The ‘Cover-up University’ goes for broke. We have seen one of the biggest scandals in the history of Cambridge University.
The appointment of Jason Arday was misjudged. By itself, this was poor, but not a scandal. There are other lousy Professorial appointments in the University.
The first serious misstep was the failure by Prof Hilary Cremin and Dr Rhys Morgan to investigate the plagiarism allegations in 2023. If an academic’s research methodology is inadequate, that should be addressed — it’s part of a university’s duty of care & commitment to professional development. In this case, it could have been resolved in 2023, quietly.
The allegations re-surfaced in 2025, followed by the not fully explained use of the police and Carter-Ruck to silence journalist Jack Grove, working for Times Higher Education. There are previous examples of heavy-handed use of lawyers and the police by Cambridge University to shut people up. This time, Dr Rhys Morgan asked Prof Manuel Eisner to examine the allegations. He concluded they were ‘out of scope’, though the scale and seriousness of the problem must have been obvious to him. It was another missed opportunity to deal with matter quietly.
The allegations once again came to light in 2026, this time on substack and twitter/X. It has now been the top-running story on X for about two weeks. The University’s handling has drawn widespread criticism and helped fan the flames of the scandal. Nobody in the senior leadership team seemed to bother to look at the evidence. Rather, they maintained the fiction that it was all “a vile campaign” motivated by racism.
It has been an ‘omnishambles’, made worse by the fact that our Vice Chancellor, Prof Deborah Prentice, has said nothing at all.
Now there is an attempt to avoid a full scale, indecent and external inquiry (“…feed into a review … Research Committee will review …”). The cover-up to end all cover-ups.
It needs to be said clearly that attempts by the senior leadership to thwart an independent inquiry will cause the University to descend into civil war. There is already a growing sense of “them and us,” with leadership perceived as distant, not listening and unresponsive.
Too much damage has already been done. Only a thorough, transparent, and independent examination of events can begin to restore trust.
We must keep up the pressure.
132 Comments
Stav · 8 August 2026 at 09:09
Jason Arday as such is not even a problem. He is a vessel of a larger problem which is the DEI worship. In places where excellence and only that should matter, the DEI was promoted. And that agenda was the easiest to promote in subject areas without real content matter or methodology: this hideous sociology, gender studies, postcolonial studies and other such tosh.The moment you allow these fields to exist and deteriorate , anything is a fair game. The University, this and others, are now eating the crap they cooked themselves. Inadequate privileged minds created niche subjects where they can play their fantasises to the max. From within these subjects these useless nonentities ‘ fix the world’ in their image. Hence Arday, culture wars and iimpossible student politics. Has Cofnas received an apology yet? A compensation for a destroyed year at the Uni? Loss of income? Reputation?
The Uni is paying for that now. Good. There is a Law and there is a Judge, as the saying goes.
Nothing will change unless and until a national committee consisting of top minds in real subjects like medicine, physics, engineering, economics, examine the university structure and methodological foundations on social sciences and humanities, and recommends closure of departments associated with subjects without methodology, fuelled exclusively by ‘ fixing the world ‘ agenda. Nothing will change until Cremins of this world ( not Ardays) have an IQ test run on them, to identify the real problem. A lot will be learned from this.
Then the privileged whites can apologise to Arday and his vulnerable likes. The latter have been used to satisfy the Whities urges and discarded like cheap toys.
21percent.org · 8 August 2026 at 09:13
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/08/07/ardays-students-think-cambridge-failed-them-now-they/
The stories are getting worse
How could folks in the Faculty of Education not be aware of all this?
EtonMess · 8 August 2026 at 22:46
I’d wondered if journalists contacted former students. The silence around them seemed peculiar. Surely they had complaints, and surely some raised these complaints. As Dr Arday was a full professor, he must have supervised PhD students. What happened to them. The students who complained and were ignored must be counted in the list of victims among plagiarised academics, journalists and faculty and students being attacked as ‘DEI’ admits.
It’s correct the pressure needs to be kept on decision-makers at the University of Cambridge such as Prof Hilary Cremin and Dr Rhys Morgan. Several of my South Asian colleagues are angry about the shamefully racist reporting. However, they agree the university handed a platform to right-wing journalists by refusing to investigate. The focus must continue to be on the cover up and on the neglect to examine the employment application in the first instance. It’s improper and wrong to hide behind the name ‘the University of Cambridge.’ The university doesn’t have consciousness. Behind all of its decisions are individuals who took those decisions.
The biggest problem with the focus on Dr Arday is many victims remain unseen and the institutional officials remain unaccountable. It has been asked on this very blog who created Dr Arday. Who hired Dr Arday. Who promoted Dr Arday. Who dismissed complaints against Dr Arday. These institutional officials must named, as this blog and other newspapers have done, and they must face questions.
Fido · 8 August 2026 at 23:01
What is fucking insane is that this is a faculty of EDUCATION. They are supposed to care about stuff like student complaints, neglect, plagiarism, and bullying of students who raised complaints. They are completely fucking derelict not just by the standards of a university but their whole discipline. How can these people be in charge of pedagogy? They are wild and need to be put out to pasture. But on the plus side, I guess, Cambridge now has a department it can shut down to save costs in place of continuously trying to terminate the Vet School again and again.
Eileen Nugent · 10 August 2026 at 01:49
I don’t find this surprising. In Cambridge people will discuss problems with a persons teaching with other people but rarely with the person themselves. It doesn’t seem to matter whether there is a significant problem with your own teaching or not people are still more likely to discuss problems with the teaching of others with you than problems with your own teaching with you. That seems to be independent of your own teaching competence state, it seems to hold from when there are few problems with your own teaching and student feedback to when there are significant problems with your own teaching and student feedback.
Cambridge feedback can be quite binary – a none/minor points feedback regime could yield straight to a full on dismantle a person completely regime – there could be very little graded feedback in between. Cambridge seems to give people quite a bit of leeway to self regulate which in principle is a good thing and I think does tend to suit people drawn to & accepted by Cambridge who typically have a high capacity to self regulate but that seems to come at a price that if external regulation does kick in – it can kick in hard and kick in fast. There is the select-your-own-mercy-level-to-apply-to-yourself self-regulation regime but at the boundary of that select-your-own-mercy-level-to-apply-to-yourself self-regulation regime there could be a no-mercy regulation by others regime.
Eileen Nugent · 10 August 2026 at 05:12
I spent more time trying to understand mental errors and mental error correction systems in relation to physics information than I would care to admit, vary the amount of false physics information, clean up the physics information, vary the amount of false physics information, clean up the physics information.
Eileen Nugent · 10 August 2026 at 07:04
That was the pattern I would start off trying to understand something about how the mind worked using physics learning, that would generate some insight about how the mind worked and then I would get sidetracked trying to understand something about how physics learning worked based on the insight about how the mind worked. I got sidetracked on learning transitions – going from understanding physics at one level of complexity to understanding physics at a higher level of complexity.
In trying to understand how the mind worked I iterated on a task – physics learning – I already had significant experience of, something I was being paid to do at a high level of complexity & something I was being paid to find out how to teach it effectively.
