Idiot Attempt to Fabricate Credentials
As I've indicated before, I don't talk about my workplace too often, but this is a sad story.
Last year was my first year at Marywood. During the fall semester, the group of new faculty would go out from time to time. One of those new faculty was a new history professor, Jaclyn LaPlaca. She had previously taught at Kent State-Stark, and had her master's and doctorate from Oxford.
Jaclyn really was doing well at Marywood. Students loved her. She accompanied students to Guatemala for a service-learning trip. She had begun a major oral history project of Scranton-area World War II veterans, getting their recollections on video, and having a public presentation of their remembrances.
Unfortunately, Jaclyn won't be back at Marywood this year. Turns out, according to the principal (provost) at Oxford, LaPlaca was never granted a doctoral-level degree and her master's-level degree was revoked when she was found guilty of plagiarism. Because of the plagiarism, Oxford expelled LaPlaca.
How Jaclyn was able to get the job at Kent State-Stark is a bit murky. Oxford provides certificates, not transcripts, of graduate work. Apparently, Jaclyn included a copy of her Doctorate of Philosophy certificate from Oxford, their equivalent of a doctorate degree, when she accepted the position at Kent State. When she applied, she said she had defended her thesis and was waiting for faculty approval. Instead, Oxford had asked Jaclyn to return the certificate they had given her before she was expelled, but she had not. It is unclear how she had such a document in the first place.
Just as Jaclyn was leaving Kent State-Stark, someone at the Stark campus had anonymously contacted Oxford questioning her degree completion, Frances Lannon, the principal at Oxford, contacted Gayle Ormiston, Kent State's associate provost for faculty affairs, in August 2005 to inform him that Jaclyn did not have any graduate degrees from Oxford. Ormiston did not take any action against Jaclyn, or even inform Marywood at the time. The story broke in the Kent State newspaper, the Daily Kent Stater, about six weeks ago. Normally, no one would notice a student newspaper during the summer, but Kent State's is online. Shortly afterwards, even Marywood students were submitting comments about Jaclyn's story to the Daily Kent Stater website (welcome to the Internet Age!). Once the story became that public, Jaclyn's fate was sealed.
I want to shout at her, "What were you thinking? Did you really think you could get away with it? How fair is it that you had a tenure track job in a field where many with legitimate credentials are having to teach adjunct at two-three schools just to make ends meet?"
Then again, what else was she to do? She either kept up the ruse or gave up her career. She was desperate.
The softie in me wishes there was some way to keep her -- reduce her in rank to instructor, take her off the tenure track, cut her salary, etc. Of course, that's impossible. It would be a terrible message to students -- both the fabrication of her credentials and the plagiarism.
It's too bad that someone who had so much promise finds her career in tatters.
Last year was my first year at Marywood. During the fall semester, the group of new faculty would go out from time to time. One of those new faculty was a new history professor, Jaclyn LaPlaca. She had previously taught at Kent State-Stark, and had her master's and doctorate from Oxford.
Jaclyn really was doing well at Marywood. Students loved her. She accompanied students to Guatemala for a service-learning trip. She had begun a major oral history project of Scranton-area World War II veterans, getting their recollections on video, and having a public presentation of their remembrances.
Unfortunately, Jaclyn won't be back at Marywood this year. Turns out, according to the principal (provost) at Oxford, LaPlaca was never granted a doctoral-level degree and her master's-level degree was revoked when she was found guilty of plagiarism. Because of the plagiarism, Oxford expelled LaPlaca.
How Jaclyn was able to get the job at Kent State-Stark is a bit murky. Oxford provides certificates, not transcripts, of graduate work. Apparently, Jaclyn included a copy of her Doctorate of Philosophy certificate from Oxford, their equivalent of a doctorate degree, when she accepted the position at Kent State. When she applied, she said she had defended her thesis and was waiting for faculty approval. Instead, Oxford had asked Jaclyn to return the certificate they had given her before she was expelled, but she had not. It is unclear how she had such a document in the first place.
Just as Jaclyn was leaving Kent State-Stark, someone at the Stark campus had anonymously contacted Oxford questioning her degree completion, Frances Lannon, the principal at Oxford, contacted Gayle Ormiston, Kent State's associate provost for faculty affairs, in August 2005 to inform him that Jaclyn did not have any graduate degrees from Oxford. Ormiston did not take any action against Jaclyn, or even inform Marywood at the time. The story broke in the Kent State newspaper, the Daily Kent Stater, about six weeks ago. Normally, no one would notice a student newspaper during the summer, but Kent State's is online. Shortly afterwards, even Marywood students were submitting comments about Jaclyn's story to the Daily Kent Stater website (welcome to the Internet Age!). Once the story became that public, Jaclyn's fate was sealed.
