Posted by
Waski_the_Squirrel on Wednesday, July 08, 2009 4:18:47 PM
Joseph Farah, of Worldnetdaily fame, had an
editorial today about Barack Obama's college papers. I can't say I was surprised by anything in those papers, at least the bits Farah reported. They're a ripe target, but serve only to illustrate my topic. You see, my question is how Farah managed to read them.
Obama was 22 when he wrote the papers in question, so he was legally an adult. The privacy in his case is not quite what I deal with since most of my students are not adults. Nevertheless, one expects a certain amount of privacy. No professor or teacher should release anything a student submits without the written permission of that student. There are several good reasons why.
- Ethics: The student wrote the papers, not the teacher. Did someone profit from releasing Obama's papers?
- Privacy: The student should have control over his personal information.
- Maturity: We all grow up and change. Sometimes our views change. Usually we become less idealistic and extreme. Most of us develop a much more mature way of expressing our views: less strident.
- Context: I wrote a paper once in favor of gay marriage. The assignment was to write a paper supporting something we oppose. The goal was to teach us to think. I'd hate to have someone trot that paper out without the context.
Now anything published is fair game. This blog, internet forums, comments around the internet, and even E-mail fall under this category. This is why college students are warned about their Facebook accounts. If these papers were published in some form, then there is nothing wrong with rereleasing them.
Frankly, my students have nothing to worry about from me. Lab reports are rarely controversial. Even if they are, I'm a thrower. After graduation, I toss anything a student has submitted to me. Seriously, why keep that stuff?