<p>I think people are missing the bigger picture in this discussion.</p>
<p>Harvard has determined that some of its professors have published uncited verbatim copied text in their scholarly writings. They remain on the faculty teaching and advising students.</p>
<p>In a different arena of faculty misconduct, the seriousness of Prof. Andrei Shleifer’s offenses rank far higher, in my opinion. He headed a US-funded Harvard project to advise the Russian government on how to set up stock markets in their country. While carrying out that assignment, he supported his wife and the girl-friend of his deputy in dealing with paperwork to set up the first authorized Russian mutual fund, a clear conflict of interest. Last summer he and Harvard settled out of court–agreeing to pay millions of dollars in damages. Institutional Investor magazine did a big cover story on it last winter: “How Harvard lost Russia.” The alleged misbehavior took place in the mid-90’s. According to the article linked below, Harvard is only now getting around to consider the issue of whether there should be any professional repercussions for Prof. Shleifer, who still insists he did nothing wrong. In the meantime, he is scheduled to continue his teaching and advising duties in the fall.</p>
<p>These professors are older, more experienced, and presumably should be expected to be wiser than a Harvard undergrad. Harvard has been willing to allow them to continue to teach and advise students. </p>
<p>If Harvard takes as long to investigate the complicated details of the KV case as they did to investigate the Shleifer case, she will graduate long before they are done. (Any investigation would be complicated given that the copyright is jointly held by a book-packaging company and the book presumably underwent heavy editing, it seems that her position is at least as defensible as the Harvard law school profs who blamed their copying on the carelessness of their research assistants.)</p>
I agree with Marite. Drosselmeier, your statement takes parsing to a new level. How can you meaningfully separate her integrity in college, as a peer advisor or otherwise, from her lack of integrity in the writing and publication of her book? Where do you draw the line that lets her wear a white hat at Harvard and a black hat in her business and book dealings? There’s really no way to do that but, even if you could, giving her a position of authority and respect sends a rotten message to every Harvard student.</p>
<p>You are absolutely right, but it still does not make KV’s appointment right. I think Summers lost a lot of faculty support when he claimed not to be knowledgeable about the Shleifer affair. Until then, I believe he could have weathered the vote of no confidence.</p>
<p>Wisteria, good points. So perhaps it’s just trickle-down institutional laissez faire. I wonder if the university’s business school would have treated this ethical situation any differently?</p>
<p>I wondering if notoriety is now an asset rather than a hindrance.
I wonder if the attention her “book” received has made her a celebrity, and we don’t hold celebrities to the same standards.</p>
<p>I agree that she seems to be a very poor choice.
I would assume that many of the applicants would make a strong candidate, and to pick the most notorious one out of the pack for a role that should require shared values with the institution they are representing.</p>
<p>How is she going to advise freshmen? Share her google tips and her list of profs who don’t use plagiarism detection sites?</p>
<p>I also don’t understand why they are paid.
My daughter was a peer mentor at Reed, it was a volunteer position.
I realize Harvard has a lot of money but advisors recieve a $1000 stipend then $60 per freshman- that would add up .</p>
<p>My daughters learned how to avoid plagiarism in middle school, does she expect people to believe that someone who is about to be admitted into one of the more competitive universities in the world, didn’t know how what my kids learned when they were 11?</p>
<p>marite: I do think the book is relevant. But the issue concerns whether it is relevant to academics. Harvard claims it isnt and that it therefore will not dismiss the student. I personally think it is, and that Harvard ought to have denied the student a spot at its university (but I am also wondering if maybe Harvard is trying to redeem the girl. I guess my ire is not directed so much at the school because I am not exactly sure of the facts and motives surrounding its decision to keep KV as a student. My ire is directed more toward KVs parents, attorneys, and to a slightly lesser degree toward KV herself).</p>
<p>
In my personal opinion, nothing at all. But my assessment here comes about strictly because of the book circumstance. If I accept that her book stuff does not matter, as Harvard has, then I just cant see a basis for denying this kid a spot as an advisor.</p>
<p>Ill think on it a bit more. I see your point. But I think what we are doing here is condemning the girl where Harvard has refused to, and then requiring that further official treatment of the kid be influenced by the action Harvard has chosen to dismiss. I dont think this is fair to this kid. She should have been dismissed at the very outset, rather than be surreptitiously denied opportunities based on something that is allegedly irrelevant.</p>