I want to shout at her, "What were you thinking? Did you really think you could get away with it? How fair is it that you had a tenure track job in a field where many with legitimate credentials are having to teach adjunct at two-three schools just to make ends meet?"
Then again, what else was she to do? She either kept up the ruse or gave up her career. She was desperate.
The softie in me wishes there was some way to keep her -- reduce her in rank to instructor, take her off the tenure track, cut her salary, etc. Of course, that's impossible. It would be a terrible message to students -- both the fabrication of her credentials and the plagiarism.
It's too bad that someone who had so much promise finds her career in tatters.
posted by Rod Carveth at 5:37 PM
6 Comments:
Both comments reflect my thinking. Jaclyn did connect with students really well, and had a passion for teaching that shone through.
On the other hand, as time goes on, I get angrier about what she did. Jaclyn is not the only person out there with a passion for teaching. There are probably dozens in history alone -- who got their Ph.D.s without having to resort to plagiarism -- who are eeking out an existence teaching 5-6 sections of courses (at 2-3 schools) at $2,000 a course and no health benefits. Jaclyn had three undeserved years in two tenure track jobs.
I wish Jaclyn well -- in another profession. She has forever forfeited the right to a job in the academy.
To Muscle_Manxx,
Talk about completing missing the point. Jaclyn did do a good job at Marywood during her first year. That's completely irrelevant to her engaging in plagiarism and then fabricating her credentials.
When you graduate -- and I certainly hope that you improve your writing and critical thinking skills before you go out into the work world -- it won't matter how good a job you do if you lie about your background. Lie about your background and your butt will be fired. Period.
Blogger,
Some of the information you ask for is in my original post.
Some you can find at: http://www.stateronline.com/media/storage/paper867/news/2006/07/05/News/Ksu-Failed.To.Verify.ExProfessors.Degree-2120408.shtml?norewrite200608300723&sourcedomain=www.stateronline.com
There are other questions for which I do not have the answers, nor are they all that important for me to find out.
As far as the Oxford trip, I wasn't there. I have no idea if the people she graduated with were from her doctoral program or her master's program. If the latter, they probably didn't know. There's a good chance that many Oxford faculty would not know. Though I am speculating, I doubt there was a student newspaper at Oxford which would have covered the story the same way the Kent State paper did.
I think a more important question is why Marywood didn't ask more questions about her background when they hired her.
Blogger,
Here's a comment that was posted on the Daily Kent Stater website:
*** Thank you for your honest posting. I am one of those dedicated teachers who really did finish a PhD and am scraping out an existence teaching part-time at several institutions. I have heard of the LaPlaca scandal only recently (today, actually!), and I am incensed. If anything, I am more incensed at the comments by people saying things like "But think of all the good she has done!" while she was guilty of acts that we would not tolerate from our students. I would like to see Kent State pursue a law suit for the 2 years salary she received under fraudlent circumstances. But, it won't happen because the University would not like the attention it would get. ***
What you fail to see is that Jaclyn committed the worst type of academic transgression -- she plagiarized. And, it wasn't just an article -- it was her master's thesis. She then compounded the problem by lying about having a master's degree and a doctoral degree.
What she did as a faculty member -- whether it be at IUP, Kent State or Marywood -- does not matter one bit because if she had been truthful about her academic credentials, she *never would have had the opportunity* to be a popular teacher or engage in the variety of activities with students that she did.
Thus, her actions are unfortunate on two levels. First, Jaclyn obviously had many qualities that would have allowed her to be a terrific college professor -- except integrity.
Second, students at three institutions -- IUP, Kent State-Stark and Marywood -- were denied an opportunity to learn from a history professor with legitimate qualifications, one whose qualities may have met or exceeded those of Jaclyn LaPlaca.
mu_best,
That was a very funny satire of an intelligent response.
talk about plagiarism- this is a Biggie, I just went through about 98 pages of Laplaca's book, Somerset County: Beauty beyond the mountains which was published in 2003 and found that she copied, in most instances, word for word and paragraph for paragraph from the 1996 book, Miners of Windber
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