Old Schools Refugee · 8 August 2026 at 09:25
It’s interesting to make a comparison with the damage inflicted to Stephen Toope in the free speech debates of 2021 and the mistakes made then with an online reporting tool. Toope was the subject of derision in the right wing press, lost a Regent House vote, and admitted to mistakes in an email to all staff sent under his own name. This was largely a policy argument, which Regent House won. He left before the end of his term,
This time we have a matter of integrity rather than policy, an uncommunicative Vice-Chancellor and much more intense press attention which is in agreement across all sides of the political spectrum.
In the last few days we’ve moved from a “vile campaign” to terse, piecemeal promises of inquiries. That would be the third time Cambridge will have marked its own homework on this matter. Toope lost an argument. Prentice is losing the institution’s confidence in its own honesty. The next 7 weeks before the new academic year starts are crucial. The administration must get ahead of the game and make these inquiries externally led and independent, or have it forced upon them.
EtonMess · 8 August 2026 at 22:49
Good points. The right wing press was no fan of Stephen Toope, or his Covid-19 policies, you’re quite right. I’d almost forgotten they made a mockery of him.
Eileen Nugent · 10 August 2026 at 02:11
This issue is organisational integrity, the issue had more time to advance in one case – Prentice – than it had to advance in the other case – Toope – but the issue is still the same – organisational integrity. If an organisation is deluded enough to think that – substantively unfairly dismissing the Chair of the organisations own Board of Scrutiny followed by putting up no counter case in an external court to justify that dismissal followed by paying the Chair of the organisations Board of Scrutiny off to refuse to comply with a re-engagement order the Chair of the organisations Board of Scrutiny secured in an external court – is practically compatible with upholding free speech in an organisation it could take the organisation going through a couple of VCs to finally work out that an organisation has a problem with its own organisational honesty with itself. If free speech has not been practically implementable in an organisation since 2013 one could argue that the organisation has not been honest with itself since 2013.
JJ · 8 August 2026 at 09:30
VC is surely doomed. I mean, she may hop around a bit like a sparrow without a wing, but it’s over.
Toope’s problems were in comparison tiny, but they did for him
Prentice has Arday … and a continuous stream of bad headlines since January. No-one had got the University more consistently in the newspapers
Prentice looks completely beaten. She has said nothing, only the “university spokesperson” has commented. It’s a complete absence of leadership
Stick a fork into her, she’s cooked
Eileen Nugent · 10 August 2026 at 03:08
In 2019 the university of Cambridge blocked an application for a judicial review – independent external review by a branch of the high court – of employment practices in the University by the Chair of the University Board of Scrutiny – internal scrutiniser in chief – who won a substantive unfair dismissal case in an employment tribunal in 2015 and who at that point in time had a 4 year old re-engagement order that the university refused to comply with.
Members of Regent House are calling for an independent external review of university employment practices now – in 2026 – but where were members of Regent House when the university blocked an application for an independent external review – judicial review – of university employment practices by the chair of the board of scrutiny in 2019?
There have been problems with the practical implementation of free speech/academic freedom/raising concerns in Cambridge since 2013 – non compliance with reinstatement/re-engagement remedy orders from an employment tribunal in cases of substantive unfair dismissal – there is no need to stick a fork in free speech/academic freedom/raising concerns in Cambridge to check the state of cooking, there’s been a fork stuck in free speech/academic freedom/raising concerns in Cambridge since 2013.
? · 8 August 2026 at 10:02
Oh come on. She really earned that vay-cay. So much so that she immediately buggered off and took another.
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 10:36
“The great and unfortunate things Jason Arday’s memoir forgot to mention”
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/education/article/jason-arday-book-proposal-cancer-coma-jsxh5hs6p
An investigation of Arday’s case, even if by an external and independent party, will not solve the key problem of Cambridge, which is the culture of cover up of misconduct, regardless of the topic, and retaliation against those who do not accept this culture. This issue will only be solved when a full investigation to HR, OSCCA and other divisions responsible for addressing reports of misconduct is done. Victims and whistleblowers deserve it. The issue is that when such an investigation is done, it will become clear that many members were aware of this culture and did nothing to change it.
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 11:44
Richard Dawkins on Arday…
https://unherd.com/2026/08/jason-arday-a-question-of-academic-standards/
“Of course, I wouldn’t normally use a public forum to lampoon a style that should have been corrected by a PhD candidate’s supervisor. I wouldn’t normally do it but — for heaven’s sake — it’s a Cambridge professor we are talking about, appointed to a presumably much-coveted chair at one of the world’s great universities, possessor of three honorary doctorates. Mightn’t you be forgiven for wondering whether, just possibly, normal standards were relaxed? Arday has now done the honourable thing and resigned, leaving the University of Cambridge with much explaining to do. A BBC news film shows Professor Hilary Cremin calling him “The best in the world”. She also said that the Board of Electors to his Cambridge professorship were “absolutely unanimous”. Really?
Fortunately, there are signs that other faculties at Cambridge are as aghast as the rest of us at what has been done to their university’s good name. May I arm them with a lovely quotation from one of science’s great stylists, Peter Medawar: “…no one who has something original or important to say will willingly run the risk of being misunderstood; people who write obscurely are either unskilled in writing or up to mischief.””
EtonMess · 8 August 2026 at 22:57
@TheResearcher
‘Fortunately, there are signs that other faculties at Cambridge are as aghast as the rest of us at what has been done to their university’s good name.’
I’ve also spoken with colleagues who are genuinely aghast. But do you not think it odd that many Cambridge academics claim to be completely unaware of the research misconduct that (sometimes) their own colleagues are committing?
I’m not sure what to make of this. Myself I don’t go looking around for it, but in speaking to students and colleagues, I am aware of a number of research misconduct problems far outside of my own discipline, from Astronomy (for example) to Anthropology.
I don’t see how it’s possible to claim absolute ignorance of a cover up problem so apparently widespread.
IQS · 8 August 2026 at 11:49
“in subject areas without real content matter or methodology: this hideous sociology, gender studies, postcolonial studies and other such tosh.The moment you allow these fields to exist and deteriorate , anything is a fair game”
There are some good scholars in each of these fields who apply balance, collect real data, and consider opposing arguments. But they eventually apply for asylum in departments of economics, demography, policy or statistics.
Stav · 8 August 2026 at 13:16
Indeed. There are scholars who reasearch these subjects. And they are better placed in economics, history etc. This is not an asylum . This is a proper places for proper scholars.
Jay · 8 August 2026 at 12:00
Notice media interest in a scandal is normally halted by a resignation. Expectation from Cambridge was that Arday’s going would cause the stories to taper off. We were past the peak, they hoped. Time for Debs to take a vay-cay (again). Regina can handle it.
This has not happened. Media interest (judged by number of press articles) is still growing. We’ve not got to the peak yet.
This is happening because of two reasons.
First, the press has moved on to the large Cambridge University background and seeing a whole tonne of more problems. And second the book launch is still to come on Aug 11th, which will provide a whole bunch more of Arday’s claims to investigate.
This could run for another week or two. May not be over when Debs returns
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 12:10
Two fun facts from people who already read the memoir:
“When Arday applied to university, his girlfriend, Debs—who had been teaching him to read—“wrote out” the application on his behalf, including the personal statement.”
