8

I’m curious about individuals who have had their master’s or PhD degrees revoked specifically for academic misconduct (e.g., plagiarism, exam misconduct), rather than personal misconduct, super ridiculous academic charges like data falsification, essay mill purchase for their dissertation, or admission fraud. What factors prevent them from returning to the institutions that nullified their degrees to retake them? Are there institutional policies, personal barriers, or stigma involved?

Updated: I did some research, and I found some places that give the guilty person another chance to redo or here (section 4.5.4.) the work for example. However, not all institutions have the same policy

Improve this question
6
  • 21
    Much the same reason that people who have been to prison for embezzlement don’t usually go back to jobs as company accountants afterwards. Plagiarism in academia is misconduct every bit as serious as embezzlement in accounting.
    – Significance
    Commented Aug 13 at 5:23
  • 28
    What would they gain from returning? And, more importantly, what would the institution gain from admitting them back? None of the involved stakeholders has any incentives to repeat the exact same thing that led to a lot of drama the last time.
    – xLeitix
    Commented Aug 13 at 6:51
  • 19
    Plagiarism and academic misconduct are "super serious charges".
    – Andreas Rejbrand
    Commented Aug 13 at 17:45
  • 2
    The value of a degree drops dramatically in most areas other than a select few industries very quickly. Couple that with plagiarism being far more common and acceptable outside of academia... I'd be more interested to know why people do go back to get it.
    – David S
    Commented Aug 13 at 22:15
  • 16
    What's "super ridiculous" about data falsification...?
    – ilkkachu
    Commented Aug 14 at 10:50

4 Answers 4

Reset to default
35

Actually, I suspect that a few do. But I also suspect that the biggest obstacle isn't regulations, but the inability to find an advisor after academic misconduct. There may be regulations in some places, but I'm not specifically aware of them. I'd be very hesitant to take on a student who had engaged in such conduct in the past. It would take a lot of convincing.

It isn't stigma so much as the inability to trust such a person.

For doctoral students there is also the age issue. Starting over later in life is harder, though not impossible.

Some, though again not many, might be successful at a different institution or (age aside) after a pause. But a reputation for misconduct can stick.

People can change of course, but the path is hard and maybe long.

Improve this answer
5
  • 11
    Also, presumably many such people wouldn't have needed to resort to plagiarism in the first place if they were capable of successfully earning their degree fair and square.
    – Adam Přenosil
    Commented Aug 13 at 0:09
  • 1
    In my opinion, those who commit plagiarism think they might get away because 20 years ago, we didn't have many plagiarism detection tools. Right now, it's very hard for those who commit plagiarism to get away with it.
    – throwawayta
    Commented Aug 13 at 0:30
  • 31
    +1 for "inability to trust such a person". Science is a game of trust. For mid-level results, one does not have time to reproduce every detail. Unless it is an absolutely crucial result, which will be reproduced or of high innovation value, where one wants to gain skills pertaining to repeating this kind of work, one is - in principle - condemned to live with existing results. This requires a high level of trust. Violating it, intentionally is the ultimate scientific betrayal. Accepting a student who willingly did so is very risky, even if their remorse seems genuine.
    – Captain Emacs
    Commented Aug 13 at 3:02
  • 5
    Also, after 20 years of schooling, the willingness to jump back into that is likely to be very low for most people. Just playing a numbers game with these various data points, there are going to be very few in this situation who will successfully redo their theses.
    – Cameron Williams
    Commented Aug 13 at 4:38
  • 3
    @throwawayta I doubt many advisors or universities would consider "They won't plagiarize again because they won't get away with it" a good reason to re-admit someone. There are plenty of types of academic dishonesty that are hard to catch in the modern era - not to mention how plagiarism reflects on their ability to obtain a degree through real, original research.
    – Dan Staley
    Commented Aug 13 at 20:44
16

I can come up with any number of reasons, including the following ones:

  • Why would an institution that has already revoked someone's degree once admit them again? In fact, why would any other institution do it? They've shown themselves to be ethically challenged. It's certainly a risk to admit them again.

  • Why would someone who lost their degree once try to regain it? Assuming they lost their job as well, then their academic career is over. Even if they obtained a degree again, nobody in their right mind would want to hire them again given their past behavior. So there is not much to be gained from going back to school.

  • More generally, going back to school for a degree once you're in or past mid-life (when these degree revocations happen) is much harder than when you're in your 20s. People have families, children, mortgages. It's hard to uproot your family to move back to a college town. It's also hard to live on a graduate student salary again once you have a family and children. Surely there are better ways to support your family than to be a graduate student again.

