Schafer involved in a SUNY Oswego journalism student's suspension

[gawker.com]

On 17/10/2012, at 3:36 PM, Michael C. Schafer wrote:
My interactions with ed gosek have all been off ice as we are div 1. He is one of the best guys in college hockey. Your last line of saying your comments don't need to be positive is offensive. Mike schafer
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Sent using BlackBerry

I guess coach doesn't have the CHN iPhone app...

Seems to me like Schafer slightly overreacted and SUNY Oswego greatly overreacted. (Although I can understand wanting to punish him for lying about his affiliation, but the other stuff is nonsense).

You wouldn't find it offensive that someone you don't know contacts you by email asking you to dish dirt on one of your colleagues? Kudo to Coach for saying what he thinks.

dag14
You wouldn't find it offensive that someone you don't know contacts you by email asking you to dish dirt on one of your colleagues? Kudo to Coach for saying what he thinks.

That's certainly an understandable reaction, but how did Oswego find out about the email? Schafer must have forwarded it to someone who works for the University. To me, that seems like he took it too far.

dag14
You wouldn't find it offensive that someone you don't know contacts you by email asking you to dish dirt on one of your colleagues? Kudo to Coach for saying what he thinks.

Totally agree. The posting by the student was poorly done. However I suspect it was all meant to be harmless, just poorly worded. It speaks more to the student and to whether he actually talked to anyone about his idea before he started. I think Schafer was spot on in his response. Someone needed to tell the student that it wasn't the proper approach.

Oswego's response was stupid. All they needed to do was to pull the student aside, have his advisor, or the prof, sit down with him show him why the proceedure was wrong and ask him to send an apology. That's it, done, over, lesson learned, get on with the rest of your schooling, this is supposed to be an educational institution, so teach. To tell him to immediately clean out his room and leave, what does he do, join the homeless on the steet? Wow.

jtn27

dag14
You wouldn't find it offensive that someone you don't know contacts you by email asking you to dish dirt on one of your colleagues? Kudo to Coach for saying what he thinks.

That's certainly an understandable reaction, but how did Oswego find out about the email? Schafer must have forwarded it to someone who works for the University. To me, that seems like he took it too far.

It might have been Schafer, but since this was sent to more than one coach it could have been some other coach that raised hell. Schafer responded to the student. He might have left it at that.

marty

jtn27

dag14
You wouldn't find it offensive that someone you don't know contacts you by email asking you to dish dirt on one of your colleagues? Kudo to Coach for saying what he thinks.

That's certainly an understandable reaction, but how did Oswego find out about the email? Schafer must have forwarded it to someone who works for the University. To me, that seems like he took it too far.

It might have been Schafer, but since this was sent to more than one coach it could have been some other coach that raised hell. Schafer responded to the student. He might have left it at that.

I guess it was wrong of me to assume it was Schafer who informed Oswego. However, somebody did, and in my opinion that was unnecessary.

jtn27
However, somebody did, and in my opinion that was unnecessary.

In my opinion it was defensible. The writer identified himself in the letter as working for the university, implying there was a connection between his position there and his questions. It was reasonable to forward the email to the university, if for no other reason than to confirm that connection.

I don't think recipients of the note were ethically bound to forward it, but they certainly had a right to if they were concerned.

BTW, I assume the student did not mean anything nefarious, he was just being dumb, but this was if nothing else a lesson in fairly obvious common sense. That could easily cost somebody a job if an employer felt it reflected poorly upon them.

In any case, it's hard to argue with this from the Comments:

But seriously, if you're coming as an exchange student from Australia, I can't think of a worse place to go than SUNY Oswego.

I went to Potsdam and we had Australian foreign exchange students, I never got it. They seemed to enjoy it though, probably because they were hammered.