge. I don't know what society is optimizing for, I think it's optimizing for more and more expensive education.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- povertyworld 7y agoAs much as I like to believe people can teach themselves anything, if you look at places like Kaggle, there are really no self-taught people. It's just a parade of Phd holders and grad students. I'm sure there are one or two, but clearly for most people coughing up the dough for a Computer Science / Data Science degree is indeed worth it.
- autokad 7y agoI agree with your statements, but dont forget the people who value education are the same ones with degrees and the same ones who self learn. when I was amazed at how we can now take classes at schools like Havard for free on Coursera, my nephew was like 'well what do i get out of it?' *face palm likewise with kaggle. I love participating on it when I have time, but when people who want to be data scientists but dont have a masters/phd and no experience, I tell them to participate there. They always say, I dont want to do that, what else? =|
- socrates1998 7y agoDon't use public schools? What do you propose instead? What should teenagers do instead of learn how to read, write and do math?
- linuxftw 7y agoIf you're still learning how to read, write, and do basic math as a teenager, society has failed you. I propose homeschooling or private schooling for those who can afford it. I have determined that the public school curriculum is trash, the people creating it are trash, and the people teaching it are trash. If you want trash students, please, send them to trash schools.
- matz1 7y ago>I can't think of one person who did it to actually learn anything I don't think this is the goal. If I can just for example pay for like $15k in order to get $15k pay increase, then to me its a good deal.
- fuzz4lyfe 7y agoGood deal for the person getting the 15k sure, a terrible deal for the people paying property taxes to fund that raise.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoAlso a terrible deal for people at the receiving end of the services of such a person.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- paulcole 7y agoNot if the extra $15k keeps an otherwise good teacher/educator from leaving and going to a private company.
- fuzz4lyfe 7y agoI'm happy to pay the good teachers more so long as we can pay the bad ones less and get rid of them easily. The unions fight measures like that hard in my experience.
- yummypaint 7y agoUnions fight to protect their members. If taxpayers arent willing to fund enough compensation to attract quality candidates, it is gaurenteed to create a bad situation. Unions protecting bad teachers is a symptom not a cause.
- everdrive 7y agoYou might get more earnest learners if the degree weren't tied to pay or prestige. Everyone wants pay and prestige, but only some people want to learn.
- uxp100 7y agoI have a friend who has a Doctorate and teaches some high school teachers, and is a high school teacher/administrator herself, and she always complains about teachers doing things like taking phone calls in the middle of lecture, or just never showing up and complaining to the colleges administration if she gives a poor grade. The older they are the worse they behave, so she says. Of course, her side job teaching them in the summer probably wouldn't exist if they didn't get pay increases for degrees, so...
- uxp100 7y agoJust anecdotes from one person, but she also said that those perusing degrees were more engaged and less likely to just be taking calls etc. than those who were doing continuing education credits.
- austincheney 7y agoThis is the most high profile case that comes to mind: https://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/11/us/boston-u-panel-finds-plagiarism-by-dr-king.html https://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/11/us/boston-u-panel-finds-p...
- JakeStone 7y agoYou just sadly reminded me of when I was an undergrad taking a grad class on "History of Mathematics". Two undergrads taking the class because it just sounded neat, and the professor made things interesting. 10 graduate students who were teachers taking the class for the increased salary. An evening seminar of three hours per week after work where we examined as much as possible over how people did math through the ages and through time. You could tell these grads were bored. But, fine, dealing with kids all day, then having to learn something new that isn't likely to ever be more than a trivia point in a lecture might not be a great thing. Then... We get to a point where it looks like Archimedes came this close to discovering integral calculus. [insert appropriate WOW! meme here] A couple of grunts from the grads. Me and the other undergrad were gobsmacked. There were other examples, but that's the one that always sticks in my head. It's also what contributed to me not being very impressed by some of the grade school teachers I met as my kids were enrolled.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- chengiz 7y agoI dont understand what you're trying to convey. I like history but someone almost discovering something holds no appeal for me; what actually happened does. And these people were not interested in the course in the first place.
- AlexCoventry 7y agoWhat would the world look like, if the calculus had been discovered two millenia earlier?
- chengiz 7y agoThat's fiction, not history.
