She currently has a staff of Ph. D. academics in various fields, including law and social science. The work involves research and writing without (oh, irony) copying existing theses and sources that are IP protected.
Ms. Nowak operates in a grey area; it’s her students that are facing repercussions when caught, not her since she only facilitates. Interviewed on German television, one of her customers justified her hiring Nowak to help her graduate with flying colors a follows: “My dad passed away, I have three small kids. It was impossible to keep up.”
Nowak emphasized that people turn to her not because they are lazy, but since circumstances forced them. She did not address the ethical issue at any time during her TV interview.
I have my own take on this. For one, writing a thesis is a wonderful exercise that forces you as an academic to focus, study, research, analyze, execute, follow up, write, present and defend. It build skills that are priceless is anyone’s career.
Taking the “Nowak Shortcut” gives the “cheater” an unfair advantage over all those that put their own efforts in their theses. Furthermore, the ethics of such a person are questionable to say the least, so any university or employer should think twice before hiring such a person.
As for Ms. Nowak, she does not lose any sleep over it. She rakes in Euro 40 per page, which totals Euro 4,000 for a standard 100-page thesis. Not bad, since the turnaround time is 4 weeks. I calculate her monthly income at Euro 16,000 up.
My advice to universities and employers: let potential employees sign a statement that they never, ever, used ghostwriting and/or third party services to obtain and/or contribute to their academic credentials including, but not limited to, ghostwriting their theses…..all at the risk of being fired and facing a hefty penalty fee.
This blog post was written by Debra De-Jong, who wrote her own thesis all by herself (as it should be).
(Image courtesy of RTL Nord)