“By the time Arday started on his master’s degree, he writes, he was reading at about the same level as his 3-year-old daughter. Still, he pressed onward. Still, somehow, he got a teaching job.”
““As his dissertation deadline approached, Arday started having blurry vision; medical scans revealed a brain tumor. After it was removed, he had a ministroke and lost his short-term memory. “I’d worked on my thesis for over thirty months, and now I was reading it as if for the first time,” he writes. As one might expect, his thesis defense did not go smoothly. One examiner was suspicious of his work: “I am struggling to see that there is any original contribution here,” she said, according to the book. But Arday, who often likens himself to Rocky Balboa, managed to fight back, and in the end, he passed. (The memoir brings up the fictional boxer in about a dozen different contexts.)””
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 12:11
Three! And there are much more!
Rock On · 8 August 2026 at 12:37
Good comparison, given that Rocky Balboa was a fictional character too
Raven · 8 August 2026 at 12:25
The corruption and rot in Cambridge is such that no one among the senior management – lawyers, compliance and coms very much included – can be trusted anymore, with anything, including the way forward.
Silence and absence may be a way for the VC of devising the least public way of dealing with this huge mess.
The Registrary was sacked. And Munir was, by all accounts, sent packing after the public ET debacle.
Anonymous · 8 August 2026 at 13:04
It would not be hard for her to say that she was horrified by what she has learned in the past two weeks, and that she would welcome a comprehensive and independent investigation into what has been happening on her watch. Simply contrast that to how Gillian Tett responded once she found out about bullying and harassment at her college.
Prentice’s silence is deafening, and true or not, it invites the public to believe that she must have been aware all along and complicit in the sequence of events.
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 17:21
“Prentice’s silence is deafening, and true or not, it invites the public to believe that she must have been aware all along and complicit in the sequence of events.”
Prentice and the Pro-Vice Chancellors knew about this. Ask them directly, face-to-face, if they were not aware of Carter-Ruck being hired to silence a journalist of THE. If they ever tell you they did not know, they are lying and I can show it. It has been circulating that the University claims it did not send Carter-Ruck threats, and it is possible that Arday did. But who put Arday in touch with Carter-Ruck? Who paid the bill? Was the leadership asked if they knew of the practices and they denied? They cannot deny this because there is evidence that they knew but this was not published yet.
Reggie · 9 August 2026 at 09:44
Of course there are all taking another vay-cay.
There’s only a few countries left without extradition treaties. It is important to pick the right one!
Old Schools Refugee · 8 August 2026 at 14:19
I don’t think it would be wise to speculate on the reasons for Munir and Rampton’s departures. Whatever happened, we are two PVCs and a Registrary down. At least Toope left behind a fully staffed, functioning administration. The VC is trapped. If she were to leave now, with a hollowed out administration, it would look as though she’s running from a burning building. She has 7 weeks to show some leadership and work through this.
JJ · 8 August 2026 at 14:21
By October, she’s more likely to be 4 ProVcs and a Registrary down
??? · 8 August 2026 at 14:25
It is impossible. For one thing she is on holiday. They had all year to fix the staffing issues and who would want to join now? The only solution will be collective resignation and a completely fresh slate with a mandate to clean up the mess and no association of any kind with what went before.
Xerxes · 8 August 2026 at 13:13
Boris comments:
“In their callousness and their cynicism, and their basic selfishness, the dons have behaved like Randolph and Mortimer Duke”
An analogy that will cut through!
https://www.dailymail.com/debate/article-16037181/BORIS-JOHNSON-Jason-Arday-fraud-academic.html
Bojo Mojo · 8 August 2026 at 18:33
When Boris Johnson is calling out the university for being liars and frauds — and is 100% on point — you know something has gone terribly, awfully wrong
Anonymous · 10 August 2026 at 02:03
Never would’ve guessed Boris Johnson wrote that article. Boris Johnson? “Oh we all know what’s going to happen now, don’t we? All those responsible at the University of Cambridge will run for the hills, desperately trying to cover their backsides as they go.
They will say they didn’t know, that they were fooled, that they were taken in by his charm. They will present him as a chancer, a charlatan, someone who brilliantly preyed on their good intentions.” Except he’s wrong to say those exposing the research misconduct and plagiarism are racists.
SPARTACUS · 8 August 2026 at 14:06
There is only one solution: clear out the whole senior leadership. That is: VC, ProVCs, Council, Acting Registrary, Heads of HR, Legal, Comms and Research Office. Anything short of that will leave rot and ensure terminal decay. It is not too late yet but it will soon be!
21percent.org · 8 August 2026 at 14:19
Good article in New Statesman, archived here
https://archive.is/CFoby
Raven · 8 August 2026 at 16:41
“The university sector should be a refuge entirely independent from the prevailing political-cultural zeitgeist, not its nervous, uncritical servant“
210 · 8 August 2026 at 15:32
Realistically, I think the way this continues is as follows. The senior management team are stuck in place. No-one has the authority to replace them. A vote of no confidence in the Regent House will take months to go through. Requires matters to reach even more abysmal lows and they will. Obvious from media so far that beyond Arday the next in the line of fire are not only Cremin but also senior leadership across sociology, race, gender, and post-colonial studies. Moves by history faculty to get on the right side of this are wise because they see this coming.
G(r)ove(r) · 8 August 2026 at 19:59
imagining how hilarious it would be if the pile-on continues and they ended up having to appoint Gove as VC to restore academic standards
4* · 8 August 2026 at 17:18
The damage caused by senior inaction is incalculable. Alumni are in revolt and twitter is full of declarations to stop sending college donations. Donors may be more taciturn but at least one having a rethink. Every REF submission, every grant application, every research consortium bid is tainted until leadership gets a grip, and hard to believe that “objective” university rankings (starting with THE and Times!!!) will not factor this in when thinking about how their 2027 numbers will appear to their readers.
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 17:32
“‘Old racist wine in a new bottle’: Black academics respond to Jason Arday affair”
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/aug/08/black-academics-respond-to-jason-arday-affair
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 17:41
“It emerges that Jason Arday went to our nearest primary school, Heathbrook. Neighbours remember him – but as a completely normal small boy with no development issues. Can they all be wrong? It seems incredible.”
https://x.com/philiphensher/status/2086016404310863965
It must be all a “vile campaign to undermine his credibility”
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 20:05
The New York Times just published a good one:
“A Top Scholar’s Fall Shows That Universities Don’t Get It”
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/08/opinion/cambridge-plagiarism-arday-higher-education.html
“If interest in this story peters out, that would be unfortunate, because what’s needed now is genuine accountability. This was a prime example of academia’s maddening tendency to embody the worst caricatures painted by its critics. The available evidence strongly suggests that, when faced with the allegations against Mr. Arday years ago, Cambridge and the other academic institutions connected to him responded not by genuinely investigating them with integrity and transparency, but acting in ways that helped him avoid scrutiny. Their decisions were both wrong and further damaged the reputation of higher education at a time when it has come under withering and sometimes unfair attack.”
