Professor at Kumoh National Institute of Technology Includes Spouse as Co-Author on Paper

Ministry of Education Comprehensive Audit Results: 147 Personnel Disciplinary Actions Including 11 Minor Penalties
Improper Submission of Academic Research Funds Papers, Unjustified Co-author Listing Detected
Recovered 94 Million KRW for Excess Lecturer Fees and Improper Research Fund Receipts

[Asia Economy Reporter Han Jinju] It has been revealed that a professor at Kumoh National Institute of Technology included the name of their spouse as a co-author on a paper funded by internal research funds and published it in an academic journal. Another professor was also caught in an audit for summarizing a student's master's thesis without proper citation and publishing it in an external academic journal.

On the 1st, the Ministry of Education announced that as a result of a comprehensive audit of Kumoh National Institute of Technology, 11 individuals were lightly disciplined for improperly listing co-authors on research outputs and submitting internal academic research fund results improperly, and 147 people received personnel-related measures. In addition, there were 53 items pointed out regarding administrative and financial actions.

Two professors received light disciplinary action for listing their spouses, who were not participating researchers, as co-authors on four papers written with internal research funds, thereby sharing the achievement evaluation results. Two other professors, who received 14 million KRW in internal research funds, were lightly disciplined and returned the funds after summarizing their students' master's theses without citation and publishing them in external academic journals as research outputs.

Another eight faculty members were lightly disciplined for submitting papers that had already been accepted or confirmed for publication in academic journals before the start of the research projects as results of internal academic research funds. It was found that the university negligently managed the situation by not taking measures to recover research funds at the time of paper submission.

Ten faculty members took about 2.14 million KRW in excess lecturer fees without making up for 75 hours of missed classes in 21 subjects due to overseas trips unrelated to work. One of them received a light disciplinary action and the excess lecturer fees were recovered.

One professor received a warning for submitting a relative disclosure form after the admission process had ended when a cousin applied to the professor’s department during the 2019 academic year early admission. It was also revealed that four students who did not meet the language score requirements were selected as successful candidates in the overseas exchange student selection process, resulting in three warnings.

Two professors corrected the grades of two students, exceeding the A-grade ratio limit (30%) for the respective subjects, but the school approved the grade distribution without reviewing its appropriateness, resulting in warnings and cautions.

Five construction design projects were executed exceeding 61.66 million KRW without prior consultation with the Minister of Education, resulting in warnings. Kumoh National Institute of Technology received institutional caution for installing container buildings to store materials without consulting local government heads.

Additionally, the institution received a caution for entering into 224 private contracts worth 500 million KRW with a single company without signing unit price contracts for printed materials. Eighteen staff members who performed related duties were improperly paid test committee allowances, and caution was issued for failing to record affiliation and filming when spending business promotion expenses exceeding 500,000 KRW.