UK Produces Most Rhodes Scholars in World

Wouldn't that be a great headline? Wouldn't it be wonderful for UK to be known as an intellectual center, a great place of learning and achievement?

We already know how good it feels to be famous for our basketball program and history. How much better would it be if students from all over the world were clamoring for a chance to attend one of many superb academic programs?

Why don't we put as much energy into our academic programs as we do athletics?

Is it a lack of funding? Poor teaching? Timid advertising? Administrative indifference? Rock-bottom admission requirements?

What would it take to make that title a reality, just one of many prestigious awards we could all be proud of?

Take Another Look, Part 2

Dr. Krish Muralidhar received a response from Christopher Rice regarding yesterday's letter but did not feel comfortable publishing it without permission. However, he did want to share his response back to Rice.

What's your take on this situation? Do you think UK should give users of the Big Blue Network a chance to opt out of the research-related data gathering?

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First of all, I am all for improving student retention and appreciate your efforts in this regard. My only issue is that your current procedure does not provide the students with all the facts regarding the specific objectives of the Big Blue Network. The Big Blue Network is described as follows http://www.uky.edu/UGS/network.html

“The goal of the network is to build real connections between students, and between students and the University in a safe and private space to interact. Students will learn from each other and assigned peer mentors how best to make the most of their University of Kentucky experience. UK faculty and staff from the departments and colleges will also participate in communicating about and finetuning expectations about students' majors.

The online community members can share content between Big Blue Network and your existing Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Second Life, Twitter, etc. accounts. Members can update their personal status, send instant messages, post pictures and videos on both their existing social networking sites AND Big Blue Network.

Nowhere does this description include any information that the comments posted on this web site will be analyzed. The description leads one to believe that when you join the Big Blue Network, you are joining a social network of peers, faculty and staff at UK (which is monitored and administered by UK). The participating students have no idea that the comments they post will be gathered, catalogued, and analyzed. In my opinion, with the exception of those students who you chose to inform, the other students who participate in the Big Blue Network have not consented to their comments being analyzed since they do not have all the relevant facts.

In your response, you have addressed several points, but the key point that directly addresses my concern is the following statement: “It is my understanding that students "opt in" to the collection of data for retention and success efforts when they confirm their admission to the university.” This may be true. It is also true that many commercial organizations use the same (fine print) approach. However, privacy advocates have consistently argued against this implicit “opt in” approach and have insisted that every individual must be provided the opportunity to explicitly “opt in” or “opt out” even in situations where the participant is simply sent informational emails. In the case of the Big Blue Network, you intend to analyze the comments that are posted on the network which is far more intrusive. Currently, the students have no facility to “opt out” since most of them are not even aware that their comments will be analyzed.

As an institution of higher learning and a Tier I research university, UK must hold itself to a higher standard when it comes to privacy issues. What is an acceptable standard for a commercial organization is not necessarily an acceptable standard for an educational institution. It is for this reason that we have entities such as the Institutional Review Board that oversee research involving human subjects.

It is not very difficult to achieve this higher standard. All that is required is the following. In addition to the description currently being provided, provide every student joining the network with a statement informing them that the comments that they post online will be gathered, catalogued, and analyzed. You can also provide additional information regarding the purpose of such analysis and the procedures that would be adopted to prevent their identity from being disclosed. This information should also be included in the description on the UK UGS web site. You should also inform students who have already enrolled. After receiving this information, if a student chooses to participate in the Big Blue Network they have given you informed consent to analyze their comments.

Providing this statement will result in one of the following outcomes:

(1) It has no impact on student participation. This implies that the students have made an informed decision to participate because they feel that analyzing their comments does not adversely affect their privacy.

(2) It has a positive impact on student participation. This implies that some students have made an informed decision to participate specifically because they would like their comments to be analyzed.

(3) It has a detrimental impact on student participation. This implies that some students have made an informed decision not to participate specifically because they do not wish their comments to be analyzed.