“Mr. Cofnas arrived on the scene because of Cambridge’s complacency — he wrote the post after an anonymous Cambridge tipster reached out to him — which soon hardened into stridency.”
Let’s all thank the “anonymous Cambridge tipster” for the help! Hopefully the tipster knows about POLIS, History, DAMTP, CRUK, Astronomy, Physics and more scandals. We are just in August, Cambridge!
People should be aware that while the Arday case becomes an international humiliation for the institution and you would think that this alone would make managers rethink their approach, retaliation against whistleblowers continues in the background away from the spotlight. For now.
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 20:12
Check what happened to the author of the piece:
https://x.com/jessesingal/status/2086088113240088966
“Can I also please ask you that you do not name Rhys Morgan. He is a junior member of staff who is simply implementing the University’s academic misconduct policy. He has no decision-making powers. Naming him in incredibly unfair and will create undue pressure and stress on this member of staff.I am sure the New York Times or any other reasonable publication would not wish this hurt unnecessarily.”
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 20:33
“The “not for quoting” highlights the different mindset of British v American attitudes. They use “it could cause stress” as justification for sidestepping scrutiny. It’s the same reason they claimed when calling the police on a journalist in the U.K.”
Welcome to America, Cambridge! Where is Carter-Ruck now?
Platform 22 · 8 August 2026 at 21:21
Even in the UK, the press knows full well that their bark is louder than their bite. That is the consequence of poor legal strategy as well as costly and wasteful. Had they kept the threats limited and strategic, perhaps that might have worked (possibly), but they played this extremely poorly by fire-hosing the entire press pack with SLAPPs and then doing little more than crying foul when their bluff was called again (and again and again). The press has better lawyers than Cambridge while journalists are pack animals and have the memory of elephants. So really no surprise the university is now getting utterly trampled
21percent.org · 8 August 2026 at 21:11
Is RM really a junior member of staff? He’s running the research integrity office, which seems a big job. Or, at least, it should be a big job.
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 21:35
Morgan is obviously not junior, and I would be very keen to know who said that. Likely the most pitiful person for Andrew Gelman who was told to say it like that for emotional manipulation.
EtonMess · 8 August 2026 at 23:19
A clear example of how much ‘the University’ does not want those accountable to be named.
Dr Rhys Morgan’s name was surely already known from the Dr Magdalen Connolly case. Where is that young woman now. After 4 years and an employment tribunal, she has left academia.
High positions with high salaries and decision-making powers come with responsibilities. To demand invisibility as soon as the public starts demanding answers is not responsible or accountable. This behaviour never would have passed decades ago.
21percent.org · 9 August 2026 at 06:05
Dr Rhys Morgan was already named by the campaign group ‘For Better Science’ in the Gorriz paper milling case
https://forbetterscience.com/2025/02/14/schneider-shorts-14-02-2025-aberrations-that-cannot-be-explained/
He was named in the Magdalen Connolly case.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/67976561fe1eabe7d7a22c65/Dr_M_Connolly_v_The_Chancellor__Masters_and_Scholars_of_the_University_of_Cambridge___other_3305018.2022___other_written_reasons.pdf
Obviously, whether Dr Rhys Morgan accepts it or not, his decisions are doing really harm to people and to the university’s reputation.
Dr Mike Glover carries overall responsibility in this area, takes home a huge salary and should be held accountable. Glover has been involved in most of the high profile scandals, yet somehow never gets named.
So, some sympathy with Dr Morgan — let’s make sure Dr Glover gets more credit. (He is also in charge of Whistleblowing policy).
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 07:19
Dr Glover is also the direct line manager of Ms Sarah d’Ambrumenil, the Head of the Office for Student Conduct, Complaints and Appeals (OSCCA). Let’s remember how the complaints from students are treated (https://21percent.org/?p=2628):
“Over the years I have served on many committees at the university tasked with the miserable job of handling student complaints. You may wonder what happens on such committees to produce such unfortunate results.
First, please understand: no complaint was ever taken seriously. As soon as it is handled the immediate discussion centres around how it must be dismissed. The student is immediately presented as “troublemaker” and the fact of their having made a complaint presented as evidence that this must be true. At no point has anyone ever considered whether we are the ones who need to reflect and learn.
Second, no evidence is ever taken from any person who raises an issue. Indeed no evidence is ever at all. Any person accused is asked for their account and this is immediately and durably assumed as fact (even if their account of the matter changes over time and is not consistent). We protect our own and the more senior the individual the more protection they deserve.
In the most comical episode I can recall, a student had made valid accusations against legal noncompliance. For this reason all mention of their complaint was not included in the agenda. When the chair of the committee turned to raise the issue HR handed out sheets of paper in small print with a highly edited summary of the matter. After the meeting they checked very carefully to ensure that each piece of paper had been handed back. It was agreed by the chair and all those present to exclude any note of having discussed the matter from the minutes. What the discussion agreed was to dismiss their complaint without evidence.”
Teapartytime · 8 August 2026 at 21:52
“Naming him in incredibly unfair and will create undue pressure and stress on this member of staff.I am sure the New York Times or any other reasonable publication would not wish this hurt unnecessarily”
Oh boy. These people reeeeaaaaallly do not understand America. I almost feel sorry for them.
Except I really don’t.
Let freedom ring!
Always Be Closing · 8 August 2026 at 22:07
The Netflix version of this shitshow definitely needs a scene where Hugh Grant / James Helm is proffering vague wafflly pleas for clemency to the US press corps while the entire office are reeling in laughter while they are on mute / he is on speakerphone
Tom · 8 August 2026 at 22:18
This would be Ok if it said, “Don’t name Rhys Morgan, the person who should be held accountable is Mike Glover,”
Because Glover will have been informed about this and called the shots
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 22:32
Exactly. Incidentally, it was Mike Glover as Academic Secretary who complaint against me for my “abusive behaviour” in reporting misconduct of senior members that eventually led to my expulsion as a Cambridge student. I hope that he is not considering applying for Vice-Chancellor because that will not happen, at least not in Cambridge.
10 days that shook the academic world · 8 August 2026 at 22:36
Glover has been running a Kerensky government
Time for the real revolution to begin
EtonMess · 8 August 2026 at 23:12
‘“Can I also please ask you that you do not name Rhys Morgan. He is a junior member of staff who is simply implementing the University’s academic misconduct policy. He has no decision-making powers. Naming him in incredibly unfair and will create undue pressure and stress on this member of staff.I am sure the New York Times or any other reasonable publication would not wish this hurt unnecessarily.”
This shows no understanding of the position held by Dr Morgan. He oversees the Research Integrity Office, having only two people above him according to The Researcher. It is false to claim he is a junior member of staff. His powers are unmatched in many cases.
TheResearcher · 8 August 2026 at 23:23
The direct line manager of Dr Rhys Morgan is the Director of Research Services, Dr Andrew Jackson, who is managed directly by the Academic Secretary, Dr Mike Glover. The only person above Dr Glover is the Vice-Chancellor herself. Dr Morgan is obviously not a junior staff and it is very misleading to say he is not involved in the decision-making process.
? · 9 August 2026 at 09:04
The failure of management responsibility is what is on display. The leadership are no better than Arday – i.e. asking the press to attribute blame to others, hiding their own responsibility, and refusing to acknowledge fault.