<p>Wisteria, I think that most people who were involved in the earlier discussion on the KV case, remember that we covered the “lapses” that were forgiven at Harvard. This is one of the reasons, I wrote" </p>
<p>“From faculty to students, they sure know how to reward cheats in Cambridge. What were they really thinking?”</p>
<p>However, I believe that we do not have to dig that deep by attempting to cover all the issues of plagiarism at Harvard. I believe that the central scope of this discussion is the impact of the appointment of KV to a peer advising position. Further, I do not believe that Harvard needs to spend countless resources in investigating the KV details. It is simply not worth it: she cheated, she got caught, the publishers and movie makers reached the correct decision, and they decided to “settle” amicably. If KV was not the sole culprits in this sordid tale, she is STILL entirely responsible for her choices. No further investigation nor comparison with other cases involving faculty is warranted here. The circumstances of the original case are no longer in contention. </p>
<p>What is left for Harvard is to do the right thing, even if it deals with it behind the privacy of its Ivy covered walls. For some reason, I believe that there ought to be someone with sufficient power–and integrity–to call KV to the mat, and politely but firmly ask her to keep a lower profile, and refrain to further embarass the institution by insisting to remain in the limelight, be it voluntarily or involuntarily. </p>
<p>I would sincerely hope that Harvard could dedicate some of its resources, and offer more advice and guidance to her, especially helping her making better choices, starting by not letting her being manipulated in participating in summer programs such as 85 Broads after being dumped by Lehman Bros. </p>
<p>Even Opal Mehta needs a bit of real summer and a real vacation. If she truly possesses all that talent, she’ll have no problem rebounding after clearing up her slate.</p>
<p>In the past, the upperclass peer advisors (called “prefects”) were not paid. </p>
<p>According to the Crimson, 120 upperclassmen applied to be unpaid prefects in the last year of that program. This year, 480 students applied to be paid peer advising fellows. (The program also changed in other way–there is apparently far more extensive training than in the past. Peer advising fellows were required to spend a number of hours in training during the May reading period and they are also required to return to campus several days early for additional training. Also, in the past, prefects were not supposed to give academic advice. They are now allowed to do so.)</p>
<p>Harvard is not claiming anything. It has been silent on the KV case. </p>
<p>While I think that the faculty’s infractions are more serious than those of a student, there are real differences on how the university can handle the cases. The faculty in question are tenured. Stripping them of tenure involves very complicated proceedings. They apologized. We may think (and I do) that the apologies were not sufficient and rather pro forma, but at least they were not rewarded with new positions/honors. The exception is Shleifer who was given a chair while his case was still being argued. There is a case to be made for not judging him guilty while the case was on-going, though, obviously, many members of the faculty were unhappy. As I said, this played a part in the Summers saga. </p>
<p>KV was guilty of a transgression which is the most severe in the eyes of universities, and that is plagiarism. Plagiarism is by its very nature an academic transgression. One may debate what the appropriate penalty should be for a transgression that was committed before the student was admitted; but there is no reason to behave as though the transgression had not happened at all and give her what is seen as a plum appointment.</p>
<p>I think the program at Reed is much different
Everyone has a faculty advisor in their dept, that they can meet with however much they want, my daughter had a very good relationship with hers, he also would do things like have his advisees over for dinner with his family, although they did vary in their accessibility. Hers happened to be good at it.
I don’t know if they recieve a particular stipend, although I know that everyone who is staff at Reed, receives a stipend to use with students, the CSOs ( community service officers aka campus police), will bring food to the dorm barbeques, the housekeepers will drive students to the airport who miss the shuttle, and the president takes students to play paintball.</p>
<p>The Peer mentors are a different program. Students who are first gen college &/or who identify with a diverse racial or ethnic group are given the opportunity to have a peer mentor. My daughter welcomed this opportunity when she was a freshman, and she continued in the program the next year as an advisor until graduation. They also have trainings, workshops, dinners etc, but they only have one mentee apiece.
