Prospective Professors Involved in ‘Joki’ Scheme for Research Papers

A Kompas investigation has uncovered the existence of joki in the academic world. From administrative officials to prospective professors, all are allegedly involved in the scheme at both state and private universities.

INSAN ALFAJRI

In its website, the Budapest International Research and Critics Institute-Journal which is managed by MR claims to be a Sinta 3 indexed journal. In fact, the accreditation of this journal has been revoked since May 27, 2022. Consequently, scientific articles published since 2022 until now are no longer accredited or indexed by Sinta .

JAKARTA, KOMPAS — The practice of using joki (brokers) in the academic world is occurring on a massive and systematic way at a number of state and private universities across the country. Using the services of joki in producing academic work to meet graduation requirements or to be promoted to a professorship is practiced at state and private campuses in big cities.

The practice of using joki involves administrative officials, lecturers, and students. In addition, lecturers and students who need to produce research papers can use the services of off-campus brokers. Many academics, from lecturers to prospective professors, have even been deceived because they used the services of the manager of the Budapest International Research and Critics Institute-Journal (BIRCI-Journal), known for having an office on the outskirts of Deli Serdang regency, North Sumatra.

One of the modes joki employ is to form a special team that prepares articles for publishing with an international journal. The team targets the names of senior lecturers aspiring to become professors or to be promoted among the authors credited on a research paper, even though they made no active contribution to the paper for publishing in a reputable journal. This activity is apparently aimed at increasing the lecturer’s credit as well as their institution’s accreditation level.

Synonymous with thesis

One of the investigation’s findings was that a lecturer with the initials AKAP, who aspired to a professorship and was also a high-ranking official at the Jakarta campus of Esa Unggul University (UEU), was credited for an article published on 23 Jan. 2023 in a journal of the Swiss Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI). The article was identical to a thesis written by a UEU undergraduate student with the initials RAS.

The number of respondents and questionnaires, the methodologies and graphics used in RAS’s thesis and article in the MDPI journal were exactly the same. RAS confessed that there were no differences in the substance between his thesis and the article in the journal. "Yes, that's right, [they’re] the same," he said on Tuesday (31/1/2023).

AKAP was the lead author of the article published in the MDPI journal. In fact, the lead author of a research paper is usually the principal researcher or the scholar who made the greatest contribution to the paper. In the MDPI’s journal, RAS was credited only as the second of eight authors credited in the published article. Besides AKAP and RAS, UEU lecturers TYRS, EMS, MPD, PS were also credited. The remaining two were lecturers at Malaysian universities.

Also read: Steep Road to Being Published in International Journals

RAS had been told by TYRS, one of his thesis mentors, that his thesis would be published in an international journal. TYRS had also told him the names of several other UEU lecturers would be credited as authors.

RAS’s thesis ratification sheet includes only the name of TYRS as the thesis supervisor.

On confirming that his name had been credited as one of the article’s authors in the MDPI journal, MPD said that all credited authors had contributed to the article. "I processed the article. Don't think narrowly, those who [were credited on] the article are those who actually provided guidance," said MPD.

As regards AKAP being credited as the lead author of the article published in the MDPI journal, TYRS said that while AKAP was not recorded as either a mentor or examiner on RAS’s thesis ratification sheet, the research idea came from himself and AKAP as the secondary supervisor. According to according to TYRS,, he and AKAP were involved from the beginning of the these. "We gave this idea to the student," said TYRS, while showing his thesis guidance logbook.

However, RAS rejected TYRS 's statement, saying that he had come up with the thesis idea on his own, because he had gathered primary information and reference persons to support his thesis.

KOMPAS/INSAN ALFAJRI

Sworn translator Prayudi Wijaya's statement after examining Esa Unggul University student thesis files and scientific articles at MDPI. According to him, the two articles are substantially the same.

‘Teamwork’

Similar findings were made at the State University of Padang (UNP) in West Sumatra. UNP had a professorship acceleration team in charge of providing guidance for writing research articles. One of the UNP lecturers knowledgeable about the team's work revealed that it actively worked on research articles for lecturers who were professor candidates.

The team worked on the research, data analysis, and writing the manuscript. Meanwhile, the senior lecturers aspiring to a professorship made minimal contributions to the research paper developed by this team.