The key here is that in all cases, the students are making an “informed” decision. The only outcome that would adversely affect your data gathering effort is the last outcome. However, if you believe that this outcome is more likely, then it is all the more reason to provide an explicit statement of your intention to analyze the comments. Failure to do so, in my opinion, is to mislead some students to participate in a process that they would not have participated if they had all the relevant facts.

In conclusion, I believe that every student should be provided an explicit statement detailing the specific objectives of the Big Blue Network including the fact that the comments posted online will be analyzed. This is probably one of the first interactions that the student will have with UK as an institution and represents an opportunity to earn their trust. We do not earn their trust by relying on some fine print statement included in the admission letter to gather and analyze their online comments without informed consent. We earn their trust by being honest and upfront with the students and allowing them to make an informed decision.

Dr. Krish Muralidhar
Gatton Research Professor
School of Management
University of Kentucky

Take Another Look . . .

What looks like a great service at first glance proves to be something else on second look . . . .

Following is a letter sent to Christopher Rice (UK Online Community Manager), copied to Lee Todd, the Provost, and Ryan Alessi (Lexington Herald-Leader) regarding the Big Blue Network. It is reprinted here with the permission of the author, Dr. Krish Muralidhar, Gatton Research Professor, School of Management.

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Dear Professor Rice,

This is in reference to the story in the Lexington Herald regarding the Big Blue Network. I am very happy that UK is using technology to make it easy for incoming students. However, I was somewhat disturbed by the following statements in the article:

He and a team will catalog students' exchanges and discussions to track how participation in the Big Blue Network might affect freshmen retention rates, although most of the incoming students using the site haven't been told that their comments will be collected.

Rice said they didn't broadcast the cataloging of content because they wanted to avoid "creepy treehouse syndrome."

"Nobody wants to hang out in the treehouse with Dad," Rice said. "We didn't want the research to get in the way of aspects students find useful."

He and a team will keep track of how many times each student posts something on the network as well as the quality of the discussions, Rice said. For instance, there's a big difference between starting a debate over an academic issue and posting a mundane update, such as "my cat just threw up," he said.

It is clear from the above statements that the research team not only intends to monitor usage, but actually evaluate the content of the comments. Even if you will be analyzing only de-identified (anonymized) data, I believe that every student must be informed that such information is being collected. And, in situations such as this, it is very easy to (re)identify the individual posting a comment even if the data has been de-identified.

Your statements above make it very clear that you are aware that the students are not necessarily comfortable sharing some comments with researchers (the treehouse syndrome that you discuss). If this is the case, then to analyze the comments when the students have not explicitly “opted in” is inappropriate. The article also does not provide any information whether some students can use the network but “opt out” of participating in the research study. The students have a right to be informed as to how the administrators of the network will use the data.

The article mentions that “student leaders” were informed, but not the individual students. I think this is inappropriate. As a leading research institution we should attempt to be a leader in appropriate research practices. Not providing the participating students with a clear indication that the individual comments will be analyzed is, in my opinion, not appropriate research practice. It is irrelevant that “no one has expressed that fear”. They should have been provided a choice to “opt in” or “opt out”.

In addition, as educators, one of our responsibilities is to educate our students regarding the dangers of participating in networks and posting information that could potentially have adverse consequences. By gathering data without (what I consider to be) informed consent, we not only fail to educate the students, we are contributing to the problem.

At the very least, I strongly suggest that you immediately inform all students that their comments will be used for research purposes and allow them to “opt in” if they want to participate in the study and “opt out” if they do not wish to. I clearly understand that this may have a detrimental effect on the data that is being collected. But that is a small price to pay for the loss of trust that would result from the current practice.

Sincerely,

Krish

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We don't know about you, but we're not joining a network with no opt out.

Another Day, Another Lawsuit

Another employee has filed a lawsuit against UK, and as is often the case with UK, has seen the lawsuit dismissed.