Improve this answer
2
  • It's also hard to live on a graduate student salary again once you have a family and children. Surely there are better ways to support your family than to be a graduate student again. I know several graduate students with families and children who also work a separate full-time job, myself included. It just takes longer to finish your degree (unless your employer funds your research which I have also seen). You're right it's hard, but I have no problem supporting my family.
    – imnotarobot
    Commented Aug 30 at 23:09
  • @imnotarobot Yes, surely it's possible -- many manage to do so. But I don't think any of what I said is wrong: It's hard, and there are easier ways to support a family.
    – Wolfgang Bangerth
    Commented Sep 1 at 3:30
13

At least in , for all examination rules I am aware of, the answer is that they are not allowed to.

The rules work roughly as follows: Certain failures of exams, theses, etc. invoke a process that allows you to make up for them in a repetition or similar, e.g., delivering a bad thesis. Others let you fail the entire programme, e.g., delivering a second bad thesis or academic misconduct.

A degree revocation usually is of the latter kind: The faculty concludes that you never (fairly) completed the programme but instead committed acts that lead to instant failure without an opportunity to make up for them – whether you are found out now or later. (Mind that there is a middle ground, where the conclusion is that the programme was neither completed nor failed the programme and you can pick up the pieces and continue, but my impression is that this rarely happens.)

Moreover, you cannot enrol or be examined if you already conclusively failed a programme in the same field (in Germany). For example if you are studying physics, and the programme’s rules say that you only have three attempts for the exam for a certain module, failing that exam for the third time bars you from studying physics not only at that university, but at any university in Germany for life. For PhD programmes, roughly any other PhD programme counts.

Improve this answer
5
  • 1
    For masters and bachelor I agree with your fail-programme-once banned-afterwards statement, but for PhD I am sceptical. There is no such thing as a PhD programme (formally you just hand in your thesis at a faculty and then it is judged). One the other hand failing a PhD defense is extremely rare (or PhD being revoked). Do you have a quote or pointer to regulation that failing a PhD once will prevent you from handing in a PhD thesis elsewhere? After all each factulty makes their own rules with repect to granting a PhD (And I am not talking about practical issue, just the format requirements).
    – Andreas H.
    Commented Aug 14 at 8:12
  • 1
    There is no such thing as a PhD programme (formally you just hand in your thesis at a faculty and then it is judged). – Even though handing in your thesis is the major official interaction in most PhD programmes, you do have to formally enrol as a PhD student at some point and restrictions can be placed on that. — After all each factulty makes their own rules with repect to granting a PhD – Indeed and hence “for all examination rules I am aware of”. It’s very difficult to make a statement applying to all PhD programmes, but in certain respects (such as this) surprises are rare.
    – Wrzlprmft ♦
    Commented Aug 14 at 9:13
  • 6
    Do you have a quote or pointer to regulation that failing a PhD once will prevent you from handing in a PhD thesis elsewhere? – For example, my faculty’s PhD rules state (§ 5.5): “Eine Bewerberin oder ein Bewerber, die oder der eine Promotion zur Erlangung des Grades Dr. rer. nat. bereits einmal endgültig nicht bestanden hat, kann nicht als Doktorandin oder Doktorand zugelassen werden.”
    – Wrzlprmft ♦
    Commented Aug 14 at 9:13
  • Somewhat of a counterexample: Göttingen Physics is far more ambiguous there: "In serious cases, the Examination Board may exclude the doctoral candidate from taking further examinations", see here. I'd also note that one of Germany's most prominent cases, Guttenberg, got another PhD from Southampton in 2019 - so you can always try abroad.
    – Anna_Mayo
    Commented Aug 15 at 10:12
  • @Anna_Mayo: Göttingen’s rule structure is rather convoluted, but at first glance PhD students have to sign on admission that “a corresponding doctorate has not been applied for at any other university in Germany or abroad; the submitted dissertation or parts of it have not been/will not be used for another doctoral project” (your link, Page 34, Point 4). It may be that you will allowed to modify that one though.
    – Wrzlprmft ♦
    Commented Aug 15 at 11:28
11

Some reasons come to my mind:

  • Financial issues: After working with a master's degree or PhD, you earn good money in industry and even politics. Going back for three years without or litte pay is impossible or at least a huge sacrifice.
  • The title is the entry ticket to land a good job. Once you have at least five years of experience and according references, there is no need to get the title. Even without a title the next employer is interested in the stuff you did in another position, not in some title from years back. Only for lawyers or medical stuff the title might be necessary to work in the actual job.
  • Academia requires a lot of patience and endurance. Industry is more pressured and short-lived. Publishing a paper, giving a talk at a conference, writing a grand is always a multi-month effort. In industry problems pop up, you solve them within days or weeks and move on. It might be difficult to change the style of working.
  • Why should an institution give second chance? There are so many people not having a first change to do real research. Why giving someone a second shot?
Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .