HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania (AP) — The Canadian university that awarded Doug Mastriano a doctorate in history nearly a decade before he became the Republican candidate for governor of Pennsylvania is investigating new complaints about his research. Recent published papers.
University of New Brunswick president Paul Mazzerol told The Associated Press by telephone on Saturday that he had a policy and an understanding of graduate research, including issues raised by how Mastriano’s work was treated and evaluated. He said the school is also inviting a team of outsiders to review the procedures.
“We’re getting complaints, so we need to let that process run naturally,” Mazerolle said. As such, this should be considered through the complaints process. ”
He said the school’s chief executive, chemistry professor David McGee, is conducting an initial review to determine whether a full investigation is warranted and who should conduct it. . There is no time limit.
Mastriano, who was elected to the Pennsylvania Senate in 2019 after decades as a U.S. Army officer, received his Ph.D. was awarded. Alvin York. But that research, which formed the basis of his 2014 book, has long Criticism from other researchers Inaccurate, sloppy, and even deceptive.
Mastriano has not responded directly to numerous requests for comment on his investigation from AP, including Tuesday, going back almost two years. He is currently at odds with Democratic Attorney General Josh Shapiro on Nov. 8. gubernatorial election.
But on Monday, he spoke about his graduate studies in an online interview, stating that “the left follows right-wing academic research.”
“The meaning of everything I’ve done is that it’s been brutal,” he told Real America’s Voice, speaking of his doctoral work. But I was afraid he would turn my politics and military career against me.”
One of the rival researchers who challenged his work, James Gregory, a history doctoral student at the University of Oklahoma, sent a new complaint to New Brunswick officials on October 6. This comes about a month after the school quietly published Mastriano’s doctoral dissertation. The dissertation embargo, which seems to have prevented Mastriano’s access to research for nearly a decade, is one of the topics Mazerolle is considering by an external team investigating graduate research policy and practice. is.
“His paper and subsequent book are based on falsified research,” Gregory wrote in a cover letter to the list of what he described as 213 cases of academic misconduct in Mastriano’s doctoral dissertation. I’m here. used his research to obtain the imprecise basis on which their claims are built. ”
In a letter to Who Should Be Concerned, Gregory detailed how a complaint he had made last year was handled based on the issues he identified in the book. McGee said the allegations did not require a formal investigation and said they were honest errors and would be corrected.
However, Gregory said the amendments made in response to the book’s problems were added in 2021 before the paper was posted online this August, and are themselves “academic fraud.” I am haunted by the conduct,” ignoring most of Gregory’s complaints last year.
“I think this is a case of grave incompetence for a university that is supposed to maintain academic integrity,” said Gregory. “Not only does it demonstrate poor response to serious allegations, it also lowers the reputation and standards of all other students at the University of New Brunswick.”
Mastriano’s papers were primarily biographies of war heroes from Tennessee, and also documented his attempts to pinpoint York’s famous shootout in the woods of Northern France towards the end of the war. I’m here.
Jeff Brown, a professor of history in New Brunswick, a faculty member who evaluated the work, said Mastriano’s degree was awarded in response to his protest. He completed his military career by teaching at the Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
The controversy prompted some current New Brunswick history graduate students to seek a meeting with the head of the department, and Mazerolle said the fallout brought it to his attention. .
“We generally hear two things,” Mazerolle says, from faculty and graduate students. “One is that people want to keep their jobs and this has become a kind of distraction. I hear there are some.”
Mazerolle said the external reviewers of the school’s processes and policies, whose names have not yet been announced, will focus on the role of faculty advisors as well as the handling of banned dissertations.
A few days after filing a new complaint, Gregory receives an email from MaGee saying that the first investigation will begin soon.
“I am disappointed that UNB has suffered a publicity fiasco in finding real reviewers to confirm my complaint. “They also need to make sure to fix the issues that have led to this poor example of doctoral research,” Gregory said on Tuesday.