No Way: Complaint Alleges that UWisconsin's "DEI Czar" Is Guilty of Decades of Research Misconduct

Huh, I'm starting to think that DEI is just a grift for people who were kicked out of Rainbow PUSH for ethical violations.

The research misconduct alleged is self-plagiarism for a change. Now, you may say, "You can't plagiarize yourself," and then you might repeat, with no fear of ethical rebuke, "You can't plagiarize yourself."

Which is true.

But he keeps presenting the same research as "new research." Apparently he's Regifted the same freaking "research" five times, counting each regurgitation as a new, separate academic achievement.

Oh and he also strangled a cop in 2011.

The chief diversity officer of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, LaVar Charleston, who also teaches at the university's school of education, has a decades-long track record of research misconduct, according to a complaint filed with the university on Wednesday and a Washington Free Beacon analysis. That misconduct includes presenting old studies as new research, which he has done at least five times over the course of his career.

The complaint, which was filed anonymously, implicates eight of Charleston's publications, many of them coauthored, and accuses him of plagiarizing other scholars as well as duplicating his own work. It comes as the university is already investigating Charleston over a separate complaint filed in January, alleging that a 2014 study by him and his wife--Harvard University's chief diversity officer, Sherri Ann Charleston--is a facsimile of a study he published in 2012.

"This is an extraordinary case of serial misrepresentation and deception," said Peter Wood, the head of the National Association of Scholars and a former associate provost at Boston University. "The closest analogy would be someone who sells the same real estate to five different buyers, all of whom are unaware of the others."

In January, Charleston won a lifetime achievement award for "excellence in higher education." The university trumpeted the award in a press release, praising his "unwavering dedication to creating inclusive environments in academia" and noting his "wealth of academic accolades."

...

"It is academic misconduct to publish essentially the same paper twice with no acknowledgment of the duplication," Alexander Riley, a sociologist at Bucknell University, told the Free Beacon. "It seems fairly clear that Charleston is gaming the system in order to get more on his CV than is merited by the amount of research he has actually done."

...

Each study is framed as a novel survey addressing a gap in the scholarly literature. None cite Charleston's dissertation or indicate that they are drawing on previously published material.

...

Charleston did not respond to a request for comment.

The complaint raises serious questions about how a flagship public university vetted one of its top administrators, whose career has been marked not just by questionable research practices but by criminal conduct.

Shortly after joining UW-Madison as a researcher in 2009, Charleston was charged in 2011 with attempting to strangle a police officer, according to documents obtained by the MacIver Institute, a conservative think tank in Wisconsin. He avoided a conviction through the Deferred Prosecution Program, a local initiative run by the district attorney's office that offers first-time felons the chance to do community service in lieu of jail time and removes their arrest records from public databases.

"Even with a PhD, I'm looked at as a criminal," Charleston said in an interview in 2020. "[I]t has to be because of my color."

Of course.

DEI

Didn't Earn It

Posted by: Just Lily

posted by Disinformation Expert Ace at 03:19 PM

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