Cambridge to review hiring process amid plagiarism row

• The University of Cambridge said on Aug 7 that it would be reviewing its hiring process for senior roles as it probes claims of plagiarism by a professor who resigned this week.

Jason Arday, who made headlines when appointed as Cambridge’s youngest black professor in 2023, resigned on Aug 5 after the university announced a probe into snowballing claims he plagiarised parts of his PhD thesis.

The university in an update on Aug 7 said that “regardless of” Arday’s resignation, it would “continue to investigate the circumstances around (his) appointment and tenure”.

“The findings will feed into a review of the process for the appointment of senior academic roles,” it added.

Arday had announced that he was resigning with immediate effect both from his university post as professor of sociology of education and as a fellow of Jesus College.

In a letter posted online, he said quitting was “the only way” to end a “difficult period”, but insisted the decision should not be “mistaken for an acceptance of the narratives that have surrounded me”.

The university had previously defended Arday but said on Aug 5 that its probe was prompted by “new information”, without specifying.

Jesus College said separately that it was launching its own probe.

The college’s head, Sonita Alleyne, the first black head of an Oxbridge college, has removed her name from a petition defending Arday.

The scandal has been seized upon by right-wing newspapers and commentators, who have labelled Arday as a “poster boy” for diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) policies.

The Times newspaper has recently published several investigative articles into Arday’s academic work and personal life.

In an interview with the newspaper, Arday admitted to “mistakes” in his academic work, but said he was being wrongly “portrayed to be a liar and a fantasist and an academic fraud”.

He also alleged the “campaign to unseat me from my position” was “racially motivated”.

Plagiarism claims against Arday were first made in July by Nathan Cofnas, a US academic and self-defined “race realist” whose research affiliation with a Cambridge college was terminated in 2024 amid racism accusations. AFP