Britain’s largest teaching union has become the latest institution to distance itself from an open letter supporting Jason Arday.
Daniel Kebede, General Secretary of the National Education Union (NEU), had originally signed the letter two weeks ago on the Good Law Project website.
It claimed there was a ‘smear campaign’ against the former Cambridge University academic and that allegations against him of plagiarism were ‘entirely false’.
However, the NEU has now clarified that he had signed it based on ‘the information provided to him at the time’ and now believed a new letter should be issued ‘appealing for a fair and transparent investigation’, given the events since.
The union said Mr Kebede believed Mr Arday should have a ‘right to due process’.
It came as one of Mr Arday’s former students claimed in an article for Unherd that he arrived late at lectures, delivered poor teaching and accused her of having ‘white privilege’ when she complained about her grade.
Cambridge launched an investigation last week after fellow academics accused Mr Arday of copying others’ work and inventing some previous academic posts.
He resigned from his post, saying the ‘personal cost’ of the furore had been ‘too great’, and cancelled a series of events to promote his upcoming memoir, Great and Unfortunate Things.
Britain’s largest teaching union has become the latest institution to distance itself from an open letter supporting Jason Arday (pictured)
Daniel Kebede (pictured), General Secretary of the National Education Union (NEU), had originally signed the letter two weeks ago on the Good Law Project website.
Three academics have already had their names removed from the open letter – Sonita Alleyne, the first woman to lead Jesus College, where Mr Arday worked, Sir Simon Philip Baron-Cohen, a professor of developmental psychopathology at Cambridge, and Ricardo Sabates Aysa, a professor of education and international development.
Mr Kebede, who experienced racism as a child and has championed anti-racist activism within his union, is still featured on the list of signatories.
However, an NEU spokesman said: ‘As a trade unionist, Daniel Kebede fundamentally believes that where questions are raised about an individual’s professional conduct, that person has a right to due process.
‘Daniel Kebede signed the statement on the information provided to him at the time.
‘In light of the new information that has since emerged, he would have hoped that the authors of the statement would have presented a different statement. One appealing for a fair and transparent investigation.’
Meanwhile, one of Mr Arday’s former students at Roehampton University wrote an anonymous piece for the Unherd website saying he had ‘failed’ her when she was taught by him in 2018.
The woman, whose identity has been verified by Unherd, said Mr Arday ‘often arrived late and left early’ and once only taught one of the four hours he had been scheduled for.
She said he would ‘ramble’ about rapper Eminem during his ‘terrible’ teaching and gave ‘generalised views on racism without ever referring to any academic theories’.
However, the NEU has now clarified that he had signed it based on ‘the information provided to him at the time’ and now believed a new letter should be issued ‘appealing for a fair and transparent investigation’, given the events since (pictured: Mr Kebede on an anti-racism rally earlier this year)
The letter (pictured) claims there was a ‘smear campaign’ against the former Cambridge University academic and that allegations against him of plagiarism were ‘entirely false’
‘It gradually dawned on us that we were learning nothing of substance, and that much of his talk was nonsense,’ she wrote.
And she said that when she complained about a low mark in an essay, Mr Arday became ‘angry, but also scared’.
She wrote: ‘Arday implied that I was racist, and said that the only reason I wasn’t happy with 70 per cent was due to my “white privilege”.
‘He was clearly upset at being questioned.’
In another development yesterday, internet sleuths accused Mr Arday of copying the title of his book from the 2010 Spartacus TV series, aired on Sky1, which had an episode called Great and Unfortunate Things.
Professor Arday has been contacted for comment.
The Good Law Project declined to comment. However, its founder has previously said they merely ‘carried’ the letter and did not write it.
A Roehampton spokesman said: ‘Professor Jason Arday was employed by the University of Roehampton as a senior lecturer in the School of Education from September 2017 until February 2019.
‘The university has reviewed its student casework records and identified no complaints relating to Professor Arday during his period of employment.’
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