MIT Hired Six New Diversity Deans. Two of Them Are Serial Plagiarists, Complaint Alleges.
14th May 2024
MIT welcomed six new deans of diversity, equity, and inclusion, one for each of the institute’s main schools, as part of a “DEI Strategic Action Plan” launched the previous year. Aimed at boosting the representation of women and minorities, in part by developing DEI criteria for staff performance reviews, the plan pledged to “make equity central” to the university “while ensuring the highest standards of excellence.”
But according to a 71-page complaint filed with the university on Saturday, at least two of the six DEI officials may not be living up to those standards. The complaint alleges that Tracie Jones-Barrett and Alana Anderson are serial plagiarists, copying entire pages of text without attribution and riding roughshod over MIT’s academic integrity policies.
In her 2023 dissertation titled “Cite a Sista,” which explored how black women in the Ivy League “make meaning of thriving,” Jones-Barrett, MIT’s deputy “equity officer,” lifts a whole section on “ethical considerations” from Emmitt Wyche III, her classmate in Northeastern University’s Graduate School of Education, without any sort of citation.