one year later: where's the data?
sept. 2 marked one year since the state of massachusetts ordered umass amherst officials to comply with massachusetts public records law and provide detailed demographic information about umass students to SGA president eduardo bustamante, who had filed the request. the university has yet to give any indication that it will comply with the order, which came from supervisor of records alan n. cote, who works for secretary of the commonwealth william galvin.
in an interview with the collegian last fall following the order, mike gargano continued to maintain that the information requested could not be provided because of FERPA, the federal law designed to protect privacy. this reasoning was effectively dismissed by the state when it ruled that the data requested by bustamante did not fall under FERPA protection. the purpose of FERPA is to protect the privacy of individual records, not of aggregated data, which is what was requested.
the true reason for the university's illegal withholding of the data was explained to me and bustamante when we met with gargano last summer, before the two of us, like the SGA, realized how utterly pointless it was to meet with him. he explained that he won't give us the information because we would "misuse" it. plainly, the university's concern is not privacy but rather what the data would reveal, were it to be made public.
and what would the data reveal? the request, which was printed fully in the first issue of the graduate voice last year, asks for breakdowns of data on racial, gender and income diversity by department, program, school, town of residence, and other such detailed information designed to go beyond the superficial data that the university reports in order to make itself appear to be a more diverse and accessible place than it actually is. the GSS created the staff position of "educational access research coordinator" largely in order to keep the university honest about its track record on diversity and affordability. the university's withholding of information makes it hard for this staffer to do his job.
the university's contempt for any attempt to hold it accountable is not just the province of extreme misanthropes like gargano: it flows from the top down. chancellor lombardi seems to have evaded criticism here for his contempt for the public, but when he was at the university of florida, he was criticized for, among other things, deriding public record laws, calling them "a crutch for lazy newspeople".
right now the case is sitting in attorney-general reilly's office. he is the official responsible for enforcing the law, and has the power to take whatever measures he deems necessary to ensure compliance. unfortunately he has not acted. keep in mind when he declares his candidacy for governor that he does not respect the state's laws enough to enforce them as an attorney-general.
as for the university's contempt for state law, keep it in mind next time the university wants something from you. if the institution won't take the public seriously enough to comply with state orders, there is no reason why anybody else should take it seriously enough to donate money to it or show any respect for it.
in an interview with the collegian last fall following the order, mike gargano continued to maintain that the information requested could not be provided because of FERPA, the federal law designed to protect privacy. this reasoning was effectively dismissed by the state when it ruled that the data requested by bustamante did not fall under FERPA protection. the purpose of FERPA is to protect the privacy of individual records, not of aggregated data, which is what was requested.
the true reason for the university's illegal withholding of the data was explained to me and bustamante when we met with gargano last summer, before the two of us, like the SGA, realized how utterly pointless it was to meet with him. he explained that he won't give us the information because we would "misuse" it. plainly, the university's concern is not privacy but rather what the data would reveal, were it to be made public.
and what would the data reveal? the request, which was printed fully in the first issue of the graduate voice last year, asks for breakdowns of data on racial, gender and income diversity by department, program, school, town of residence, and other such detailed information designed to go beyond the superficial data that the university reports in order to make itself appear to be a more diverse and accessible place than it actually is. the GSS created the staff position of "educational access research coordinator" largely in order to keep the university honest about its track record on diversity and affordability. the university's withholding of information makes it hard for this staffer to do his job.
the university's contempt for any attempt to hold it accountable is not just the province of extreme misanthropes like gargano: it flows from the top down. chancellor lombardi seems to have evaded criticism here for his contempt for the public, but when he was at the university of florida, he was criticized for, among other things, deriding public record laws, calling them "a crutch for lazy newspeople".
right now the case is sitting in attorney-general reilly's office. he is the official responsible for enforcing the law, and has the power to take whatever measures he deems necessary to ensure compliance. unfortunately he has not acted. keep in mind when he declares his candidacy for governor that he does not respect the state's laws enough to enforce them as an attorney-general.
as for the university's contempt for state law, keep it in mind next time the university wants something from you. if the institution won't take the public seriously enough to comply with state orders, there is no reason why anybody else should take it seriously enough to donate money to it or show any respect for it.
posted by Uri at 12:28 PM
<< Home