It truly is Arday University.
Old Schools Refugee · 9 August 2026 at 09:51
Dr Morgan is middle management, a professional services manager rather than an executive decision maker. He’s secretary of the relevant committees, not its chair. He reads the rules, but doesn’t make them. Unlike those further up the food chain, he almost certainly is not paid enough to take the public heat in this situation.
I recommend reading the university’s policy on investigating research misconduct. It defines a secretary for the process, who has responsibility for overseeing its implementation. For an academic, the policy states that this is the Academic Secretary, Dr Glover.
21percent.org · 9 August 2026 at 09:59
This is correct. As the Grace makes clear, Dr Rhys Morgan followed the existing rules.
However, a prudent individual might well have alerted the University senior management, given the sensitivities in this case.
This is an important question — did Dr Morgan channel information about this case upwards?
Our guess is probably he did. He has done it in other controversial plagiarism cases known to the 21 Group.
In which case, Dr Morgan has been made the ‘fall guy’, when someone more senior should be out taking the flak
21percent.org · 9 August 2026 at 10:24
Also, fair to say, there is no-one senior out there taking the flak
The scale of the press/pr disaster is just breathtaking.
Complete silence from the VC has not helped.
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 10:06
@Old Schools Refugee,
I am familiar with the policy as I used it. I am very familiar with Dr Morgan, Dr Jackson, and Dr Glover. I can assure you that Dr Morgan makes key decisions, just as rejecting an external investigation upon request of the claimant when it is clear that the people involved in the internal investigation are conflicted. Of course, it is very possible that he is told to make such decisions by someone above—and in this case very likely because Dr Glover is involved in the malpractices—but it was he, Dr Morgan, and his team who made that decision. This is not in the policy.
Jackson, Jr · 9 August 2026 at 10:17
Wait up:
“Can I also please ask you that you do not name Rhys Morgan. He is a junior member of staff”
Dr Rhys Morgan is Head of Research Policy in the Cambridge Research Strategy Office. He’s been in the role seven years now. To describe him as “junior” is an outright lie It is true only in sense that Arday was also “junior” i.e. by virtue of his age (Morgan landed the job in his mid-30s after getting a 2.1 from Oxford and then doing a Phd at Cardiff).
He’s paid a lot of public money to do whatever it is he clearly isn’t doing. Including benefits has probably been better part of a million pounds since he started. Value for money folks?
Manifest Destiny · 9 August 2026 at 10:38
As the scandal goes west the focus is now on Andrew Jackson…
The guy did an “MBA” at Open University, and for that now he’s running research integrity at Cambridge – probably on a salary in the £120,000 to £160,000 range, maybe higher, who knows
Anyway if he thinks he is blameless then he should sign the letter and support a full and independent investigation.
Anonymous · 10 August 2026 at 02:35
I’m w/ TheResearcher. “Dr Morgan is obviously not a junior member of staff and it’s very misleading to say he is not involved in the decision-making process.”
Dr Morgan makes decisions. His decisions have done harm to the complainants and whistleblowers. He’s not a small fry and he ain’t being made the fall guy. Yeah, the focus shouldn’t only be on Dr Morgan. It should be on everyone TheResearcher named, in addition to Dr Morgan. All of this “just following orders” sounds a little too Nuremburg for me.
Blacklisted · 9 August 2026 at 08:08
“Cambridge” statement about Rhys Morgan
Naming him is INCREDIBLY unfair.
“Cambridge” statement sent to media 2nd August 2026
We take allegations of academic misconduct INCREDIBLY seriously.
HR Witness statement in a recent ET
I explained that they have had an INCREDIBLY difficult relationship for as long as I have known them…
“”Incredibly” is an adverb with two main meanings: it means extremely or it describes something hard to believe”
Who writes this incredibly incredible shit?
- · 9 August 2026 at 08:25
Freudian slip. Nothing out of Cambridge HR is credible.
UNBELIEVABLE · 8 August 2026 at 22:07
Rhys Morgan former head is now a wine merchant! Anything in Cambridge is possible! The gross incompetence of the Research Office, which homes RM, has been know for years! The gigantic scandal at the SCM oncology/cancer research was presided over by them. If RM is ‘junior’ it just shows how UCam runs!! Unbelievable but true!
Time to Breath · 8 August 2026 at 22:15
To be fair this is probably a good landing after having to deal with so much BS inside the research office, seems like he has moved on and I wish him well. What cannot be forgiven is the way members of HR have it seems reinvented themselves as property moguls on the university’s own dime
42 · 9 August 2026 at 00:18
Grafen, A. (2026). Levels of injustice [Review of the book The Latin Square: Essays in Defence of R.A. Fisher, by A. W. F. Edwards]. Oxford Magazine, Noughth Week Hilary Term, 12-13.
42 · 9 August 2026 at 06:47
There are troubling parallels between the ongoing scandal surrounding the appointment of Jason Arday at the University and the earlier public cancellation of Ronald Fisher at Gonville and Caius College. Both cases show an institution willing to sacrifice its core academic integrity to satisfy political fashions.
In the Fisher controversy, Caius hastily removed a stained glass window from its hall celebrating the founder of modern statistics, Ronald Fisher. Edwards details in his book The Latin Square how the college rushed this decision in 2020, partly driven by a student petition following global BLM protests. In doing so, the college brushed aside Fisher’s contributions to science and population genetics, relying instead on poorly informed denunciations primarily motivated by the fear of bad publicity. Any attempt at a nuanced debate was hastily shut down. Caius did grapple with its decision through a symposium the following year but then failed to actually listen to those who were critical of the original decision.
One might argue that there are parallels in institutional shortcomings reflected in the recent Arday scandal. In one instance, an academic pioneer is cancelled demonstratively to avoid a public relations crisis, failing to sustain a sophisticated position that respects reason. In the other, the university administration aggressively protected a contemporary scholar of far less significance to maintain a preferred political narrative, despite numerous pieces of evidence exposing fundamental flaws.
Both instances demonstrate how a fashionable, ideological worldview voiced by a vocal minority drowns out truth, where any dissenting voice becomes a nuisance.
Mystery · 9 August 2026 at 17:08
Well worth a read indeed, but difficult to get hold of. Here it is.
https://gofile.io/d/tnWaKa
Clearly this is not a problem confined to the senior leadership of the university but goes much deeper through the colleges. The rot sits deep!
Badger · 9 August 2026 at 20:59
How very interesting. Mind you this happened during the “Pippa and Andrew” years (https://www.thehelenjoyce.com/p/an-open-letter etc etc) and at least that college moved on Pippa (“She looks forward to resuming full-time teaching and research in private international law.” https://www.cai.cam.ac.uk/news/statement-mastership). What a strange coincidence that she is no longer a fellow there but can now be found at her undergraduate college as a fellow instead (https://newn.cam.ac.uk/person/pippa-rogerson)…
Annoyed · 9 August 2026 at 23:21
Pippa chaired the committee that appointed Prentice. She made sure to get someone of similar mindset to herself. Cue the current unfolding disaster
42 · 9 August 2026 at 23:40
Honi soit qui mal y pense…
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 07:44
“Jason Arday scandal turns spotlight on publishers”
“A memoir by an academic accused of plagiarism and fabrication will still go on sale this month. The industry has a fact-checking problem, insiders say”
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/jason-arday-scandal-turns-spotlight-on-publishers
Arday University · 9 August 2026 at 09:23
The similarities in how Cambridge HR / Comms behave and how Jason Arday behaves is no coincidence. They are birds of a feather.
