Texas A&M Threatens Professors Who Suggest Students File Open Records Requests
from the the-future-of-journalism dept
A large group of journalists are publicly protesting a policy at Texas A&M University, which effectively threatens professors who suggest students file open records requests to do investigative reporting on the University itself. The specific policy, which has been in place for a while, officially bars university employees from filing open records requests as a part of their jobs. But it appears that Texas A&M is now interpreting this to mean that journalism professors cannot suggest that journalism students use open records laws in investigating the university itself. In other words, the university wants its staff to teach journalism, but not if that journalism involves uncovering wrongdoing by the university itself. Not surprisingly, the "clarification" of the rules came after some students filed open records requests showing that an A&M campus (Tarleton State University) "failed to fully comply with a federal law requiring schools to disclose crimes on and adjacent to campus."Filed Under: journalism, open records, texas a&m
