NAME has stopped considering complaints about plagiarism in theses older than 10 years: scientists are outraged
On July 17, ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets sent a letter to NAZYAVO with a request about the legal uncertainty of the application of the law on academic integrity.
The National Agency for Quality Assurance of Higher Education (NAZYAVO) has suspended consideration of complaints and reports about violations of academic integrity following a letter from the ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets.
Dysergate anti-plagiarism initiative performed against such a decision. They sent an appeal to the Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada, Ruslan Stefanchuk, and the Chairman of the Supreme Court, Stanislav Kravchenko.
On July 17, Dmytro Lubinets sent a letter to NAZYAVO with a request about the legal uncertainty of the application of the law on academic integrity during the verification and consideration of plagiarism complaints in doctoral (candidate) theses defended before September 6, 2014.
The representative of “Dysergate” Svitlana Blagodyeteleva-Vovk reported that the ombudsman justified this appeal by control functions, in particular, in the field of the right to work.
On July 23, NAZYAVO decided to temporarily stop the review of these dissertations until the legislative settlement of the complaints or the official interpretation of the Supreme Court. The agency also suspended the terms of their review.
“Suspension of consideration of complaints and reports on violations of academic integrity is a signal to the scientific and educational community about the inability of state institutions to fulfill the powers assigned to them”, – the anti-plagiarism initiative noted in the appeal.
Oleg Smirnov, a former associate professor of Sumy State University and a representative of Dysergate, reported that NAZYAVO sent him a letter stating that the consideration of his complaints regarding the dissertations of the following persons was terminated:
- Head of the State Education Quality Service Ruslan Gurak;
- Chief Military Prosecutor Anatoly Matios;
- Rector of Melitopol State Pedagogical University named after Bohdan Khmelnytsky Valentin Molodychenko;
- Acting Rector of the Kyiv Agrarian University of the National Academy of Agrarian Sciences of Ukraine Oleksandr Nikityuk;
- Angela Lyashchenko, associate professor of the department of advertising and public relations of Dnipro National University named after Oles Honchar;
- Serhiy Demchenko, former head of the Department of Mass and International Communication of Dnipropetrovsk National University named after Oles Honchar;
- Obstetrician-gynecologist of the Medical Center “Academy of Your Health” Yulia Chornopyshka;
- Obstetrician-gynecologist of the City Clinical Perinatal Center of Ivano-Frankivsk Tetyana Chernega;
- Obstetrician-gynecologist Tetyana Parashchyshena.
In the appeal of Dysergate, it is noted that this is not the first case of suspending consideration of complaints about violations of academic integrity. A similar situation happened in 2016 after the then Minister of Education and Science Lilia Hrynevych filed a complaint about plagiarism in Kateryna Kyrylenko’s doctoral dissertation. Then the review of complaints was renewed only after five years.
“To date, 12 complaints and reports have been considered and a decision has been made. Currently, many complaints are blocked in the courts by top plagiarists, in particular the rector of the Vinnytsia National Medical University Victoria Petrushenko, the rector of the Karazin Kharkiv National University Tetyana Kaganovskaya, the rector of the Ternopil National Pedagogical University Bohdan Buyak, the vice-rector of scientific work of NU “Chernihiv Polytechnic” by Victoria Margasova”, – declared in “Dysergate”.
