Sara Shepherd reports:
Kansas University has offered additional explanation about its heavy redacting of fraternity hazing documents, specifically regarding the fraternities’ membership numbers.
The Journal-World, which reported Sunday on KU’s disciplining of two fraternities, filed a Kansas Open Records Act request for documents from KU’s investigation into the fraternities, which are on probation for hazing. The records KU provided the newspaper were heavily redacted to hide all information about the nature of the hazing — which, under KU code, can include anything from creating “mental discomfort” to “recklessly” endangering someone’s physical safety.
Under the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) KU is only allowed to release student information without the student’s consent after removing “all personally identifiable information,” university spokesman Joe Monaco said, in an email early this week.
Read more on Lawrence Journal-World.
Not surprisingly, Frank LoMonte of the Student Press Law Center disagrees with their interpretation of FERPA as applied to this situation.