To compare and contrast coverage and outcome of the Jason Arday scandal with that of Cambridge plagiarist William O'Reilly

[OneArtfulUmberSquid]

Partly due to being an academic, the slow news season and the sensationalism, like many people I've been following the Jason Arday story and have been appalled by the scale of the fabulation and the abysmal lack of due diligence by Cambridge when they appointed him - I've also been appalled by how he was presented by the University when he was hired in terms of the emphasis on his back story and what he represented rather than his scholarship.

It's interesting to compare/contrast with the case of William O'Reilly - who was caught plagiarising his own undergrad students' essays and was then found to have plagiarised other scholars' work a number of times before...see https://www.varsity.co.uk/news/27433

He also threatened to sue student journalists for exposing him - not as bad as Arday calling the police, but still pretty risible
https://www.varsity.co.uk/news/26105

A further issue relates to his witness for the accused in a rape case despite being involved in the investigation.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/feb/22/cambridge-university-sexual-misconduct-cases
https://www.varsity.co.uk/news/18747

I'd be interested to know what anyone else thinks of the two cases in terms of academic misconduct and outcomes, particularly anyone who works in Cambridge. O'Reilly claimed that the scrutinising of his work was due to homophobia.

More here but behind a paywall
https://www.ft.com/content/ae7f16ae-95ab-4aae-a676-0748e3e61b6d?shareType=nongift&syn-25a6b1a6=1

How could you describe JA as "having met the criteria"? He had not nearly enough academic experience or publication record to have even been considered a shortlisted candidate.
I thought that article in the Atlantic by Tyler Austin Harper made it very clear how even those who have been appointed feel "a bit miffed" when they discover how decisions over appointments like theirs are made. And it's been pointed out that Coffas was a little more than motivated to pull JA down a peg as he'd been ousted from his similar position due to wrongthink.

Is there a silence from the many teachers and Academics and even students who must have worked with Jason Arday in the various institutions he worked in?

The criteria were pretty vague and open to interpretation. He'd already been a Professor in Glasgow so hadn't come from nowhere.

Cofnas didn't have a similar position at all, he was an Early Career Fellow in Cambridge and Research Associate at Emmanuel, very junior positions. He's still only at post-doc level despite coming up to 40 years of age. By wrongthink do you mean his belief in eugenics? Not exactly intellectually sound. In terms of JA he gleefully said 'this is what happens if you don't give Cofnas a job' and had a good old laugh about his 'vengeance' with David Starkey, who also resigned/was fired by Cambridge due to racist comments including references to 'so many damn blacks in Africa'.

No, there's this https://leilacancode.github.io/everythinggood-about-jasonarday/?fbclid=IwY2xjawTy_atwZG9mBWV4dG4DYWVtAjExAGJyaWQRMWZRc21mTFFpRTZJU1FDeWpzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeYRkMOeOOIogyqZOJXRYpQwKLZkHvbyrmTsryEop9KB5trmY4XKjV5sn0XJ4_aem_Mpo0A9T1Z_RUsbYeruWsGA

as well as less complimentary comments

One of the biggest issues that the Jason Arday case has highlighted is that sociology of education appears to be a discipline that is entirely devoid of academic standards or rigour.

@snurtifier I expect others would disagree but I know nothing about that field. I rather suspect there had to be people out there with better academic credentials and output of work.

Possibly because he made millions of pounds from the back of his fantasies.

‘Millions of pounds’? Now you sound like a fantasist.

He did say that he was given 1.4 million as a book advance.

But that could be in vietnamese dong for all we know.

Cofnas had a Leverhulme Early Career fellowship. It’s a national competition and success is very rare. Less than a 20% success rate ie fewer than 1 in 5 applicants are successful. And the host institution (Cambridge in this case) has to cough up half the salary+ costs for office, computer etc.

There’s no question about Cofnas’ qualifications and excellence in successfully landing a Leverhulme.

Whatever one thinks about his racist views.

Genuinely not baiting, but I understand Cofnas claims he is also autistic. Does that give him any sort of bye in the whole debate or explain some of his tenacious views? I had a quick scroll through his Twitter feed and he comes across as quite emphatic in the views and stance he holds and takes.