The Cambridge administration, right to the very top, is full of second-rate grifters like Arday. Look at their CVs and the mediocrity just oozes out. It would make a great read to go through their job applications, I bet a load of them played the DEI card too (probably made up) and whatever other strings they could pull.
Like Arday they are grifters with a severe case of responsibility-avoidance disorder. They write other people’s letters, but won’t appear in court to defend them. They get caught out by the press, but put entry hires forward (“anonymous spokesperson”). When asked to take responsibility, they tell the press they “aren’t responsible”.
Then just like Arday, when the lies finally do come out and their names are known — they play for “pity points” and say oh no, I am just a little person, I am in “distress”, I don’t deserve to be named blah blah blah.
Well fuck. If you are not responsible, name the fucking person who is. And if you are responsible, then fucking own it and stop being so pathetic.
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 11:04
News from the Founder and Director of Good Law Project on Arday:
https://www.whatthelawdoes.com/p/good-law-project-and-dr-jason-arday
The fact this person is a KC and says “Do I agree now that the plagiarism claims are well founded? In short, no” after all the available data is scary. But the good news is that he may like to represent Arday University as this institution may need help when students start to sue the University.
Report Him to SRA! · 9 August 2026 at 11:27
Jolyon (or Joylon or whatever he goes by now) offers a masterclass in deception with this post.
Let’s take it piece by piece.
1. “We also know that Dr Arday is profoundly neurodivergent”. Oh boy. Indeed, in the same way that Ted Bundy was “profoundly neurodivergent”.
2. “the racist and eugenicist Nathan Cofnas”. Is there anything to support the idea that Cofnas is a “eugenicist”? That sounds like a slam dunk Defamation case for Cofnas right there. Anyone would interpret that sentence to mean that Cofnas wants Black people killed, which he obviously does not. And to my knowledge he has never advocated for forced sterilization, state control over fertility, or euthanization based on IQ. Jolyon should retract this statement. Poor form for a post purporting to defend “the truth”.
3. “I am not aware of any neutral investigations that have concluded he was a plagiarist.” This is surely a lie. Jolyon has been at the centre of the public debate on this. He cannot have failed to have seen the Turnitin report showing a quarter of his thesis was copied, or the multiple AI analyses showing even worse results (copying of structure, argument, and even the title from others). And he surely knew of the complaints issued against Arday well before writing this piffle.
Also, for what it is worth, the 97-page report was from Grove, not Cofnas. Again, blame-shifting.
4. “The Telegraph initially asserted that Dr Arday had falsely claimed to be a professional athlete. It then quietly withdrew those assertions on learning that Dr Arday had not in fact made those claims”.
This is a completely false claim. Arday personally told the Talking Matters podcast in 2024 that he spent “a handful of years” at Crystal Palace and played semi-professional football for 12 years.
Furthermore, Jolyon seems to be confused. The documented correction referred to was made by the University of Bath, not the Telegraph. On 30 July Bath corrected a blog post that had wrongly said Arday “played football to a professional level and joined a professional snooker tour,” when he had actually said semi-professional and had not pursued snooker professionally – and Bath apologised publicly and unreservedly, which is the opposite of “quietly”.
5. “It is expedient for me to say, but it is also true for me to say, that: I only last night returned from ‘holiday’.” Sure you did, Jolyon, sure you did. You had your phone off the whole time, right?
And now, the icing on the cake?
Check the bio line: Jolyon is “author of the Sunday Times Bestseller ‘Bringing Down Goliath’ about how the law buttresses wealth and power.”
And yet, the “Good” Law Project was defending Cambridge, one of the wealthiest and most powerful organisations in the UK!
What a joke.
21percent.org · 9 August 2026 at 11:34
The most astonishing revelation is that the Good Law Project “now has about forty staff”! Are they working pro bono? Or is this paid staff?
Bonard · 9 August 2026 at 11:39
If pro bono then wouldn’t be surprised if that number was dropping quite fast right now, starting with the poor girl they put up to do that TikTok video
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 11:49
You mean this girl? I think she did not look at the data herself:
https://www.tiktok.com/@goodlawproject/video/7667880913975463190
“It is really interesting because it does not matter that academic journals, the universities, everybody that has locked into these claims has found no evidence of plagiarism whatsoever.”
⚾️ 🦇 👘 · 9 August 2026 at 12:42
Jolyon doesn’t care about being wrong. He hosted the open letter to harvest email addresses for future GLP campaigns for donations. The guy has no concern for the truth — just look at his support for the mad idea (popular in places such as the Cambridge Faculty of Education) that it is possible to be change biological sex. He is the archetype of the white middle class liberal responsible for this mess.
Level the Land · 9 August 2026 at 12:04
Hah. Jolyon is “author of the Sunday Times Bestseller ‘Bringing Down Goliath’ about how the law buttresses wealth and power.
But I just read his post, and found it an “object lesson” in how British high society protects “wealth and power”.
First, he claims that: “Personally, I felt able to rely on the statement by Cambridge University.”
So – no verification required. No due diligence. I mean, why would a KC bother with that, right?
Instead Cambridge says jump and Jolyon replies “how high?”
Next, he further explains that GLP got involved on a personal favour (“I was asked by a senior Black member of the academic community”). Let’s leave aside what this says about the pervasive elite nepotism of British high society, though, and interrogate this claim a bit further.
A statement like that is an odd one, because why not name the individual, if ahe has a specific individual in mind?
Instead, Jolyon forces us to speculate. An unfair situation to be in, but one he sadly invites.
Now, given half of the lead signatories were from Operation Black Vote (for which Arday himself worked in times gone by), surely the most likely candidate is surely Lord Woolley – also, as it happens, the lead signatory on the letter.
But a Lord of the Realm (and Master at Cambridge – yes, that is an official title!) is hardly a representative of the common people. Indeed, by definition, that is the exact opposite.
So welcome to the UK. Elite corruption and nepotism on full display.
21percent.org · 9 August 2026 at 13:12
Worth pointing out that Woolley is not really an academic (Masters of Colleges often aren’t)
100% · 9 August 2026 at 13:40
Exactly. The names change, the accents change, and in this case, even the skin colour may change. But what is behind it never changes – the old class structure of hierarchy, indolence, and unchecked privilege.
Anonymous · 10 August 2026 at 03:36
Second that
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 13:01
“In defence of sociology”
https://www.spiked-online.com/2026/08/09/in-defence-of-sociology/
“I want to reassure students currently preparing to start, or re-start, their studies in September that sociology is far from a ‘Mickey Mouse’ subject – this despite the damage done by university HR departments forcing through dense, complicated yet inane statements about equality, diversity and inclusion, and by some social scientists themselves.”
