Author丨Li You
Edit丨Conan
After kneeling to his tutor, Yang Tao's application for resumption of school also failed. The school not only removed him from school, but also canceled his doctoral degree that he had been struggling for nearly 5 years. This master's and doctoral student from Nankai University suddenly became a bachelor's degree.
His previous education and family background are enviable. After graduating from Beijing University of Science and Technology, Yang Tao was admitted to Nankai University. His father was a senior economist and his mother was a senior engineer. Even his grandfather and grandmother attended key universities.
But this boy born in 1990 has poor social skills. His mother said that he has low emotional intelligence and cannot handle various relationships. Fortunately, Yang Tao's academic performance is good.
However, Yang Tao's fate changed a few months before he graduated from his doctorate. On the eve of his PhD graduation, Yang Tao went to a university in Singapore for a scientific research internship. Nankai University therefore asked him to take a leave of absence for half a year. When he returned to school half a year later to apply for resumption of school, the relevant person in charge delayed signing, and the thesis defense was also shelved.
After several negotiations failed, the school decided to "automatically drop out of school".
Nankai University’s decision to drop out of school for Yang Tao. Photo provided by the interviewee
After learning that his doctoral degree was also cancelled, Yang Tao sued Nankai University, hoping to get his academic status back through judicial channels, but he lost the first and second instances. The court did not hear the case itself, but said that he had exceeded the statute of limitations and rejected the case with this.
In May this year, Yang Tao applied for a retrial to Tianjin Higher People's Court (hereinafter referred to as Tianjin Higher People's Court). After the court accepted the case, it has not yet been officially filed. On July 23, the judge told Yang Tao's mother Xu Ling: "We are still studying." Xu Ling said that court officials privately believed that Nankai University "has indeed had problems" in handling Yang Tao's withdrawal.
After two doctoral students fought each other, one of them was arranged to do experiments in another school
Jilin Changchun Yang Tao is the only son of the family. Because he suffered from myositis twice when he was young, his parents only hoped that he could grow up safely and his academic requirements were not high. But Yang Tao is very good at studying, especially science. He has won many awards in the national mathematics competition
. "He uses learning to hide his inferiority." Xu Ling said that his son is only 1.65 meters tall, he is introverted, and he has never even had a girlfriend. She and her husband have always hoped that their son could do academic research in the future and stay away from those workplace disputes.
Yang Tao High School was spent at Changchun No. 11 Middle School, the top 100 middle schools in the country. In 2009, he scored 599 points, surpassing the first batch of undergraduate admission score of Jilin Province, and was admitted to the applied physics major of Beijing University of Science and Technology.
Before the university, Yang Tao's award certificates were some. Photo provided by the interviewee
After graduating from undergraduate degree in 2013, Yang Tao was admitted to the master's degree in " condensed matter physics " from , TEDA College of Nankai University. His tutor was a professor named Cao. This major has a narrow employment range. Generally speaking, in addition to teaching, you are going to a scientific research unit.
When Yang Tao first started his master's degree, he planned to go abroad to study for a doctorate after graduation, so he studied very hard.
"After a semester, Professor Cao proposed to ask me to go to Nankai University for a master's and doctoral degree, and he is still my supervisor." Yang Tao said. But his relationship with his mentor also deteriorated, and it also started with a doctorate.
On May 28, 2015, Yang Tao was admitted to the TEDA School of Applied Physics, Nankai University as a doctoral degree graduate student with " Materials Physics and Chemistry ". If all aspects meet the standards, he is expected to apply for graduation in June 2018, when he was only 28 years old, and he may have more opportunities in life.
However, because she was a master's and doctoral degree, Yang Tao could only obtain a doctoral degree certificate after graduating from her doctoral degree, and during this period, she could not obtain a master's degree in .
In his first year of PhD, Yang Tao was still smooth. He spent most of his time doing experiments in the "Photoctalysis Experimental Group". The tutor also believed in him more and not only gave him the work email password, but also asked him to manage the laboratory keys.
