Docent A notified the rector of a university that humanities professor B from the university was guilty of making exaggerated claims on his/her curriculum vitae. A had been the researcher in charge of a project at the university. After A left the employ of the university, the credit for financial responsibility for the project in question had been changed in the university’s internal research database from person A to person B, who was the head of department. B was credited with the acquisition of funding for the project on his/her CV, while A feels that the merit was his/hers.
TENK concluded that B’s CV had been misleadingly formulated in such a way that it allowed the reader to believe that the acquisition of funding for the project in question was entirely thanks to B. Even though B had shared some of the financial responsibility for the project as the head of department, and although the misleading nature of the CV was partly due to unclear subheadings, B should have specified his/her contribution to the acquisition of funding more clearly on the CV. According to the university’s RCR process, B had not been party to changing the information in the research database.
In its statement, TENK concluded that although B had acted irresponsibly, the act was not careless enough to constitute disregard. Therefore TENK agreed with the conclusion of the university’s RCR investigation, i.e. that no RCR violation had occurred. Because the events in question had taken place prior to the publication of the RCR 2012 guidelines, the former RCR 2002 guidelines were used in reaching this conclusion.