- JakeStone 7y ago[TL;DR] It's not the destination, it's the journey. Archimedes didn't reach the destination of integral calculus, but he at least started the journey, and I appreciate it. [/TL;DR] I think it's a sense of wonder thing. The scope of knowledge (to my understanding) didn't exist back then to imagine infinitesimals. I believe they were having issues with irrationals, let alone things that approached 0 but weren't exactly 0. There's a sibling comment along the lines of "what if calculus had been discovered 2,000 years earlier" that touches on this, but I think for me there's added the idea that there's proof that some people, some times, can almost see what's next in terms of discoverable knowledge, and it keeps me hopeful. Most of us have some "off" theory/fantasy/hope with no rigid proof of validity. And many of those are just random neurons firing that might make a good fanfic. But there's that person over there who has a mostly fleshed out idea for (insert super tech here) and just needs to figure out step 37. It turns out she'll never invent the super tech defined. But X-2891q in the year 3971 will meme a holograph that brings that super tech into reality. While the super tech likely adds to society, the original person who came up with elements of the concept enriched herself in doing so, by my perspective.
- awillen 7y agoIt wasn't until I dated a middle school teacher for a while that I realized how crazy the pay scale is there. Her pay would automatically go up for any grad degree. She was teaching middle school science, but she could have gotten an online Master's in sociology and received a pay bump. I absolutely would have gone online and done the absolute minimum in the easiest possible program I could find, and I wouldn't have thought twice about it. The fact that any Master's degree would do already tells me that it's irrelevant to the school district whether the degree improves teaching (and let's be honest, even getting a Master's in bio won't really help a third grade science teacher), so what difference does it make if it's a total BS degree?
- barbecue_sauce 7y agoThis all depends on the school district and/or state. Many places, you have to actually get degrees in Education rather than random subjects. (And you are expected to do this to stay employed, rather than to get pay bumps).
- awillen 7y agoSeems weird that you have to do it to stay employed. If you're a middle school science teacher for several years, why would they fire you for not getting an additional credential just because you've been in the job for a certain amount of time, when they've been allowing you to do the job without it?
- barbecue_sauce 7y agoWell, in the situation I’m describing, you’re expected to have an education bachelors to get a teaching job in the first place, with the condition that you get a masters within a certain number of years (followed by continuing education credits). This is essentially dictated by the Teachers Union, to keep salaries high and reduce the supply of qualified educators (though they also negotiate for partial or full reimbursement of education costs for their members so teachers aren’t paying completely out of pocket).
- Alex63 7y agoI was taught (as a Canadian from an English family) that the only people who should be addressed as "doctor" in normal conversation are MDs and active/retired college/university professors. What is common etiquette today?
- cgh 7y agoStill the same I think, except in certain provinces such as BC chiropractors and naturopaths can unfortunately refer to themselves as "doctors" and do so at every opportunity. But maybe that doesn't fall under the definition of "normal conversation".
- gnicholas 7y agoI wouldn't call anyone "doctor" in normal conversation. Also, at least in my experience (several friends/family are professors), it can be seen as disrespectful to refer to a professor as "doctor" because that is the title that you get when you finish your PhD, but before you have a job as an actual professor. For reference, I live in Palo Alto and went to universities in the US.
- MaysonL 7y agoMy mother worked for years as secretary for an EdD who was unable to draft a coherent paragraph: she wrote all of his business letters for him. He did, I believe, enjoy being referred to as "Doctor".
- qrbLPHiKpiux 7y agoMy 5th grader referred to her principal as “doctor” so and so... I told her he is not a doctor. Now, on the other hand, I am one. With a license to practice and I never demand anyone use it. That’s just absurd!
- barry-cotter 7y agoAn Ed.D. is not an advanced degree. It is an abomination. You cannot cheapen an Ed.D. or an M.Ed. by cheating to get it because no one with any familiarity with them respects them. Degrees in education have no effect on teaching effectiveness, they’re among the clearest possible examples of pure credentialism and gatekeeping.
- grenoire 7y agoThat was much milder than expected, but not particularly surprising. I made this point recently in an unrelated thread; having taught academic skills classes at a research university and talking to many of my friends who didn't go to research universities, the one big problem is that people don't know what research entails. They don't know how to conduct it, how to express it, and (a fundamentally problematic one) why it's done. This is partially a problem with unethical students who just want their degree or title, but that's just one part of it. There's a problem with research education. That's why we have students who are just dumbfounded at the effort needed to write research papers worth reading and studying.
- nosianu 7y ago> That was much milder than expected, Just keep scrolling and reading. There's cheating story after cheating story, maybe one of the other ones gets you more excited :-)
- phist_mcgee 7y agoCan we all agree that the author of that article wrote incredibly unsparingly, and did not presenT any form of an interesting narrative, for something that could have been a quite interesting topic/personal story. In fact, it felt like I was reading the work of someone who was not interested in writing whatsoever, which is funny considering that they are a professor at a liberal arts college.
- skrebbel 7y agoNo, we can't. I enjoyed reading it. It was light, honest and I liked the differences in pace.