Yang Tao has a postponed doctoral senior brother named Lan Xiaolong from the same school. Many things that happened since then revolved around them.
According to Yang Tao, Lan Xiaolong went to the tutor for help because he could not calculate some data in the paper. The tutor originally arranged this task to Yu Moumou in the same group, but Yu pushed it to Yang.
He said that he could not match Lan Xiaolong's experiment and data no matter what. "He asked me to collect the data, but after I refused, we began to make enemies." Yang Tao said.
But this matter is a different saying in Lan Xiaolong. According to Lan, each person in the experimental group has different divisions of labor. Yang Tao is responsible for calculating data for everyone and others help him with other things. "The tutor has the final say on what information to use in the end."
In September 2016, the two had conflicts over trivial matters and even fought against each other. Yang Tao said that Lan hit him on the head with a rolling pin. Lan Xiaolong said: "It was him who attacked me and I snatched me up. It was completely self-defense. He also used an iron chair behind him."
In short, the two of them had their own opinions about this fight. But there was no video evidence left in the fight, and the police did not intervene, so it is difficult to determine who is lying at the moment.
The matter has developed to this point, and Yang and Lan’s problems only remain at the level of conflict between classmates, but after this incident, it left Yang Tao with deep resentment.
By the Spring Festival in 2017, Yang Tao did not go home for the New Year. Just after the fifteenth day of the first lunar month (February 11th of the Gregorian calendar), he suddenly returned to Changchun from Tianjin and told his parents that his supervisor asked him to go to Jilin University for joint training and would go back during his doctoral defense.
Jilin University. Photo provided by the interviewee
Thinking that my son will graduate in more than a year, and he is doing experiments at home, so his parents don’t take it seriously.
However, Xu Ling still asked her son: "Does Nankai University agree?" Yang Tao told her mother: "The tutor said that the procedures were completed. If the school disagrees, how could I come out?"
As for why the tutor asked Yang Tao to jointly train, Professor Cao did not respond to the interview. Lan Xiaolong said: "He performed poorly in school and was afraid of doing extraordinary things, so he got him to Jilin University."
However, Yang Tao, who "performed poorly", was an outstanding graduate student in the school from 2016 to 2017, and received a bonus of 15,000 yuan.
Just after the Lantern Festival, Yang Tao went to a key laboratory of Jilin University to do experiments. During the joint training of
, Yang Tao also published an academic paper in "2017, the 19th National Light Scattering Academic Conference on Abstracts" as the first author. Other authors of the paper include his supervisor Professor Cao at Nankai University and his joint training tutor at Jilin University.
The author of the paper is "State Key Laboratory of Supramolecular Structure and Materials, Jilin University, School of Physics, Nankai University, ".
It is worth noting that during the joint training of Yang Tao at Nankai University, the school did not allow him to take a leave of absence. But what happened later ruined his path as a doctor.
found that the tutor was "academic fraud". During the internship, he was asked to take a leave of absence for half a year
In late July 2017, Yang Tao accidentally found a rejection email from the magazine "Imaging Science and Photochemistry". The magazine was headed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and belongs to the "core journal of chemistry".
Rejection information of "Imaging Science and Photochemistry". The manuscript returned by the interviewee is titled "Research on the Nonlinear Light and Properties of Gold Nanorods with Different Aspects and Width Ratios". There are 6 authors in the paper, the first author is Lan Xiaolong and the last one is Professor Cao.
Judging from the information of the rejection, the magazine received the manuscript on June 13, 2017. During the preliminary review of the editorial department on June 23, it was found that the paper "has clear ideas, but lacks important references, and the logic of the key part of the discussion is lacking. I hope the author can modify it well." If
is just these problems, it is not a principled error. However, after reviewing the paper, the external review experts proposed that all the experimental results in the manuscript have been published in a paper entitled "Controllable Preparation of Gold Nanocolumns and Its Optical Nonlinear Properties".
