Quantifying Post Grad/Post Doc Modern Slavery, trafficking, other forms of Academic/Science Corruption and Whistleblowing within Academic Science Industries.
Birmingham, England
Joined December 2022
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This would never happen at a British Russel Group University. So there is no need for a complaints procedure or Whistleblowing type protections for the victims. Postgrad Whistleblowers should just go on Hunger Strike!
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
lol, why bother? Management doesn't care about plagiarism and they sure as hell don't care if all work is done by AI.
Several more UK universities are considering whether to continue paying for Turnitin after another institution announced it will not be renewing its deal with the edtech giant #highered #Turnitin
timeshighereducation.com/new…
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
In 2021, the Uni of Nottingham spent £37.5 million buying a new campus, in central Nottingham.
They then spent £40 million developing it.
It is expected to be sold for £14 million.
Shearer West, former Vice Chancellor moved on to Leeds in 2024. She was paid £300k+.
Nottingham was 6th for modern languages in the 2021 REF and is the only university in East Midlands providing language courses. The closure of an objectively brilliant department by a Russell Group university raises questions about the 2015 decision to uncap student numbers and leave UK HE provision entirely to market forces timeshighereducation.com/new…
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
The Yannick Griep case "reveals why cheating in science is so persistent, and what can be done about it."
retractionwatch.com/2026/07/…
myprivacy.dpgmedia.nl/consen…
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
🎮⚔️Professor Erin Sullivan (Shakespeare Institute, @unibirmingham) and @DrSarahOlive (@AstonUniversity) have secured £590,000 from @ahrcpress to build "The Shakespeare Arcade", a free platform of Shakespeare-inspired games and classroom resources: aston.ac.uk/latest-news/asto…
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
What has happened to Nottingham University is a huge scandal
Those responsible have moved onwards & upwards
There's no accountability for senior management in UK Higher Education
Mistakes are rewarded, cost is borne by the victims through job losses
21percent.org/?p=3647
Whistle blowers should be protected:
🧵1/2 Something very worrying has been happening since controversy erupted over the open letter signed by more than 950 academics raising academic-freedom concerns about disciplinary proceedings against Dr Nathan Cofnas at Ghent University.
Cofnas, a philosopher who describes himself as a “race realist”, was among those who publicly scrutinised the academic work of Cambridge University’s youngest ever black professor, Dr Jason Arday. The letter argues that academics must remain free to raise evidence of alleged research misconduct without being punished for doing so.
CAF has since been contacted by a growing number of signatories worried about professional repercussions and ostracism within their departments for having put their names to it.
They have shown us ideologically charged abuse from colleagues and peers, outlandish accusations of being funded by billionaire right-wing political figures in the US, and complaints denouncing them as racists or supporters of race eugenics. Some complaints have been sent to senior university administrators and institutional bodies with which the academics are affiliated, in some cases explicitly calling for disciplinary action.
In one case seen by CAF, a senior academic manager wrote directly to a signatory to tell them they were wrong to sign, before reminding them that, under university policy, academic freedom and freedom of speech are qualified rights.
CAF is taking up some of these cases directly with the universities concerned, reminding them of their legal duties to secure freedom of speech within the law and protect academic freedom.
The wider chilling effect should not be underestimated. Academics who experience this themselves, or simply hear about it through departmental gossip, will inevitably think twice before adding their voice to the next important but contentious public debate.
If you signed the letter and are now facing pressure from colleagues or your institution, please get in touch. CAF can advise, intervene with universities, and arrange specialist legal assistance where necessary.
Email [email protected].
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
Jason Arday reviewed and approved this student's PhD thesis, which portrays black women taking trips to London and attending potlucks as forms of "marronage"—the historical practice of Africans fleeing enslavement.
The 70K-word thesis is based on conversations with just 3 black women, which were converted into poems and then, after being infused with the author's own subjective experiences, analyzed via "Critical Poetic Inquiry."
The thesis can only be described as a tribute to black women such as herself, channeled through an amalgam of slam poetry and activism.
