U. Missouri Prof Accused of Racism After Asking Student for Update on Work
“holding students of color to lower standards than majority students”
Ten years ago, people might have taken this seriously but things have changed.
The College Fix reports:
Mizzou professor accused of racism after she asked student for update on work
The University of Missouri cleared a professor of racism allegations after a fellow academic reported her to the school’s bias team for asking a student to give an update on her research, according to documents obtained by The College Fix.
The result of the investigation highlights criticisms of bias reporting systems, which can include ratting people out based on hearsay evidence.
Professor Michael Garcia filed the complaint with Mizzou’s bias response team based on what a “senior graduate student” told him. The Fix recently obtained hundreds of pages of bias reports for fall 2024 semester after filing a public records request.
Garcia accused a fellow biology professor of “holding students of color to lower standards than majority students” because she accused a graduate student of plagiarizing from an undergraduate.
The graduate student who made this allegation to Garcia also complained about the accused professor asking her to get an update from an undergraduate student who had taken sick time.
“I do have to mention that the undergraduate submitted her paper first,” Garcia wrote in his Oct. 2024 complaint. “Thus, if chronology is the only thing being considered this would make sense. However, it would seem odd for a senior graduate student to plagiarize an undergraduate.”
Christopher Ave, the director of media relations at Mizzou, confirmed to The Fix over email that “the University of Missouri Office of Institutional Equity reviewed the matter,” and “no information was identified to indicate a policy violation,” so “the matter was closed.”
The Fix reached out to Garcia over email multiple times in the past several weeks, asking how he views the result of the complaint, how often students come to him with complaints about other faculty, and how he determines whether allegations are valid.
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Comments
It’s not odd to steal academic work. What is odd is a non related person to insert himself into the situation. Garcia needs to be canned as he is the type going around trying to be offended by any perceived slight and then abusing the system to go after people.
Am I the only one wondering what this article is about? Exactly what accusation was made? On what basis? How was asking about the status of a research project equal to holding minority students to lower standards? Was the grad student or undergrad the minority party? Or were both? Or neither? Where did the plagiarism claim come from? And Garcia? Which team is he or she playing on?
Not a single one of these questions was addressed in this article.
Typically, these things can be worked out with a couple of jabs followed by a solid right.cross. I would say “put your weight into it”.
– Krumhorn