"Controllable Preparation of Gold Nanocolumns and Its Optical Nonlinear Properties" is named Dong Jiangzhou. Dong was also in the School of Physics, Nankai University when he published the paper that year. Among the six authors of "Research on Nonlinear Light and Properties of Gold Nanorods with Different Aspects Ratios", which were rejected, the third author is also Dong Jiangzhou.
"Imaging Science and Photochemistry" external audit experts said that all the experimental results of that paper later have been published in the literature of the aforementioned paper: "The manuscript used 3 samples, and all data and charts are basically the same."
external audit experts pointed out that "Research on the nonlinear light and properties of gold nanorods with different aspect ratios" is the English version of the document "Controllable Properties of Gold Nanocolumns and Its Optical Nonlinear Properties".
After the editorial board of "Imaging Science and Photochemistry" reviewed, it recommended that the magazine return the manuscript. Yang Tao happened to know the information about the rejection. Yang and Lan had conflicts. After seeing this information, he immediately posted it online.
Nankai University. Image source: Internet
Yang Tao said that he only wanted the students to know that Lan Xiaolong was "academic fraud", but ignored that the name of the tutor was also in the paper. He didn't know what trouble this action would cause him.
Regarding the saying "academic fraud", Lan's explanation was that Yang Tao was spreading rumors: "It was caused by our failure to carefully review when writing. We have already taken the initiative to report to the college, and the school also has investigation results, and it has not been published." For this reason, Lan Xiaolong and Professor Cao both reflected on themselves.
After Yang Tao posted the matter online, it did not cause any trouble.
September 2017 is Yang Tao’s seventh month at Jilin University. At that time, his joint training tutor at Jilin University recommended him to go to a Singapore university for a scientific research internship. "I had nothing to do at that time, so I was waiting to go back to defend, and I had published two SCI papers required for graduation defense."
So, Yang Tao wanted to stay abroad for a few months to open his eyes.
He told Professor Cao about his going abroad, "The tutor was very angry and asked me to go through the leave procedure." Yang Tao was very puzzled: "I don't know why, I don't have to leave school when I was training at Jilin University, why do I have to go to Singapore?"
The "Nankai University Graduate Student Rules" stipulates 6 situations before I can take a leave of school: (1) Due to illness, it is diagnosed by the school hospital or designated hospital, and the courses need to be suspended for treatment and rest for more than 45 days in the same semester; (2) Those who take leave in the same semester for more than 45 days; (3) Those who are recruited to participate in the People's Liberation Army of China (including the People's Armed Police Force of China); (4) Those who study at their own expense; (5) Those who are approved by the school to start a business; (6) Those who cannot insist on normal study due to other reasons, and the tutor and the institution (department, institute) think that they must take a leave of school.
Yang Tao believes that his situation is not in the regulations on taking a break from school. So, he went straight to Singapore.
At that time, Yang Tao's father Yang Guang didn't want his son to take a leave of absence, because the monthly doctoral allowance of 2,000 yuan was not only stopped, but also had to postpone graduation. Therefore, he only took the leave note and went to Tianjin. At school, after several consultations, it was recommended that a leader still take a leave of absence.
Yang Guang had to receive a blank "Nankai University Graduate Leave Leave Approval Form", but Yang Tao had already gone to Singapore at that time and he was unable to sign.
So, Yang Guang returned to Changchun with the table. He found a signature of his son from other materials, then cut the name part with scissors and pasted it on the application form, and finally copied the application form with the name "Yang Tao" signed several times until there was no trace of the clipping.
On October 16, 2017, Yang Guang sent the scanned copy of the application form through the email. The time he applied for a leave of absence from October 2, 2017 to February 25, 2018, with a total duration of more than 4 months. The reason is to go to "relevant universities in Singapore for scientific research internships."
Application submitted by Yang Tao’s father and the school’s approval for the suspension of school.Photo provided by the interviewee
On October 23, 2017, Professor Cao signed his name in the tutor column: "In principle, agree that the student will leave school. Given that the student does not contact the tutor at present, the tutor has unknown information about his going abroad, and there is currently a lack of supporting materials for him to go abroad. Please contact the college to confirm the specific situation. Please ask the leader to decide whether to make up for relevant materials."