Donald Duck · 9 August 2026 at 13:32
“in light of the Jason Arday affair, I ask the public to look beyond the stupidity and Marie Antoinette-like practices of elite universities”
Damn I rather like this Lisa MacKenzie lass
Avenir · 9 August 2026 at 14:42
There are moments when everything changes, like the turning of the kaleidoscope. For Cambridge, and perhaps higher education as a whole, that moment is now.
Thinking through the consequences, a few things seem apparent.
1. First, this is going to run and run. Corruption in UK higher education has been a slow-burning issue for a year now. At this point, it is a full-on forest fire. There will be parliamentary sessions in Westminster, police investigations – you name it. This will run the full gamut – senior pay awards, failure of academic standards, DEI, and legal misconduct.
2. Cambridge will lose all, or a large majority, of its upcoming tribunal cases. Never again will judges take the “sweet and fragrant” words over the evidence of whistleblowers and victims. These will trickle in at a slow pace (going by the court calendar), but never, ever again, ever, will the university be able to dismiss claimants as entertaining “conspiracy theories” as it did to earlier victims. The Arday scandal has exposed conspiracy facts, and there’s plenty more to come. Claimants will likely be able to leverage a high price.
3. The legal quandaries of the university are just beginning. Arday himself will surely face charges of fraud and misuse of police time. Questions will be raised about whether others were complicit in these acts. If further, similar cases emerge, we could be seeing some big names in the dock. This will span out over a course of years, not months. This cannot be put back in the box.
4. Prentice will have to resign. Her position is now completely untenable. Already senior politicians are calling her out. Her silence has rendered the end inevitable. But if Cambridge is to somehow survive, however damaged, it will need to root out all of the figures involved in the mess – the Pro-VCs, HR officials, solicitors, all of them. Otherwise, the university will keep getting dragged back in to both the courts of law, and the court of public opinion. They have to go. Leave.
5. The civil war at Cambridge is about to deepen. A culture of silence has vacated the space for democratic action i.e. the formation of factions, platforms, policy agendas and change. Now it all has to happen at once, in the open, as academics finally find themselves forced to speak out and take sides. And now that everyone knows the reckoning is coming, that will simply make the battle lines clearer – as those with less to hide join the opposition, leaving the rats alone on the sinking ship.
DestroyingAngel · 9 August 2026 at 15:03
A devastating assessment
Prentice will struggle to fill her senior leadership team — who wants to join a ship that is holed below the water-line and sinking?
Even the chief bilge-pump is leaving in September
The handling of this crisis has crystallised the doubts of many about the Vice Chancellor. Prentice can stay and fight a civil war, but she doesn’t look to have the will or interest.
!!! · 9 August 2026 at 15:22
Classic civil war theory. Civil wars break out due to state failure. The leadership here is completely absent and that is why alternative power factions are mobilising. Prentice still has yet to send an all-staff email after 3 years – forget about a statement on the Arday scandal. If someone alleged she didn’t exist, who could prove otherwise?
But the worst case scenario is that Cambridge ends up like Iran, with the hardliners seizing power and doubling down again and again, until the entire endowment is burned up in legal and PR warfare, while donations wither, honest people leave, and the university is destroyed forever.
Eileen Nugent · 10 August 2026 at 08:31
This reasoning fails to take into account self governance capability at different levels of an organisation/state. Belgium had no federal government for more than a year – it had an interim government in from Dec 2018 to October 2020 – there was no civil war at that point in time. The power hardliners seize is some fraction of the full power available in an organisation/state, it’s not the same power as that available in an organisation/state when it is operating at high levels of self governance at all levels of an organisation/state.
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 15:36
“Prentice can stay and fight a civil war, but she doesn’t look to have the will or interest.”
I remind people that Professor Prentice is a Respondent in a Tribunal Case of whistleblowing retaliation, Victimization and bullying, and that the verdict should come out shortly, hopefully in a few weeks. It is not clear to me that she can stay if the tribunal decides against the University and her in particular.
That she is not a good leader it is abundantly clear by now. She could at least apologise, resign and leave with honour. As she went on holidays in the middle of a major crisis, I think she is expecting to be kicked out, which eventually must happen if she does not leave by her own. Staying has the potential of further impacting negatively her reception once back in the US, namely when it becomes clear she was aware of multiple scandals and did not address them.
Cuzak · 9 August 2026 at 16:41
Oh yeah. Forgot about that. Feels like a given that she’s going to be found either directly or indirectly culpable for whistleblower retaliation come September judgement. That’s unsurvivable for her and the entire team around her.
Anon43770 · 9 August 2026 at 15:52
Oh well, at least there may be a silver lining for Jason Arday: even if he didn’t really get a 1.4m book deal with S&S, this global scandal will probably turn out to be the best possible marketing tool to have people queuing up to buy his memoir, so he will get 1.4m from their proceeds….
21percent.org · 9 August 2026 at 16:16
Frankly, he has got a great book to write.
Who would not pay £40 for a book that provides an honest account of what has been happening? Maybe more.
The book on offer is not this book, unfortunately
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 16:24
Some news from Varsity!!!!!
https://x.com/danielaconte/status/2086399401950367783
It appears that Varsity is actively rejecting submissions! 21 Group, I already contacted them multiple times and they ignored. Perhaps you or other members can contact them as well? This is very embarrassing for their main audience but it seems they could not care less!
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 16:35
https://arthurbrooke.substack.com/p/cambridge-is-culpable-in-plagiarism
“This shows that the University cannot be trusted to ensure that its staff practice correct academic conduct. The effect of this is that, in failing to properly vet its own staff, the University has created an opportunity for the public to vet its staff instead.”
Well said, Elizabeth. The University cannot be trusted regarding reports of misconduct more generally. Many of us have been pointing that out for a long time and have been ignored at best, but some received extreme retaliations as a response.
Anon · 9 August 2026 at 16:36
Alas I feel like this is the next scandal. It appears hard to avoid the impression that Varsity has actively worked to silence debate on the issue, even though it is one that affects students and the learning experience directly. It is also a complete betrayal of the university’s history, and simply disgraceful for an . institution seeking to raise the next generation of journalists.
Facts · 9 August 2026 at 16:53
Also this
>> This raises questions about where Arday, as an academic, could have obtained the funds to hire such a notoriously expensive firm. One possible explanation is that the University itself was involved with his use of the firm.
*****To the best of my knowledge, to date, the university has not issued any statement denying the allegation that funding for his legal threats to the Times Higher Education were paid from university funds. *****
Ender · 9 August 2026 at 17:16
“But the worst case scenario is that Cambridge ends up like Iran, with the hardliners seizing power and doubling down again and again, until the entire endowment is burned up in legal and PR warfare, while donations wither, honest people leave, and the university is destroyed forever”
This is by far and away the most likely outcome.
Think about it. Prentice leaves: but the entire power structure around her know they are facing court battles, police investigations and public name and shame.
Are they going to go silently? Why would they?
Their obvious course of action is to stay within the system and ensure they can continue to drain the endowment and the university’s entire administrative apparatus to protect themselves. They will not set things to right but rather, continue cracking down on whistleblowers and internal dissent. They are the ones in the position to hire the next VC, and any new Pro-VCs. They will hire new and more aggressive PR managers, hire more solicitors, engage in more monitoring of academics and students who might cause any sign of trouble.
