The wife of Bill Ackman, the hedge fund billionaire who accused Claudine Gay of being a plagiarist and led calls for her resignation as Harvard president, is now facing allegations of plagiarism herself.According to the analysis by the publication, similar patterns of plagiarism were found in Oxman's 330-page PhD dissertation: “Material-based Design Computation". As per the report, she used direct quotes from sources without quotation marks in her dissertation. Oxman, who has been a tenured MIT professor since 2017, is accused of plagiarising texts from two separate articles by NYU historian Peder Anker published in 1995 and 2006. she also lifted text from 1998 book by Claus Mattheck, a German physicist.
Responding to the allegations, Oxman expressed regret and apologized for the errors made by her. She even said that she should have provided a citation to Mattheck.
Unfortunately, because some of the original sources are not online, and Business Insider was unwilling to give me beyond 4 pm to review these citations, I cannot confirm whether Business Insider or the sources I referenced for this paragraph are correct. When I obtain access to the original sources, I will check all of the above citations and request that MIT make any necessary corrections," she wrote.
"As I have dedicated my career to advancing science and innovation, I have always recognized the profound importance of the contributions of my peers and those who came before me. I hope that my work is helpful to the generations to come. I am also incredibly grateful for the 15 years I spent at MIT beginning when I enrolled in the PhD program in 2005, obtained my PhD in 2010, and later joined the faculty that same year. I became a tenured member of the faculty in 2017 and then left MIT in 2020 after I got married, became a mother, and moved to New York City," she added.Claiming that allegations against Oxman were “targetted attacks”, Ackman said: "You know that you struck a chord when they go after your wife, in this case, my love and partner in life," he wrote on X, attaching Oxman's apology and explanation post on the issue.