The existence of this team was tracked in the 2019 and 2021 university performance reports. In the 2019 performance report, lecturers who attained professor candidacy had received assistance and incentives to write research articles. UNP allocated research funds worth Rp 500 million to accelerate professorships.

Also read: Academic Morality

One UNP professor, with the initials RI, admitted to have involved the “acceleration team”. He wanted to publish a research paper in a Scopus indexed journal to meet part of the conditions for becoming a professor. "Now, my [paper] is being examined at the university," he said.

The findings revealed that the acceleration team engaged in conflicts of interest, namely producing research papers with the intention to benefit and/or to harm certain parties as regulated in Article 10, paragraph (5) of Education, Culture Research and Technology Minister Regulation No. 39/2021 on academic integrity in producing research papers.

Yohandri, who chairs the UNP community’s Research and Service Institute, acknowledged the existence of the professorship acceleration team. According to him, the team’s task was indeed to support lecturers who had the potential to win a professorship. However, Yohandri dismissed the notion that the team was a type of joki service that produced papers for prospective professors.

"Conducting the research remains the responsibility of lecturers [prospective professors]," he said.

My job was to write special manuscripts on soil biology and soil fertility. That was my contribution.

The investigation at Brawijaya University (UB) in Malang also uncovered a prospective professor initialed AW who was indicated to have used a team of young students and lecturers to produce and publish articles in international journals. The research article the team produced was published on 1 June 2022 in Poland’s Journal of Ecological Engineering.

There were strong suspicions that the article published in the journal was drawn on the research by a master’s student with the initials WSE. In the research, WSE took soil samples while the land analysis was conducted by RA, another UB lecturer.

"My job was to write special manuscripts on soil biology and soil fertility. That was my contribution," said RA.

KOMPAS/INSAN ALFAJRI

Front view of AW's workspace, senior lecturer as prospective professor at Brawijaya University, Malang, East Java, Monday (6/2/2023). He is strongly suspected of using a small team in making scientific articles.

An UB senior lecturer initialed IN, who became a source for the Kompas investigation, said that the small team that helped AW had deviated from UB’s academic rules. According to IN, that team should only provide guidance and consultation to lecturers in producing their research papers. "The work of this team has deviated," IN said.

AW confirmed he had contributed to the article published in the Journal of Ecological Engineering. During a telephone call on Friday (3/2/2023), AW said, "What is clear [is that] those who reported me and provided incorrect information are people who do not like me."

In 2012, AW was sanctioned for plagiarism. In 2022, AW was also strongly suspected of dishonesty in his funding report for a study on education development/education development contributions (DPP/SPP). Information from the campus showed that AW's report used photos from other sources, but were made out as if they were photos taken during his research.

AW, who had been nominated for a professorship, was reported to UB rector Prof. Widodo. Through Kotok Gurito, the head of UB’s public relations and archives subdivision, Widodo said on Monday (6/2/2023): "This case is being handled by the ministry, I cannot comment [on it]."

If the accreditation is revoked, it seems as if this journal is no longer valid. How can that be?

The education ministry has never instructed the formation of a team to fast-track professorships, let alone to produce research papers. "An acceleration team should be formed in order to ‘accelerate’ in the context of helping with guidance, helping with methodologies [...], yes. However, [producing research papers] is not allowed," said the ministry’s resources director, Mohammad Sofwan Effendi.

In addition to using internal resources to conduct research and produce papers, lecturers and professor candidates also used the services of external joki. The Kompas investigation revealed that many lecturers and prospective professors from both public and private universities had been scammed by a publishing broker with the initials MR, the chief editor of BIRCI-Journal.

MR offered his services to lecturers to publish their articles in BIRCI-Journal or other international journals. BIRCI-Journal is ranked Sinta 3 in the national journal index. As of 27 May 2022, the education ministry has revoked BIRCI-Journal’s Sinta 3 ranking. During a meeting with MR at Deli Serdang, he said the journal should not require government accreditation because it was not managed by a university.

"If the accreditation is revoked, it seems as if this journal is no longer valid. How can that be?" he said.

This article was translated by Hyginus Hardoyo.