He did, but if one is going to disregard everything he says as fantasy, one can’t then pick bits out of that and use them as evidence of fact. Even if true, it’s still not millions plural.

I think the 1.4m claim is probably false - it’s an enormous advance even for an established author.

I haven’t seen Cofnas say he’s autistic. He’s referred to Arday as ‘mentally disabled’ and ‘not so retarded that…’ so would be quite surprising to find he is equally ‘mentally disabled’.

He said he's more autistic than Arday, however it's unclear whether this means he is actually autistic.

I see he has been suspended by his university and is expecting to be fired. I doubt anyone will be crying witch hunt over that.

It may have been competitive but it’s nowhere near the same as a professorship - someone said he had a similar post to Arday at Cambridge.

If he was once thought to have promise, that no longer seems the case if he’s only a post doc, and it seems his racism is inalienable to his research given his ambitions to be Professor of the non-existent field of eugenics and race science - if he applied for an academic post in most universities and seriously stated that as his career goal I don’t imagine he’d be appointed.

‘More autistic’ doesn’t mean anything.

It’s not a witch hunt. He’s continually drawn attention to himself and laughed about his vengeance on Arday. From Ghent’s standpoint he’s done reputational damage to the institution and they’re completely within their rights to suspend him.

Yes, that’s what I saw and where I got it from.

I wasn’t sure whether he meant he really was more autistic that Arday, or if he was suggesting that if Arday considered himself autistic, then Cofnas was undoubtedly so.

I think his views are abhorrent and the uni is well within their rights to suspend him. I'm guessing that they are already aware of his views based on him losing that position at Cambridge.

To suppose that his university haven't been bombarded with complaints in the wake of Arday's death in a concerted effort to get him fired would be extremely optimistic.

So if one is a witch hunt, why not the other?

‘To suppose that his university haven't been bombarded with complaints in the wake of Arday's death in a concerted effort to get him fired would be extremely optimistic’

that’s pure speculation on your part - witch hunt isn’t a term I started using but it probably involves some sort of public aspect - as such the sheer quantity of public commentary on Arday is in a different league to someone speculating that there may have been (private) complaints to an institution.

Well no, it's not speculation that people have been contacting the university, because they put out a statement about it and said they were investigating. They have framed it as 'enquires' but given that there were protests against him when he was at Cambridge, I don't think it's reasonable to assume that they were neutral in tone.

No @OneArtfulUmberSquid i do understand that! Being a professor myself but also having mentored a number of postdocs who’ve won prestigious awards such as Leverhulme and the in the EU. MSCA postdoc scheme.

Ii was simply pointing out that Cofnas has been successful in a very competitive funding scheme supported by Cambridge, whatever one thinks of the racist views he revealed while in that post.

In today’s UKHE it’s my observation that it’s tougher to get these entry-level posts than for an established academic to get promoted to professor at the moment.

Getting onto the permanent contract ladder (we no longer have tenure in the UK) is the real hurdle, and one that is very difficult more in terms of socio-economic resources than race, in my view.

In some areas in the Humanities and social sciences, Early career researchers have to be prepared to hang on for up to 8-10 years post-PhD surviving on short term contracts, part-time academic work and so on.

But in some ways - not all! - Cofnas and Arday have both suffered by playing their back stories and their personal beliefs, rather than their scholarship. I’m not saying they are the same in terms of their beliefs - Arday’s were pretty anodyne and obvious, Cofnas’s come close to hate speech. But there are more parallels than liberal, left of centre academics (I count myself as one) would care to admit.

It’s about the sticky situations that can ensue from giving too much time and value to a scholar’s personality, personal beliefs and politics, rather than their scholarship and what they can argue for, with evidence which can be tested and argued with.

We could have said the same about Arday:
It’s not a witch hunt. He’s continually drawn attention to himself and sicced lawyers on those who challenged him. From Cambridge’s standpoint he’s done reputational damage to the institution and they’re completely within their rights to suspend him.

Did he? From whom?

You can’t really say the same as the narrative around Arday has been the witch hunt across the media. Not his interactions with the university that employed him.

Cofnas, certainly has not been the subject of 100s and 100s of articles about all aspects of his private life.