
Australian universities are accused of trading free speech for cash - baylearn
https://www.economist.com/asia/2019/09/19/australian-universities-are-accused-of-trading-free-speech-for-cash
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missosoup
They didn't just trade free speech for cash. They traded their academic
integrity.

Talk to anyone who teaches at ANU/Monash/Melbourne and they'll tell you the
same thing: most international Chinese students should fail by every metric
there is, but there is tremendous pressure from the faculty to 'find marks' to
get those students to scrape through and look the other way at their
plagiarism and cheating.

It's like there are two sets of standards now. One for Chinese students, and
one for everyone else.

~~~
lwakefield
I TAed a compulsory "Introduction to Engineering" class at USyd. The class
itself was dead easy, the equivalent of the fizzbuzz interview question.

The single assessment was "review an engineering article" where I caught 7
students (all international) plagiarizing. Not just borrowing a sentence or
two, but lifting entire paragraphs and gluing them together with broken
English. In one case a student had gone as far as submitting Stephen Hawking's
"Space and Time Warps", verbatim.

I raised all of these to the professor. Despite all students signing the "I
know what plagiarism is, I won't do it and understand there I will be kicked
out if I do" \- the professor knocked back all of my claims and all students
passed.

It was a huge disappointment to realize that this is how the "education
system" works.

~~~
close04
> It was a huge disappointment to realize that this is how the "education
> system" works.

Is there any man made system that isn't eventually run or at least strongly by
financial interest? Genuine question.

~~~
wendyshu
It's not clear that low standards actually are in the long term interest of
the universities because it devalues the degree.

Thus it is important to expose this corruption far and wide so that people,
e.g. employers, can be aware.

~~~
close04
I totally agree. The cynic in me was just surprised at the disappointment, not
the reaction of outing them for what they do.

And to your first point, fewer and fewer people think for the long term.
Perhaps because in an age where you want results _now_ they will be judged by
short term performance.

Also I noticed I'm missing an "influenced" in the comment above. Strongly
influenced.

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tjpnz
Similar stuff is going on in NZ. A university in Auckland recently halted a
pro-Democracy protest organised by HK students after a university official was
summoned to the Chinese embassy. There were of course no issues when mainland
students organised a pro-Beijing rally.

~~~
caf
Pretty sad state of affairs when students will halt a protest on the orders of
the university administration.

~~~
jaimex2
Clearly they weren't Maori. They could learn a lot from them.

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throwaway4888
Throwaway account.

Local. TAed (USA nomenclature) 6 instances of 4 courses at top 5 AU Comp. Sci.
university. Can confirm professorss of 3 courses wanted to fail at leats 1
student (one wanted to fail half a summer school class: approximately 75
students) and not a single student was ever failed because politics. Very few
if any candidates for failure were local students.

Have many contacts, some with Ph.Ds, some who are lecturers in charge of
courses now who at least reluctantly admit to this pattern.

Universities have indirect policies that penalise LiCs for failing students.
Classic example: every failing students requires a report to management. Why
did they fail? What is your proposal to prevent this type of failure from
happening in the future?

When the reason is: how the hell did they get through the prerequisite course
(presumably because of the same political pressure) you are met with: they met
the prerequsites; you are applying unreasonable expetations on your students.

The entire reputation of the univiersity is for sale. How long can it last? If
recent history is any guide, a long time. Let's find out.

~~~
solidsnack9000
LiC ?-

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jaimex2
While at university here in Australia I was given the opportunity to spend a
few weeks in China sponsored by Huawei.

I was naive back then. It was just one massive brain washing exercise where we
were taken on a propaganda tour and taught how stupid the Australian
government was to not contract Huawei to build the NBN.

~~~
boredishBoi
I’m a uni student in aus right now and I’m not a fan of Chinese propaganda but
I wouldn’t mind a free trip to China. Do you have any links/tips on how I
could get myself on one of these trips? I’m at UNSW btw.

~~~
jaimex2
Google Huawei seeds of the future and apply.

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dghughes
When I went back to school I found out about a thing called CourseHero. How? A
classmate lab partner submitted the report we submitted for our work. He
submitted it verbatim with his name, my name, a third person in our group and
even the instructor's name.

The only reason I knew of it was a fellow classmate got a new phone and for
kicks looked up his name and found the report at CourseHero.

By the looks of that website I'd say cheating is rampant. Being drawn into
something you're not aware of then nearly expelled is maddening.

