Minister

1. Minister Real-lifeexample O2-B-1-en

2. It‘s the beginning of the new millennium. Internet and digital is very slowly getting to every day life of people of a small country named Lelkoland. Even the universities are using internet and computers in very limited way.

3. Kate is a young woman from Lelkoland, the first one from her family who went to study to university. She choose a studyfield in agronomy because it’s close to traditional business of her family.

4. In the middle of her studies she became pregnant and then gave birth to a beautiful baby. Her family greatly supported her, so she decided to continue in her studies. Of course it was not easy to study with a little baby, anyway Kate was a hard-worker and she was managing it quite well.

5. Just before the end of her studies Kate became very exhausted. For her master thesis she was performing research on a distant rabbitfarm where she had to travel every day. Being tired by the research she just decided to give up writing literature review for the thesis. She is doing all the measurements and analysis, right? She doesn’t need to spend dozens of nights in library. She’d rather be with her baby who is growing so fast…

6. Kate found a few years old thesis from the same study field on a very similar topic. The literature review was written really well, she just changed something here and there, deleted few needless chapters and wrote by herself few chapters demanded by her supervisor.

7. Kate successfully defended her thesis, her supervisor and opponent were satisfied with it, claiming that the literature review was well written and research well performed and analyzed. Kate’s thesis is stored in university library. Starting with the next year after Kate’ s graduation, all theses at the university are submitted electronically published in publicly available online database.

8. The year of graduation is very happy for Kate – she meets a man of her dreams and marries him. He is an ambitious man and a lawyer. This inspires Kate and she wish to become a lawyer as well realizing that she doesn’t want to work in the field of agronomy that she previously studied.

9. Kate enrolsto a law school. Soon she becomes pregnant and the scenario from her previous study repeats. Despite having a great support from her husband, the study and motherhood are demanding. At the end of her studies she repeats what worked when she studied agronomy: she uses texts written by somebody else in her thesis. The law school doesn’t use any text-matching software and Kate graduates successfully receiving compliments both from her supervisor and opponent.

10. Young ambitious woman Kate with two university degrees joins politics. Through local politics she climbs up to national level. Her party wins the elections, the leader of this party becomes a prime minister and appoints Kate for minister of justice. Journalists are curious about the new minister, who almost nobody heard about her before. They take a look into her 7 yearsoldthesis from the law school publicly available online… and find an obvious plagiarism from many sources.

11. Kate’s thesis from law Threeyearsolder thesis

12. Obviously, journalist also visit library of the first university, where Kate graduated 13 years ago.Theycompare herthesis with older ones on a similar topic. They find a thesis defended few years before hers: out of 25 pages of Kate’s literature review, 16are identical with this older thesis. Obvious double plagiarism of the new minister is the breaking news of the next days.

13. What happened next? Let’s finditout!

14. Whatisplagiarism? • …ifoutof 25 pages, 16 pages are identicalwithanolder text, isitplagiarism? • … and 16 outof 50 pages? • Plagiarism is presenting work/ideas taken from other sources without proper acknowledgment. (ENAI)

15. Activity: Press Conference • At first Kate rejects to speak on this topic. • Nevertheless, public, journalists and government push her to speak. At the end, she organizes a press conference. • Group A (students): Imagine you are journalist or political opponents, what would you ask or tell Kate to prepare her some hot moments? • Group B (students): imagine you are Kate and/or her supporters. • How would you defend these age-long mistakes? • What would you say to keep your political credit?

16. Activity: Public Opinion What is the public opinion after the press conference? • You all are now the public – the ordinary people of the Lelkoland • How do you feel about having a person who plagiarised twice as a minister of justice? • Why? • What should happen with the new minister? • Agree on the outcome.

17. Activity: Ethical Committee • At the first university (where Kate studied agronomy), ethical committee needs to decide how to deal with her case. • Background facts for the ethical committee: • The thesis has 50 pages, the literature review has 25 pages, 16 pages are identical with an older thesis. • The identical parts are only in the literature review, nowhere else. • The plagiarized thesis is not mentioned in the bibliography. • At the beginning of the thesis, there is a statement of the author: “I declare I have worked individually and all sources I used are properly cited.” • The thesis was defended 13 years ago. • In Lelkoland, it is possible to reversely revoke degrees for serious academic integrity violations

18. Activity: Conclusion • Whatis the main lesson you learnt from the story?

19. Anchor to thereal case Except for family and personal details (such as motivation and reasons for the behavior), the whole story is based on a real case. The story isbuild using data from publically available resources listed at the end of the presentation.

