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How to remain a bad university.

The University of the District of Columbia has responded to the discovery of three diploma mill grads on its faculty (it’s bad enough when, as at Ramapo College and Northeastern Illinois University, you’ve got one) with lethargy and defensiveness. They’ll… you know… look into it (others have done that for them, though of course it was UDC’s responsibility from the start to winnow faculty frauds); and hey “the university considers more than academic credentials when hiring faculty.”

This is the time-honored response of hapless organizations to diploma mill people — It doesn’t matter that we retain (at tax-payer expense, at UDC) people who’ve lied and cheated their way to a bogus degree in order to get a raise; we love other things about them.

Margaret Soltan, July 30, 2012 3:20AM
Posted in: diploma mill

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4 Responses to “How to remain a bad university.”

  1. Mr Punch Says:

    I think UD is being unfair here — you can’t call Georgia “the worst university in America” and also count UDC as a university.

  2. Margaret Soltan Says:

    Mr Punch: It’s true that UDC is not in my basket of universities.

  3. theprofessor Says:

    “the university considers more than academic credentials when hiring faculty.”

    GWU does not use a holistic approach to the whole person when hiring rather than fixating on where and how people earned what kind of degrees? Dr. Margaret A. Moore of UDC, for example, worked for the illustrious former mayor of DC, Marion Barry–how can you say “no,” to that kind of life experience?

    UDC provost Ken Bain explains

    “The University of the District of Columbia has been undergoing radical changes, building a new kind of institution that will become the model for 21st century public higher education. The overwhelming majority of UDC’s professors and leaders are extremely talented, credentialed professionals with doctorates, or other appropriate terminal degrees, from the world’s leading universities and should be commended for the work they do every day. Even at that, we are raising the bar beyond credentials to focus on quality pedagogy and research and to become the center of “deep learning” that enriches and enhances our students’ education and preparation and that benefits our communities and the world in which we live. Rest assured, we will address anyone who does not meet our stringent internal review standards as we continue crafting the model university.”

  4. Margaret Soltan Says:

    Bain’s statement, tp, is so depressing. Those of us who’ve lived in Washington all our lives have followed the sad go-nowhere history of UDC, even as it’s sometimes been run by thoughtful people who’ve tried to improve it (the turnover in presidents at UDC continues to be astounding).

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