This will continue for years and the university will end up a rogue and failed state.
- · 9 August 2026 at 17:36
You are obviously not from Cambridge. That is what has been happening already for the past decade and especially last few years
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 17:43
Have faith, Ender. There are a few scandals in line to be made public. If the senior leadership does not learn from Arday’s case and does leave, the situation will become even worse for them because they are directly involved in some of these scandals, and they know that. Remember,
“Mr. Cofnas arrived on the scene because of Cambridge’s complacency — he wrote the post after an anonymous Cambridge tipster reached out to him — which soon hardened into stridency.”
Xerxes · 9 August 2026 at 18:29
Many more scandals to come, the press know about many of them already.
Looks like James Orr is next in the queue.
https://subscribe.bylinetimes.com/editions/88/
AntiQ · 9 August 2026 at 18:49
Fun fact: In Jenrick’s first major speech as Reform UK’s Treasury spokesman, delivered in the City of London on 18th February 2026, he stated:
“Reform will liberate planning across city centres and industrial zones. It will make an immediate national priority of densifying inner east London and the building out of Cambridge.”
An odd statement for a UK political party, no?
Do we know anyone else whose career objective is “building out Cambridge”?
? · 9 August 2026 at 18:57
Wow. Good spot. If that is linked to the Cambridge Reform UK outreach effort reported around the same time, then Prentice is toast.
TaPit · 9 August 2026 at 19:04
She’s already toast. This will simply make her charcoal.
DestroyingAngel · 9 August 2026 at 18:37
“Pathetic. This “junior member of staff” is a 2011 PhD, has been at Cambridge for almost 15 years, and is the lead author of a League of European Research Universities’ advice paper on “Communicating with Integrity.”
https://x.com/byrne_a/status/2086139409880003022?s=43&t=XScyfJpXaK_V6FgMv5Z6Ew
Paper here from Mr Communicating with Integrity
https://www.leru.org/news/research-integrity-doesnt-end-with-publication
Abe · 9 August 2026 at 18:45
OMFG, Rhys Morgan actually says “Integrity specialists like myself ….
Irony just packed its bags and left the chat.
Anonymous · 10 August 2026 at 02:39
Yeah, it’s pathetic. “Pathetic. This “junior member of staff” is a 2011 PhD, has been at Cambridge for almost 15 years, and is the lead author of a League of European Research Universities’ advice paper on “Communicating with Integrity.”
21percent.org · 9 August 2026 at 19:09
Not quite as funny as the one posted here, but the first Downfall parody appears on Twitter/X
https://x.com/yeatskeats/status/2086381707159040424
“Anglia Ruskin are hiring … Update your LinkedIn profiles”
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 19:24
Was that made by students? Very good!
Class Survey · 10 August 2026 at 12:26
Lesson to university:
1. Don’t hire mediocre professors
2. Don’t bully popular professors
The End
TheResearcher · 10 August 2026 at 12:43
There is another important lesson:
3 – Do not bully and harass students and staff because one of them may become an “anonymous Cambridge tipster” and expose the real Cambridge.
Zhukov · 10 August 2026 at 12:58
or have spent two years rallying partisans who committed they would push on independently until total surrender on victory day
? · 9 August 2026 at 19:34
This one?
https://21percent.org/?p=4109
Well it is not so hard just a question of changing subtitles. But something tells me a lot more memes are on the way
Tom · 9 August 2026 at 19:39
More memes on the way
First Cambridge VC to be the butt of universal ridicule
- · 9 August 2026 at 21:51
Amazing video! Really great work too with the lip sync and semantic matching (e.g. VC saying I will chair it when AH thumbs his own chest)
21percent.org · 9 August 2026 at 19:43
It has lots of niche references, it’s great if you pick them all up
BunkerFly · 10 August 2026 at 11:47
There are lots of niche references in here which suggest a deep inside knowledge of events, e.g.
“Everyone leave the room except the College Master, Head of Department, HR and our Equality Champion”
List right there of the four individuals who, most likely, will end up in front of the firing squad. Certainly, those most directly implicated in how this mess blew up.
Then:
“Even the postcolonial studies people are claiming his work is bullshit”
Quite. That’s indeed the letter going around.
Finally:
“You don’t even believe that exam grades signal intelligence or potential in your own students! In the Department of Education for fuck’s sake!”
Sounds like somehow has been following Cremin’s work very closely!
Also – the point about all this being done in a cynical attempt to secure the Athena Swan Gold is absolutely on point.
Anonymous · 10 August 2026 at 02:52
It’s extremely funny and hope it goes viral.
https://x.com/yeatskeats/status/2086381707159040424
? · 10 August 2026 at 10:08
125,000 views on X and rising fast – I’d say it is a hit!
"Update your LinkedIn" · 10 August 2026 at 12:10
closer to 150,000 now, think we are almost on top of them
- · 10 August 2026 at 13:42
Broken, next target 200,000
DEI in Cambridge · 9 August 2026 at 21:33
DEI in Cambridge is destroying excellence! Look at the Cambridge Cancer Centre…
TheResearcher · 9 August 2026 at 21:52
Varsity is in the news…
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/education/article/cambridge-student-newspaper-jason-arday-row-qg39dnl3t
DEI Non hire · 9 August 2026 at 22:57
I am astonished at suggestion that Prentice will have to resign. How naive can one be?
This whole DEI is an elite project. The elite will maintain, susrain , protect adn nourish her. She owes them and they owe her.
She is only silent because she is on holiday. From her position on the beach, she has not even realised what happened.
TheResearcher · 10 August 2026 at 07:01
“I am astonished at suggestion that Prentice will have to resign. How naive can one be?”
As noted above, Prentice is a Respondent in this ET and is also involved in other cases.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2026/jun/15/university-of-cambridge-accused-of-tolerating-misogyny-and-bullying-in-tribunal
While she may be on holiday now, she is fully aware of the impact this story is having, including in the US and at Princeton where she was a Provost. She is silent because she is not a good leader, and if she does not step down, together with the ProVCs, the situation will get worse.
Post Office 2.0 · 10 August 2026 at 12:37
Right. Press still hasn’t reported on her dismal attempt at providing testimony at Bury St Edmunds (or that of Munir and Rampton) but half the press pack were there. Almost certainly waiting on final judgement in September before going all in.
Then there is the fact that in most of the other cases awaiting court, Prentice had been contacted at some point and either failed to respond, or worse, responded to dismiss the complaints, as apparently happened in that case. So she’s never getting a break. Nor are HR, Munir, Research Office or Legal. This is the new normal for them. If not the beginning of something far worse.
IDE · 10 August 2026 at 04:59
How has head of HR not been fired yet? Hiring integirty is ultimately their core responsibility.
notthegrauniad · 10 August 2026 at 13:06
integirty? Don’t rely on Arday to spell-check your posts! Can recommend that nice paperclip fellow in Word 2007, HR use him all the time
21percent.org · 10 August 2026 at 13:11
Point is correct
HR should have taken up references, checked qualifications, ensured that the shortlisting & appointments procedure was fair & robust