Yang Tao's exit record shows that he did go to Singapore during that period.
On October 31, Vice President Kong signed the word "Agree" on the application form; on November 6, Nankai University Graduate School , a supervisor named Xiong also signed: "Agree to take a break for half a year." Therefore, Yang Tao's official school leave is from October 2, 2017 to April 2, 2018, with a total duration of 6 months.
However, in this application form, the "school hospital supervisor" is blank, that is, Yang Tao's approval of school leave has not completed all procedures.
applied to resume school but was dropped out of school. The signature problem has been stuck
After learning that his father applied for school for him, Yang Tao was very upset, but he had to accept it.
In March 2018, Yang Tao returned to China from Singapore. He wanted to apply for resumption of classes after the school was closed on April 2. Because according to Article 28 of the "Nankai University Graduate Student Rules": "Application for resumption of school should be submitted to the school within 15 days after the expiration of the semester. Those who fail to apply for resumption of school shall be deemed to be automatically withdrawn due to force majeure and other legitimate reasons."
Yang Tao went to Tianjin on April 1 and sent an email to Vice President Kong at 12:39 noon on April 2 on the last day of the school leave: "I am going to apply for resumption of school immediately. Where can I find your signature today?"
April 2, 2018, Yang Tao asked the leaders of the school about resumption of school.
According to Yang Tao's own account, Vice President Kong asked him to sign with his supervisor first, so he first printed a standard "Nankai University Graduate Resumption Application Form" and took it to Professor Cao.
"The tutor said he would not sign anything." Yang Tao said that he still failed after begging him. "He asked me to apply online and hand over the application form to Liu's email address in the office of the School of Physics. I had to go back and prepare."
But on April 3, Liu sent an email to Yang Tao's father and said, "At present, everyone thinks he is in a bad state. Do you see if you can take him to the hospital for a check-up? It's best if it's okay. If the hospital can issue him, it will be easier to resume school."
Liu's so-called "not in good condition". His family didn't know what it meant, and they didn't take his son to check.
Later, Yang Tao first sent an application for resumption of school as required.
At 12:41 on April 12, Yang Tao sent Liu an email to his resumption of school application form, and said: "The application for resumption of school has been sent to you. The printer I used before was not very good, so the form is incomplete. Please help me write a new copy."
According to the "Nankai University Graduate Student Rules", Yang Tao should apply for resumption of school between April 3 and April 17, 2018. Email evidence shows that he did not exceed the deadline, but some relevant persons refused to sign.
5 On May 13, Yang Tao asked Vice President Kong by email: "Please help me and let me resume school as soon as possible, otherwise I will not reach the school year and I will not be able to catch up with the defense in the next semester."
5 On May 14, Vice President Kong replied in an email: "As I said in WeChat, we have done a lot of work for your resumption of school. We have obtained the consent of the institute. We will resume school this semester and arrange a defense in the next semester. You can rest assured about this matter."
On May 14, 2018, the college leaders said that Yang Tao could resume school.
Looking at the email, Yang Tao was very happy. He replied, "Thank you very much for your help. As long as I get back to school, I will be satisfied. I promise that I will not cause you any trouble after resuming school."
But Yang Tao was too happy, and no one signed the application for resuming school.
The two sides were in a stalemate until July 9th. Seeing that the "this semester" was about to end, Yang Tao sent another email to Vice President Kong: "I hope the school understands the doctoral students, and doctoral students are far more poor than their peers." But the signing problem still cannot be solved.
This made Yang Tao almost collapse and his emotions became unstable. On July 10, he sent an email to Vice President Kong and said, "I have begged Teacher Cao many times. I have returned to school these days and received subsidies for graduate school and doctoral thesis rewards. I will listen to your composure and never cause trouble. Otherwise, a person who cannot resume school and is poorer than a cleaner can do anything."
On July 12, Yang Tao sent an email to Vice President Kong and others: "I have been insomnia for several months, and I have cut myself several times with a knife."