She describes her research project in bizarre terms such as: "a lament, a war cry, a chant and a belly laugh" and "a joyful, painful rupture, a disruption, a deliberate transgression, a riff, and a drum beat… a prayer for all we have lost and for all that we can be."
She is also openly hostile to academic rigor, quoting other scholars when admitting that her project "does not align with notions of 'neutral' research or 'objective' researchers."
Academic standards, such as "marking criteria, rubrics and journal requirements that favour written knowledge over that which is communicated creatively (i.e. through painting or performance)" and also "notions that knowledge must be scientifically tested and proven to meet coloniality's contorted standards of fact" are deemed by her to be forms of colonial oppression.
This raises the question: Why is Cambridge awarding its highest academic credential to a project whose author openly presents accepted academic standards as oppressive constraints to be undermined and resisted?
It's clear the problem of academic standards at Cambridge wasn't isolated to the case of Jason Arday, but appears to be a form of systemic rot.
Because the thesis was suddenly embargoed for the next 5 years immediately when the Arday scandal broke, we are legally unable to share it in its entirety. So we have performed a very long and thorough exegesis of it, which you can read at the link below.
🔗benryan.substack.com/p/cambr…
Cambridge Said Jason Arday Was an ‘Aberration.’ So Why Was the Shaky PhD Thesis He Approved Sealed Until 2031?
Substack link: benryan.substack.com/p/cambr…
@SwipeWright and I obtained a Cambridge PhD thesis—one of questionable academic rigor—that Dr. Arday examined and that was put under a new, five-year embargo just after the scandal about Dr. Arday broke.
The PhD thesis of a student in Cambridge’s Faculty of Education—in which the late Jason Arday held a professorial chair, in the sociology of education, until he resigned hours after Cambridge on Aug. 5 announced it was investigating him—has been put under what British and Canadian academics have told Colin Wright and me is a remarkably long embargo, shielding it from public view until 2031.
Crucially, among the panelists who reviewed the thesis was Dr. Arday himself.
The thesis, which we have obtained and which we review in this Substack, raises important questions about whether the Faculty of Education, including Dr. Arday’s own contributions, let down the basic standards of higher education.
The lengthy embargo raises further questions about what Cambridge, which is among the most elite universities in the world, and the paper’s author might have to hide where her scholarship is concerned.
Written by Damilola Folayan, the thesis is entitled Of, but not in: A poetic exploration of how Black women students respond to the coloniality of Oxbridge—referring to the portmanteau of Oxford and Cambridge. It garnered her a coveted Cambridge PhD in 2025. Following what’s known as an autoethnographic style, it is in essence an epic poetry-slam interpretation of the plight of Dr. Folayan and three other black women at Oxbridge and their experiences navigating, with considerable ambivalence, these historically, and still overwhelmingly, white elite institutions.
The sprawling thesis unabashedly thumbs its nose at the rigors and demands of academia even as it demands in return an elite PhD and all the rights and privileges pertaining thereto.
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
Rest in peace, Jason Arday
You were placed in situations where others appeared to take advantage of you, using your vulnerabilities & circumstances to serve their own interests
And yet, when you needed help most, it was nowhere to be found
21percent.org/?p=4210
Can Students Sue Cambridge?
What for?:
youtu.be/s6qREgFluLs?is=GYsd…
Whistle-blowing in University and The NHS:
youtu.be/ENWPOuSl7jg?is=l_n6…
Judgment of the Employment Tribunal in the Cambridge #Whistleblowing case is grave indictment of University’s Human Resources division & top leadership
It's thorough, detailed, forensic -- British Justice at its finest
(Link in first reply)
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
Doesn’t get any more exciting than this 🦅
You can now watch the nesting peregrine falcons at the top of my tower 👀
youtube.com/live/4dsZIFfysuU…
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
Employers are directly liable for whistleblower victimisation through institutional culture, even when no individual decision-maker personally knew about the original disclosure
#whistleblowing case, 1-28 Jun 2026, Bury St Edmunds Tribunal
TWELVE YEARS, TWO TRIBUNALS, ONE PIECE OF CCTV FOOTAGE THAT EXPOSED THE WHOLE THING
Mr Moussa was a gate line operative at First Greater Western (@GWRHelp). In 2012, he filed a written complaint about a local union leader's conduct at Ealing Broadway station. The company fired him. He won at tribunal. Was reinstated. Moved to Paddington. Case closed.