20. The Real Case • In June 2018, Taťána Malá was appointed as a minister of justice in Czechia. Soon it was revealed she plagiarized in both her master thesis – first at Faculty of AgriSciences and later at Faculty of Law (at two different universities). • After few days of denying her mistakes and claiming that there was no plagiarism, she resigns on the minister post after only 13 days as a minister. It is 13 years after her first graduation.

21. Taťána Malá during a press konference about her theses Author: ČTK, Source: https://www.e15.cz/domaci/obvineni-kvuli-diplomkam-jsou-pry-kampan-mala-oznamila-ze-rezignuje-1348711

22. Public Opinion • The case became well known in Czechia and was widely discussed in media. Even when Taťána Malá wishes to stay in politics, her reputation has suffered. • During the case, MrsMalá repeatedly denied her mistakes, claimed she didn‘t do anything incorrect and blamed political opposition, whichhas done more harm than good.

23. “Thinner then the border between inspiration and plagiarism.” Commercial of a top Czech eshop Alza.cz (https://www.alza.cz/mailing-26750.htm?utm_medium=email&utm_source=alzamailing&utm_campaign=akce180711_MLG68275&ident=C9ED0668-BC0E-4BE5-9926-BD4AC1A45534)

24. Consequences • Ethical committee of the university, where Mrs Malá received her first degree, had the thesis analyzed and confirmed that it undoubtedly contains plagiarism. • The degree wasn‘t revoken because in Czechia the degrees can be revoken only up to three years after the graduation.

25. Messageofthe story A mistake done during the school years, even in a desperate situation, can ruin successful career many years later. Denial your mistakes and not facing them straightly might result into deeper troubles.

26. Acknowledgement & references • https://www.anobudelip.cz/cs/tatana-mala/o-mne/ • https://www.irozhlas.cz/zpravy-domov/tatana-mala-diplomova-prace-plagiatorstvi_1806281500_ace • https://www.irozhlas.cz/zpravy-domov/ministryne-spravedlnosti-tatana-mala-opsana-diplomova-prace_1807031237_per • https://brno.idnes.cz/tatana-mala-hnuti-ano-budoucnost-funkce-fcb-/brno-zpravy.aspx?c=A180910_426208_brno-zpravy_krut • http://mendelu.cz/30221n-tiskove-prohlaseni-zavery-eticke-komise

27. ResourcesAvailable in English • Prague Daily Monitor: New justice minister facing problem over plagiarism(http://www.praguemonitor.com/2018/07/09/new-justice-minister-facing-problem-over-plagiarism) • Pesquisa: Czech politicians resign over academic plagiarism(https://revistapesquisa.fapesp.br/en/2019/02/19/czech-politicians-resign-over-academic-plagiarism)

28. Image credits • Dita Dlabolová, based on https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Windows_98_1024_x_768_HU_Wikipedia_Winamp_Browser.png and https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dell_Desktop_Computer_in_school_classroom.jpg • AnastasiyaGeppfrom Pexels, source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-standing-in-hallway-while-holding-book-1462630/ • www.publicdomainpictures.net, source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/baby-royalty-free-mothers-day-tenderness-67663/ • Pixabay, source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/adult-blur-books-close-up-261909/ • Pixabay, source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-reading-book-256455/ • TeddiFishman (photofromgraduation) • Inna Lesykfrom Pexels, source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/adult-affection-beautiful-bouquet-566454/ • iRozhlas, source: https://www.irozhlas.cz/zpravy-domov/tatana-mala-diplomova-prace-plagiatorstvi_1806281500_ace • ČTK, source: https://www.e15.cz/domaci/obvineni-kvuli-diplomkam-jsou-pry-kampan-mala-oznamila-ze-rezignuje-1348711 • Alza.cz, source: https://www.alza.cz/mailing-26750.htm?utm_medium=email&utm_source=alzamailing&utm_campaign=akce180711_MLG68275&ident=C9ED0668-BC0E-4BE5-9926-BD4AC1A45534 • Dita Dlabolová (drawingsofrabbits)

29. Author & contact information • Dita Dlabolová, dita.dlabolova@mendelu.cz • October 2018

30. LicenseInformation Titleofthework: Real-lifeexample: Minister Attributework to name: Dita Dlabolová (dita.dlabolova@mendelu.cz) Licensedunder: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License Attributeusingfollowing text: Real-lifeexample: Ministerby Dita Dlabolováis licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.