In response to alleged plagiarism in Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taoyuan City Councilor Ling Tao’s (凌濤) master’s thesis, the academic ethics committee of National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU) said that Ling had completed the procedure of adding annotations and replacing the submitted thesis.
Could a thesis that involves plagiarism get away scot-free by adding sources and replacing a thesis that had already been submitted? No, it should not work like that. Such a statement by the NYCU academic ethics committee is shocking and leads people to doubt the academic standards of the school.
Are NYCU academics attempting a cover-up, or do they not even know what a thesis is? A thesis is a publication of research results, not just a collection of words or articles. It is the outcome of the careful selection of a meaningful topic, research using scientific methods and a thorough presentation of the final conclusions.
Topic selection and research methods should follow rigorous logical procedures, and their conclusions should be innovative or contribute to their academic field. Theses that do not meet these criteria should not be able to pass and a diploma should not be issued. Was this not the standard procedure when the professors on the NYCU academic ethics committee wrote their own theses and dissertations?
Ling’s thesis was heavily plagiarized, and some parts were a full-page copy of someone else’s work with only a few words changed, said NYCU professor Chen Shi-fen (陳時奮), the whistle-blower.
If so, could this thesis really be innovative? A thesis needs to follow specific logical procedures for topic selection and research methods.
How could a thesis that you have worked hard on be highly similar to other people’s published papers? If it is highly similar to other work, how could it be innovative? Once the content of a thesis is so like someone else’s, how could it be okay to just indicate the source and resubmit?
Ling’s thesis is a small matter, but the standards of NYCU’s ethics committee are a big deal. If the academics on the ethics committee allow a thesis with high similarity to another and a large amount of plagiarism to pass the review and award the student a degree, does this mean that this was also the procedure when they wrote their theses and conducted research?
Maybe this is the way all academics at NYCU do research and write papers?
If that is the case, should the NYCU, the Ministry of Education or even the research sponsors not come forward and demand an explanation?
A thesis is not a pile of scrap paper. It has a specific academic status, should be contributive academically or socially, and should not be treated so carelessly.
If the ethics committee at NYCU decides things in such a hasty manner, does NYCU really have nothing to say in response? Could the Ministry of Education turn a blind eye to this? Would academia sit by and watch helplessly as academics decline and integrity falls into disrepute?
Mike Chang is an accountant.
Translated by Lin Lee-kai
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