Syracusedisciplines students for Facebookgroup
NEW YORK –Four first-year students were disciplined last semester and threatened withexpulsion after creating a Facebook.com group that harshly criticized theirwriting instructor.
The Syracuse University students set up an onlinegroup called, ”Clearly Rachel doesn’t know what she’s doingever.”
The female students were listed as”officers” with officer titles such as, ”I’d rather eatall the hair stuck in the drain of the showers than go to class” and
”I’d rather watch my brother masturbate to midget porn with my momthan go to your class, Rachel.”
After the instructor filed acomplaint with the university’s judicial affairs office, the students weredismissed from the writing course and ordered to write letters of apology andcreate educational fliers that advertise the dangers ofFacebook.
University officials said in a statement that”Facebook.com is no different from other means of communication that canbe deemed harassing or threatening.”
One of the disciplinedstudents, Madison Alpern, who transferred to another school following theincident, said of Syracuse University, ”I felt like they were watching allthe time. I felt like they were restricting veryheavily.”
Universityuses MySpace profile to expel gaystudent
KENTUCKY— A college student was expelled by his university for writing heis gay on his MySpace.com profile.
School officials at the Universityof Cumberlands, a private school affiliated with the Kentucky BaptistConvention, expelled sophomore Jason Johnson in mid-April after he indicated onhis MySpace profile that he was gay and wrote about his boyfriend on the socialnetworking Web site.
According to an article in theLexington Herald-Leader, two officialsconfronted Johnson, produced a copy of his MySpace profile and showed him theschool’s student handbook.
The handbook says a student may besuspended for engaging in ”sexual behavior not consistent with Christianprinciples (including sex outside marriage andhomosexuality).”
On a profile of a MySpace member identifyinghimself to be Zac Dreyer, Johnson’s boyfriend, Dreyer urged people tospread news of Johnson’s expulsion.
”He is being asked toleave the University because he is gay,” he wrote on the profile.
”This is an outrage, discriminating against people just because of theirsexual orientation.”
Johnson has retained an attorney andbelieves the grounds for his expulsion were against the law, according to anarticle in TheCourier-Journal.
Photographerdid not violate NCAA rules with online portfolio, organizationsays
INDIANA –Several universities contacted SportShooter.com, an online photo-sharingcommunity, earlier this year with concerns about images of university athletesposted to the Web site.
University administrators, worried about NCAArules that prohibit profiting from the likeness of NCAA-eligible athletes,contacted SportsShooter with requests to remove their student athletes’photos from the site, said Grover Sanschagrin, SportShooter’s executiveproducer and administrator.
In November 2005, the NCAA determinedthat when a photographer posted photos of Syracuse University football playerson his SportsShooter profile, he did not violate NCAA rules because the purposewas ”editorial” and the photographer was not profiting from theimages.
Prior to theNCAA’s decision, Syracuse University’s athletic communicationdirector threatened to revoke the photo credentials issued to the studentnewspaper, The DailyOrange, if the photos were notremoved.
A spokesman for the NCAA said it is up to universities tomake sure their student athletes’ NCAA eligibility is not beingviolated.