Not even close.
In February 2018, a passenger incident led Mr Moussa and his colleague to call the police. The company reviewed CCTV footage, decided the alleged assault hadn't happened the way it was reported, and suspended both men.
An inexperienced investigator named Mr White was handed the case, guided throughout by an HR team that had quietly decided Mr Moussa was a problem long before any of this happened.
The charges that followed included one accusing Mr Moussa of giving a false statement to GWR, claiming a customer had pushed his colleague when the CCTV supposedly didn't support it.
Here is the punchline. When a different manager finally reviewed the same CCTV at the disciplinary hearing, he threw out the false statement charge entirely. He also threw out the allegation of laying hands on a customer unnecessarily. The footage didn't support either charge.
Mr Moussa still received a written warning. For "over-zealously putting himself at risk."
The tribunal didn't buy it. It found the investigation was poorly conducted, unfair, and unreliable. It also found something bigger: that a "collective memory" of institutional prejudice against Mr Moussa had permeated FGW's HR department, quietly poisoning every decision made about him, by people who didn't even know why they disliked him.
Management had internally tagged him as an agitator and a malign influence. That reputation had followed him across stations, across years, across personnel who'd never met him.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal upheld all of this in 2024. Moussa v First Greater Western [2024] EAT 82. Landmark ruling: employers are directly liable for whistleblower victimisation through institutional culture, even when no individual decision-maker personally knew about the original disclosure.
He raised a concern in 2012. The CCTV cleared him in 2019. He was still fighting in 2024.
Sources: Protect / @WhistleUK, Trowers & Hamlins, Lexology, Birketts, Employment Cases Update, GOV EAT judgment
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
Creative use of the black highlighter pen!
Here's a minimalist extraction. The artist has boldly stripped away everything
Courtesy of a Russell Group university ahead of a forthcoming employment tribunal
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
"Rising Retraction Rates: A Symptom of a Strained System."
the-scientist.com/rising-ret…
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
On June 15th, 2026, the Academic Parity Movement (APM) is bringing the global fight against #harassment to Bern, #Switzerland for: #STEM the #Bullying: The #European #Dialogue.
We’re moving beyond just "talking" about the problem. We’re gathering the people who actually have the power to change the system:
🔬 Researchers sharing lived experiences.
🏛️ University Administrators implementing new policies.
💰 Funding Agencies rethinking accountability.
⚖️ Policy Advocates driving systemic reform.
Harassment isn't just a personal issue—it’s a barrier to scientific innovation. It’s time to reshape the culture so talent can thrive unimpeded.
📅 When: June 15, 2026
📍 Where: Bern, Switzerland
🎟️ Register here: lnkd.in/d2UjB57p
@DrNancyOlivieri, @alison_vogelaar, @JanetGHering, @NicoleLBoivin
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
The collapse of UK universities isn’t inevitable -- it’s a political choice
Other countries manage; here, government is actively burning higher education to the ground
We’re reaching the end of accessible, nationwide research & teaching — and those in power barely care
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
UK government’s decision to remove statutory cap on unfair dismissal compensation is game-changer for UK Universities
It alters the incentive structures that have encouraged poor institutional behaviour & changes scale of financial consequences
21percent.org/?p=3229
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
Spanish court rules researcher plagiarized colleague, orders withdrawal of works.
retractionwatch.com/2026/02/…
PostGrad Modern Slavery retweeted
Six years ago today--two days after funding-agency heads Fauci, Collins, and Farrar commission scientists to write a paper falsely claiming no lab-origin scenario is plausible--one of the scientists, Robert Garry, *again* privately tells the others lab origin is plausible.