After the whole process, no matter what he said, the signature problem was always stuck.
What Yang Tao did not expect was that after more than 9 months of resumption of school, he not only did not wait until he resumed school, but instead waited to drop out. "I don't know what happened in the middle."
College notice of Yang Tao's withdrawal. Photo provided by the interviewee
On January 14, 2019, the Training Office of the Graduate School of Nankai University made the "Decision on Exit" No. 001 for Yang Tao, saying that according to Article 28 of the "Nankai University Graduate Student Rules", "with the approval of the supervisor, it will be handled automatically in accordance with the automatic withdrawal." The content of the provisions is that "an application for resumption of school should be submitted to the school within 15 days after the expiration of the semester."
Nankai University Postgraduate Rule Article 28. Screenshot from Nankai official website
2 On February 27, "TEDA Applied Physics Research Institute" sent an email to Yang Tao: "Please go to school as soon as possible to go to school to handle the withdrawal procedures and receive the withdrawal decision."
At the beginning, Yang Tao did not notice the email and did not see it until 19 days later on March 17. On the same day, he replied: "You are shameless. I completed the resumption of school in April last year." Yang Tao also expressed his dissatisfaction in the email.
According to the "Nankai University Graduate Student Rules", if the postgraduate student at the school drops out, "the person or the supervisor submits a written application, the college (department, institute) puts forward preliminary opinions based on sufficient research, and sends them to the graduate school for review, and then the president's meeting will make a study decision."
"I cannot apply to drop out, it can only be the supervisor who hides it from me." Yang Tao said.
In fact, Nankai University has another rule: "The school issues a decision to withdraw from graduate students and submits it to him." But the school asked Yang Tao to collect it himself, but he refused.
sued Nankai for losing the case, saying that he had only one "dead" doctoral dream
Later, Yang Tao was completely deadlocked when he returned to school.
Around July 2019, Yang Tao began to report to relevant departments of Nankai University that someone "embezzled scientific research funds." But this incident affected a colleague of a direct relative. "The relative felt that he couldn't hold on, so he asked my husband to write an apology letter to Nankai University," said Yang Tao's mother.
Father Yang Guang said in his apology letter: "He said nonsense that has caused harm to the teachers and students of the school. I apologize deeply... This matter may involve Yu, Lan, Yan, Zhong, Xing, Cao, Kong and other teachers and students. I apologize here." Afterwards, Yang Guang said that the reason he did this was to leave a way out for his child to resume school, which was forced to do so.
On May 14, 2020, when Yang Tao had no intention of logging into the Academic Information Network, he found that his doctoral degree was cancelled as early as January 14, 2019, issued by the "Decision on Exit" and his academic qualifications became a bachelor's degree. This is really unacceptable to Yang Tao, who has been studying for a master's and doctoral degree for several years.
Yang Tao's doctoral degree was cancelled. Screenshot from Xuexin.com
Yang Tao’s master’s and doctoral information at Nankai University. Photo provided by the interviewee
Immediately, Yang Tao sued Nankai University in the Nankai District People's Court of Tianjin (hereinafter referred to as Nankai District Court), demanding that the court "revoke the defendant's administrative act of canceling the plaintiff's academic status and restore the plaintiff's academic status, and revoke the defendant's administrative act of withdrawing from the plaintiff's academic status."
Just one week before the trial, Yang Tao saw the "Decision on Exit School" from the evidence submitted by Nankai University to the court. At the same time, he saw the second "study application" he had never seen before.
"This application for school leave is also a blank version of my post, but the content has changed." Yang Tao's father said.
Evidence shows that the start and end time of this school leave application for "Yang Tao" is from February 26, 2018 to October 2, 2018, with a total semester leave of 8 months. The "Nankai University Graduate Student Rules" stipulates that the time for leave is "usually half a year."
The reason for this application for leave school is to go to Singapore for scientific research internship, but Yang Tao returned to China as early as March 2018. What is puzzling is that in the application form, the leader of the graduate school has no signature, and in the school hospital, the signature of the leader of the school leader appears.
