University of Humberside and Lincolnshire suspected of handing out fake degrees

See http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=225366&contrassID=1&subContrassID=7&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y

Cheers,

George

 

George, you must be picking up Gerts postings from the ' Off Topic-discussions' thread and reposting on the DL thread for a reason?

http://www.degreeinfo.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=6489

J.R (ic)

 

From the 'Ha'aretz' story, 31/10/2002:

Was this something done with the knowledge of the Lincolnshire and Humberside administrators, either locally in Israel or back in England? Or was it more a matter of some locally hired Israeli clerical employees setting up their own side-business creating fake student records for a price?

I find it hard to believe the former and find the latter more probable. But if this was happening on a large scale, the UK staff must have had some evidence at some point. Perhaps they did, and perhaps that's why the operation closed.

This also suggests that the problem is on the Israeli end, unless we want to believe that international colleges and unversities are cynical and corrupt (always a real possibility).

The fact that similar things are happening in Israel to a succession of foreign schools makes me speculate that there might be some kind of organization seeking to infiltrate these operations.

How much money could one make by creating fake student records anyway? Several thousand times "many hundreds" equals more than a million dollars. Is that worth organized crime's time? Or is this just a succession of free-lancers?

Now THAT is flat-out ugly.

Government officials, police and military? Buying fake degrees? I think that's such a serious ethical violation that it should be grounds for termination or dishonorable discharge.

The probem is that the corrupt are mixed in with those that actually earned their degrees and everyone will proclaim their innocence and claim to know nothing. How can you separate the corrupt from the honest?

The bottom line of this is that universities all around the world probably need to increase security in their records offices.

 

Heriot-Watt has a branch campus in Tel Aviv and a couple of years ago, in common with all foreign universities operating in Israel, we had to apply for a licence to operate and submit our MBA programme for local audit by the Higher Education Council. I am pleased to say we were the only foreign university given a four year licence (all others had terms allowed from six months to only 18 months because of several defects in them; renewable). Some UK universities quit during this process.

On my last visit to teach my MBA elective, some students were complaining by comparing EBS exam requirements with other foreign (UK) universities that allowed marks for coursework, assignments and, in one case, no examinations at all. We were also, apparently, the most expensive!

Interesting, that we were also the largest, which suggests that while some students want to soften examination regimes and lower its prices, sufficient others prefer quality to its alternative.

MBAs and Masters degrees are essential for many higher posts in Israel and the tax regime drives people to qualify for promotion. That a 'university' has permitted illegal degree frauds in its name is sad; that many citizens have been induced to 'buy' their degree certificates and now stand to lose the monetary gains they made on the basis of fraud is also sad for them but just for society.

My concern now is that the authorities may turn against foreign universities by assuming even the best are in someway associated with these sordid practices. Hence, our stance never to soften our assessment regime is our best protection from the fallout from others who do so, with the best intentions no doubt, but all attempts to soften assessment regimes no matter what the excuse always end in tears.

 

Some people won't like this..!

I've been dealing, in one capacity or another, with non-western cultures (including education!) for over 20 years and all too often non-western people think everything is 'up for grabs' and 'negotiable'...as you go! In other words, you agree a set of principles and guidelines and then they want them changed within one week of having agreed what the original principles (agreements even!) were! It's a nightmare....and corners are cut! This is why so many UK universities have found the 'carpet being taken from underneath them'! They actually reusted and believed where they shouldn't! I like Prof Kennedy's route (like my own)...if this is what we want, and you want it, then this how we/you do it!

'telfax'