- mark259 7y agoIt would be very funny indeed, except that the writing is done by a journalist.
- Legogris 7y agoPersonally I abhor the trend of needing to create a complete personal story out of every experience. I am not interested in several paragraphs of where the author happens to be in life, how their morning went and all their personal relationships and thoughts where I am really interested in the topic they're supposed to be talking about. I read to expand my views, not to feel artificially connected to whomever the author is. I prefer the writing style in this piece over most articles on Vice, TBH.
- homonculus1 7y agoI too hate long-form writing, I cannot bear to read it ever ever ever. If you need to flex your imagery chops on the reader that badly then write fiction, otherwise get to the damn point!
- tasubotadas 7y ago"It was an early Sunday morning when I've first met X while he was holding his hand full of bagels. Only later that day I would learn that it was actually for his dog as he is a big and naughty fan of them" Articles that start like this make me puke. Go and write a book if you want to be a writer.
- omarhaneef 7y agoIf this is widespread, it might explain the absolutely bonkers survey results that I see from time to time. As an aside, it is sad that lurking just under the surface of so many academic stories is that strong undercurrent of scarcity.
- 12elephant 7y agowhat do you mean by "strong undercurrent of scarcity"?
- omarhaneef 7y agoI mean, a contributing factor to the author's actions was the sense that he wasn't getting paid much. > "It's definitely the lowest pay available at the college, and our school is one of the lowest paid ones in the state."
- FloatArtifact 7y agoTake this in context but I think this is partly due to the overinflation education requirements for employment.
- mannykannot 7y ago... which is, in part, driven by the devaluation of credentials through this sort of thing.
- OrgNet 7y agois it that widespread?
- tombert 7y agoI took partial differential equations as an undergrad, which thoroughly kicked my ass. There was a lot of stuff that I found confusing, and so once I finally understood it, I made a Youtube video explaning separation of variables for the clamped heat equation, and posted it hoping that either I or someone else could benefit from that. A few weeks later, I got a private Youtube message from someone claiming that he was a PhD student that was willing to pay me $600 to do his PDE homework for him. As a broke college kid, $600 might as well have been $600,000 to me at the time, so I eagerly agreed, but shortly after realized that this was incredibly unethical and I started feeling guilty. Before he could send me the money, I came up with an excuse saying something like "my computer caught on fire". Looking back, it was sort of a surreal thing; I wouldn't have thought that a PhD'd person would need a lot of help from some gauky undergrad making a crappy tutorial with Mathtype and screen recording software. I guess this stuff must be pretty prevalent though...maybe if I had known about it I wouldn't have dropped out of school the next semester :) .
- PopeDotNinja 7y agoI superficially like the idea of a meritocracy, where hard work and success move you up the in the order of things. Then I remember cheating, the difficulty of quantifying success, the shifting nature of what kind of success we want to reward, yada yada. Now I am more in the egalitarian camp, where I want everyone to have enough to be comfortable, but I still want there to be rewards for being successful. Some sort of egalitarian free for all, where everyone is a winner, but some win more than others. I have this thought that keeps popping into my head. N people are on an island. On the island is a tree that makes enough X units of food, where X is greater than N, and each unit of food is enough to sustain one person. The N people work together to make sure that everyone gets at least 1 unit of food, and X - N units left over are split up by some fair enough competition.
- ergothus 7y agoOne argument in favor of UBI I found particularly thought-provoking (paraphrasing): "UBI isn't anti-capitalist, UBI enables capitalism. By providing the basic requirements for living, it allows everyone to actually participate in the competition instead of keeping the poor too busy and too at-risk to attempt business ventures." I'm still undecided on UBI, but that argument definitely made me think of things from some different angles.
- MiroF 7y ago"I also didn't—and still don't—know if this woman had some sort of agreement with the school, and they were feeding her these students. For all I know they were in on it." This section really made me realize the extent to which the mind can really rationalize anything. Something to guard against..
- dylz 7y agoI should point out that this is not all that crazy when certain for profit schools are involved...
- jrochkind1 7y agoThat doesn't serve as a rationalization for doing the cheating for pay, it doesn't excuse it; it could serve as a rationalization for not telling the school about it. I think it's also not at all an implausible suspicion.
- sarcasmatwork 7y ago>I'm a communications professor at a small liberal arts college Stop reading + its vice.
- fishtacos 7y agoPathetic^
- SubiculumCode 7y agoonline accredited phd program? Really. Unimaginable.
- asdf21 7y agoWhy is that unimaginable? Seems very imaginable to me, depending on the field.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- Proven 7y agoI don't care