<a href=“http://web.reed.edu/peer_mentor_program/overview.html[/url]”>http://web.reed.edu/peer_mentor_program/overview.html</a></p>
Please understand that I am not yet settled on this issue. I am trying to investigate it by taking Harvard’s view as much as I can. I personally don’t think it is possible to separate her integrity in college from her lack of integrity in the writing of her book. But Harvard has by implication claimed this sort of separation is possible. So now, how do we deal with it?</p>
<p>If we accept Harvard’s use of the “Clinton Loophole” (i.e. a lack of integrity on the book does not affect integrity in college, just like Clinton’s lack of integrity in our courts does not affect integrity in the Oval Office), then I am trying to discover the basis whereby we can allow the book to influence peer advising. I do not think such a basis exists. If you allow the book to influence your decision, then you must admit that the book is relevant to college and that therefore she should have been dismissed or, at the very least reprimanded, neither of which Harvard did.</p>
<p>I guess the point I am making here is that this kid needs justice, a way to pay for her crimes once and for all. That may mean dismissal or something else. If we are gonna claim her book stuff does not matter at Harvard, then dadgabbit, let it not matter. But if we are gonna claim it does matter, then the school needs to take action to deal with it. It is unfair to this kid to have her paying a price over and over again at her school, whether in secret or otherwise, for something that her school claims is a non-issue.</p>
<p>marite: Ahh. I thought Harvard decided that dismissal or reprimand was unnecessary in KVs case because her actions were not relevant to Harvard academics. If not, then why are we jumping on this kid? If Harvard accepts her, don’t we have a gripe with Harvard?</p>
<p>(Personally, I can even understand why Harvard might try to keep the girl. But it seems to me justice here is getting overlooked - and unless it is satisfied, this sort of stuff is gonna keep coming up each time this kid does something whether good or bad.)</p>
<p>Stripping a faculty member of tenure is indeed complicated but there are many sanctions short of that which could be imposed. The university could refuse to sign off on research grant proposals with that faculty member as PI (principal investigator). It could also refuse the faculty member’s requests to hire and provide office space for research assistants until such time as the faculty member demonstrates that he has taken corrective measures to ensure better supervision and oversight.</p>
<p>Very true. I have not followed what happened in each of the cases, beyond the expressions of contrition and shifting blame on research assistants. I don’t know whether the university took any of the steps you outlined. The Shleifer case is sui generis, of course.</p>
<p>Drosselmeier: Usually, infractions are dealt with by the Administrative Board, and its deliberations are confidential. So we, or at least I, have no knowledge of what was decided and on what grounds, short of dismissal. But deciding not to dismiss a student is different from allowing that student to be appointed as peer advisor.</p>
<p>Maybe Harvard thinks its hands are tied. They can’t rescind the advisory appointment for an ethical lapse because they don’t even have a policy that could stand up to a legal fight if they dismissed her from school for gross dishonesty. If they refused to let her be a peer advisor, where would it end? Would she be not allowed to lead a university-sponsored club? Represent Harvard in some other way? They can’t start the snowball rolling by limiting her opportunities on campus. So they do nothing.</p>
<p>I don’t believe this is the case. The university could not rescind her election to some clubs, her appointment to an orchestra or her selection to perform. But it is in its purview to appoint whomever it chooses to be peer advisor and to rescind appointments–especially before they are announced, because it is an academic issue and the infraction was academic in nature even if it was not committed at Harvard.</p>
<p>I’d like to see KV suing Harvard over this! As I said, “sacré culot.”</p>
<p>Talking about the university not being able to “deny” her the position makes it seem like every student at Harvard had the right to it. Every student who applied had the right to be considered for it. But many did not get appointed, presumably because there were others more qualified. Shouldn’t someone with a spotless record for character be considered more qualified to be a peer advisor?</p>
<p>That is entirely different from whether or not someone is qualified to be elected head of a student club or first chair in the orchestra or some other leadership position.</p>
<p>I wish we could just forget Kaavya Vishwanathan and move on. As an American of East Indian origin, I am very ashamed of her. Very. I am also ashamed of seeing her name up there all the time. Since there aren’t too many Indians here (well, only on the two coasts), people do tend to generalize and to stereotype and don’t tell me that isn’t so…and maybe I’m not on the curve as far as my count of Indians in this country, she still makes me very ashamed that as parents, we could push our kids like that.</p>
<p>I am against stereotyping a whole group of people on the basis on one person’s behavior. Please don’t take on that burden of shame. Hugs to you.</p>