Professor At Columbia Will Keep Her Job

Columbia University’s Teachers College will not dismiss Madonna G. Constantine, the professor it charged with plagiarizing numerous works by another professor and two former students.

On Thursday, she renewed her claims that the investigation was biased and that the president, Susan H. Fuhrman, had tried to force her to resign. She said she had not plagiarized anyone’s work and stepped up her public defense.

Her lawyer released a statement by Barbara Wallace, the other black woman in a full tenured position at Teachers, charging that the college’s actions were hasty and left it “vulnerable to the appearance of racial bias.”

Columbia University Accuses Black Professor Of Plagiarism

Dr, Madonna Constantine was the black professor who discovered a noose outside of her door last fall. Now the professor is being accused of plagiarizing the work of colleagues and other students. Here is Dr. Constantine's response to those allegations:

Dr. Constantine, in an e-mail message to faculty and students on Wednesday, called the investigation “biased and flawed,” and said it was part of a “conspiracy and witch hunt by certain current and former members of the Teachers College community.”

“I am left to wonder whether a white faculty member would have been treated in such a publicly disrespectful and disparaging manner,” she wrote.

She added, “I believe that nothing that has happened to me this year is coincidental, particularly when I reflect upon the hate crime I experienced last semester involving a noose on my office door. As one of only two tenured black women full professors at Teachers College, it pains me to conclude that I have been specifically and systematically targeted.”

Her attorney has stated that the professor's work was plagiarized. Do you think that there is some sort of vendetta against the professor?