During the first trial, Nankai University's main point was that on February 27, 2019, they informed Yang Tao of the content of the decision letter by email. According to the "shameless" email that Yang Tao replied on March 17, the college believed that Yang Tao "should know the above decision".
"Decision content and decision letter are different. They have not delivered the decision letter to me so far." Yang Tao said.
The court also believed that Yang Tao learned about the content of the withdrawal decision on March 17, 2019 at the latest. According to the law, he should sue Nankai University within one year, that is, before March 17, 2020, Yang Tao filed a lawsuit two months later.
Therefore, the Nankai District Court did not try the entity part of the case, but directly rejected the case through a ruling on the grounds that it exceeded the statute of limitations.
Yang Tao was dissatisfied and appealed to the Tianjin No. 1 Intermediate People's Court (hereinafter referred to as Tianjin No. 1 Intermediate People's Court).
Tianjin Higher People's Court's retrial acceptance notice. Photo provided by the interviewee
When the second trial was still in progress, Yang Tao's parents went to the gate of Nankai University many times to find the leader to report, but they had never even been able to enter the campus. For the longest time, they stood at the gate of Nankai University for 7 days. These two intellectuals who have received higher education have also chosen to kneel down and lie down at the school gate to protest, but none of them helped.
On December 1, 2020, the Tianjin No. 1 Intermediate People's Court rejected the appeal and upheld the original ruling. After failing to succeed through judicial channels, Yang Tao began to post online and criticized his mentor and Lan Xiaolong and others by name. Later, posts attacking Yang Tao also appeared online, saying that he was "expelled to plagiarize."
Yang Tao also applied for a retrial to the Tianjin Higher People's Court (hereinafter referred to as the Tianjin Higher People's Court). On May 7 this year, the court accepted the case. As of press time, the case has not been officially filed.
A few days ago, the reporter learned from a person from the Tianjin High Court that the court had almost never tried similar cases, and they were not even sure whether to be heard by the court or to appeal with the education authority.
The court official pointed out: "This matter is not the fault of one person, both parties have problems." Yang Tao's mother admitted that her son did not do well, but he would not cancel his academic status: "Besides, their basis for dropping out is not valid at all."
reporters contacted the school many times, but none of the Nankai University people involved in this matter accepted interviews with reporters. Vice President Kong gave the reporter two phone numbers and asked the reporter to contact the school’s propaganda department directly. The reporter called these two phone numbers, but no one answered.
At present, Yang Tao spends most of his time in Jilin Province. He is introverted. In addition to helping others with some programming work, he mostly does odd jobs in hotels and his hair has almost fallen out.
Yang Tao, a Ph.D., dropped out of Nankai University. Photo provided by the interviewee
"It's very embarrassing now. Although I have a bachelor's degree, I am 32 years old. Who would be willing to have an older graduate of physics majoring in non-fresh physics?" Yang Tao said.
Lan Xiaolong, who had a deep grudge with him at the time, is currently working as a grassroots civil servant in Mianyang , Sichuan. He was also full of anger when talking about this. In Lan's description, Yang Tao is a "person with poor popularity and high minds, and he is the real academic fraud."
has been graduating for several years. Lan Xiaolong said that he has been living in Yang Tao's shadow. Yang not only sent his home phone and ID card to the Internet, but also frequently sent emails to insult him, and often called the police to say that he was "doing drugs and involved in gangs".
"I was taken away by the police several times and the organization department has also looked for me many times." Lan Xiaolong said that he was the real victim, "You can dig more this person, which can exceed your imagination."
"What can I have?" Yang Tao said that he only had a "dead" doctoral dream.
(Yang Tao, Yang Guang, Xu Ling and Lan Xiaolong are pseudonyms in the article)
[Copyright Statement] The copyright of this article belongs to [Observation Platform]. Toutiao has obtained exclusive authorization for the information network dissemination rights. No third party may reprint without authorization.
