Troubling

I joined the EFF and ACLU today. If this is any indication of what school administrations want to do, all student bloggers ought to:

Anybody with any “blog sophistication” won’t take statements on student blogs very seriously. But what if you are a university administrator who knows little about blogs and is very thin-skinned about anybody saying anything that might in any way reflect badly on your program or students or faculty?

You might go ballistic over a student blog.

This is exactly what happened when Marquette Dental School Associate Dean for Academic Affairs Denis Lynch learned of a student blog that made one negative comment about a professor (who was not named), a negative comment about 25% of the year-two dental school class (with nobody named) and talked about going out on a few occasions and drinking too much.

According to a pretty draconian letter, the student was suspended, his scholarship was revoked, he'll be forced to make up a semester at his own, additional expense, and he'll have to apologize publicly. Personally, I'd leave any school run by such imbeciles as would require this, but I understand if he goes through with it anyway - hard to change your entire life plan based on a blog. Sad that the University can't seem to see it that way.