UK gets sued a lot, especially by hospital patients. And former basketball coaches. But a lot of employees and former employees sue UK, too, for a variety of reasons. Discrimination based on race or gender or age or religious beliefs. Sexual harassment. Hostile work environment. Wrongful termination. And so on.

It's true that some of these employee lawsuits are frivolous, but we're willing to bet that most of them are legitimate and are not brought about easily. There is a rumor that UK has nearly all the attorneys in the region on retainer -- cutting off access to employees right from the start. If the employee is still working, they face all manner of silent subtle harassments -- stolen brown bag lunches, time cards that get read "wrong," penalties for taking literally six seconds more than the legally mandated break time, not being allowed breaks at all, fewer hours, rumors about their character.

Going to HR for such "little" things is a waste of time, as hundreds of employees already know. (Let's be clear about HR. UK HR exists to protect the university's interests. Employees come in a far second. Employees can have all the wellness benefits they can handle, but only because UK has decided those benefits are in its best interest as an organization.)

In Cowan's case, UK maintains it addressed the problem as soon as supervisors were aware of the situation. Which leaves us wondering how long and how many complaints it took to bring the problem to the supervisors' attention.

To Cowan and all the other folks suing UK for legitimate reasons: We believe you and we hope you win. We work at UK, and we understand what you're up against.

Survey Anyone?

We notice that several areas of the University like to survey their staff and faculty. In fact, the Medical Center spent a great deal of money recently surveying staff to see what was really going on with them. As of this date, we haven't heard of anything changing over there. Have you?

Of course, spending a lot of money for surveys shows how much administration "really cares" about faculty and staff. It's also a lot cheaper than giving actual raises.

Have you been surveyed lately? Were you honest? Did anyone listen to you? Did anything change?

Performance Evaluation Time!

It's about time for Lee Todd's annual performance evaluation. What's your opinion of how well Todd has performed his duties this past year? Has he communicated well? Has he moved us closer to top 20 status?

If he does the absolute minimum required by his contract, does he deserve a bonus?

Do you think you should get a bonus for doing your job?

News Flash

Rick Pitino, former UK basketball coach, reveals he is not perfect. It is unknown at this time how earth-shattering this will turn out to be for the state or even the nation.

What implications do you think this will have on Pitino's career?

Sports or Academics?

Today's news informed us that UK athletes senior Jorge Gonzalez and sophomore Aaron Boyd were suspended for violating team rules. Gonzalez will miss one game. We imagine there will be much gnashing of teeth over this as well as a lot of angry comments and discussions. Or maybe it's too early in the season for fans to worry.

During the uproar about UK letting Gillispie go and hiring Calipari a few months ago there were a few letters to the editor reminding readers that UK is also about academics, or that at least it should be.

It's a bit hard to believe that UK values higher education if you consider the money that gets funneled into athletics over academics, despite UK administration's protestations that it's separate money and that athletics help support academics.

What do you think? Does UK value athletics over academics? Do you think the distribution of money at UK is fairly distributed? Do you think there's a better way?

Effective Senates?

If you've ever attended a faculty or staff senate meeting you probably wondered what was really going on. Lots of paper gets passed around, a lot of people get up and say things. Then it's over and you go back to work.

Do you think our senates are really doing their job of representing our best interests? Or are they just another empty gesture?

What do you think our senates should really be doing?

When Did She Get Hired?

The rumor mill has been busy this week and the issues are all sadly business as usual -- the UK Way.

Let's start with a simple one. Why is Patsy Todd allowed to interfere in HR's hiring and firing decisions for staff even though she is not a UK employee? Is she also interfering with faculty hirings and firings? Does she get a bonus for this (besides driving a university car)?

Of course, we all know that certain high-level administrators frequently bypass HR in hiring and firing. All they have to do is pick up the phone and say they want so-and-so hired at such-and-such a salary, and that's that.

The rest of us have to settle for being overqualified and underpaid to work at UK.