Case in Point:
Lessons for the proactive manager

This month we conclude our review and analysis of last year's Case in Point articles with a focus on our final category: Campus Life & Safety. This category is particularly important since most of these issues directly impact both our students and institutional culture.

We believe it is vitally important to recognize trends and topics in this category so that we can be ready to address these risks as needed. Being unaware and uninformed is particularly dangerous when dealing with these issues.

As we evaluated this category we noted that the topics linked during 2017 were remarkably similar to 2016. There continues to be a wide diversity within each category, but staying alert to emerging issues that can impact our campus safety culture remains vitally important.

• General Campus Safety
• Campus Climate
• Greek Life Issues
• Free-Speech Related Issues
• Hazing
• Social Media
• Weapons on Campus
• Privacy
• Immigration Issues
• Scams targeting students
• Gender Issues

We hope the review of 2017 has been beneficial in helping you become more proactive in managing risks in higher education. As a reminder, proactive risk management is important and helps us keep resources directed toward our primary mission of education, research, and improving the quality of life for others through outreach. When we fail to manage risks, our resources frequently become directed toward investigations, litigation, fines and other items that don't involve our primary mission. That is not money well spent, and it is why we send this publication to you each month.

We again encourage you to review the events of the prior month with an eye toward proactive risk management. As always we welcome your comments and suggestions.

M. Kevin Robinson, CIA, CFE
Associate Vice President
Office of Audit, Compliance & Privacy

Information Security & Technology Events

May 25, 2018: The University of Vermont says it is taking steps to address a data breach reported this week. UVM officials said Thursday that the breach could lead to malicious use of university usernames and passwords, but say they do not believe any personal information was compromised. WCAX-TV reports the university is requiring everyone to change their passwords as a precaution due to the breach. (link)

May 21, 2018: University at Buffalo leaders, along with their security team, are investigating a data breach of external third-party accounts. They say it's affected more than 25-hundred accounts campus wide. About 18-hundred of those are student accounts. Officials say those whose logins were stolen may have visited a website not associated with the university. (link)

May 18, 2018: A lost flash drive containing the names and Social Security numbers of an undisclosed number of people associated with the University of Toledo prompted the university to send out letters alerting those affected by the "security incident." A UT faculty member lost an unencrypted flash drive containing personal information belonging to some students, faculty, staff, and external research coordinators, according to the letter. That information included names, addresses, and Social Security numbers, and possibly birth dates. (link)

May 17, 2018: A university student allegedly broke into a school office four times in order to steal passwords and change his grades. On his fourth-trip, he found much more to worry about than his school performance. Kaustubh M. Shroffa, biological sciences major, allegedly broke into the registrar's office in Savitz Hall in Glassboro between December of last year and Jan. 11 with two goals. First, he plugged a flash drive containing keylogger software into a computer. A keylogger records keystrokes made by computer users and was used to steal staff login credentials, prosecutors allege. (link)

May 16, 2018: A clinic owned by the physicians organization of the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston improperly sent out mass emails containing the email addresses of many of its patients. UT Physicians' Davis Clinic sent batches of emails, notification of a doctor leaving the clinic, to patients last week. There were 19 such emails, each of which made visible the email addresses of anywhere from 100 to 300 other people. (link)

May 05, 2018: KIRO 7 has uncovered documents detailing the Kirkland Police Department's ongoing investigation into how a suspect, or ring of suspects, was able to hijack the school email account of Northwest University's chief financial officer. The hacking of CFO John Jordan's email account has the Kirkland college out nearly $60,000. According to detectives, the thieves secretly monitored Jordan's emails and, when a legitimate payment was due to a school vendor, the hackers re-routed the money. (link)

May 01, 2018: A hacking group upset with Georgia legislation that could criminalize what they do targeted Georgia Southern University and two Augusta restaurants in an ongoing campaign to draw attention to what it thinks will be the unintended consequences of that bill. A hacker who identified himself as Dave emailed a long list of what appeared to be Georgia Southern email addresses and passwords as well as a screenshot of what appears to be a student's MyGeorgiaSouthern personal profile, which he said would allow them to change the student's major or "pretty much anything else regarding their future." It also appears to allow the hackers to change a student's schedule, change passwords or access financial aid information. The screenshot shows the current news and events listed Tuesday on the Georgia Southern site. However, a message sent to the student's email came back as invalid. Georgia Southern said after investigating a partial list of emails and passwords provided to The Chronicle that its "accounts have not been compromised" and that "the information is not from our web site," spokeswoman Jennifer Wise said. (link)

May 01, 2018: Boise State University received notice recently from Fresno State University that a theft on their campus may have potentially involved some personal information that originated at Boise State, according to BSU spokesman Greg Hahn. An external hard drive stolen sometime in the last week of December, 2017, from a facility at Fresno State included personal information for some Boise State football camp attendees from 2007, 2008 and 2011 and others connected to the Boise State Athletics Department around the same time. (link)

Fraud & Ethics Related Events

May 25, 2018: A man is accused of stealing several items from a community college. Christopher McAfee, 33, took numerous items from Jefferson Community and Technical College Southwest Campus, located at 1000 Community College Drive, including TVs, paintings, drones, a mini fridge and a computer monitor, according to his arrest report. (link)

May 25, 2018: The former University of Notre Dame employee accused of taking close to $200,000 from the school's Clinical Law Center was sentenced Friday. In February, 44-year-old Jennifer Ihns pleaded guilty to one count of corrupt business influence, one count of forgery and nine counts of theft. She was also ordered to pay $199,000 in restitution to Notre Dame. An audit showed between January 2009 and June 2016, Ihns, who was the clinic administrator, cashed 129 checks from the clinic's operating accounting totaling more than $82,000. She also cashed 126 checks from the trust account for more than $96,000. (link)

May 25, 2018: A Vassar College employee was arrested after being caught making illegal purchases of more than $6,000 on a college credit card, said Town of Poughkeepsie Police. Merlisha Celestin, 34, of Beacon, was arrested Tuesday following an investigation into the use of the card over a six month period, while employed at the college, said Capt. Kevin Faber. (link)

May 20, 2018: During a lecture last fall, Sergio A. Garcia, a top official at New York's Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, recounted for the audience his harrowing experience during a deadly April 2011 bombing in Afghanistan. His account of the bombing was among numerous astounding claims that he made last October during a 57-minute videotaped speech -- titled "Courage Under Fire" -- that have been refuted, could not be verified, or are so far-fetched that longtime State Department and other current and former U.S. government officials described them as not credible. (link)

May 18, 2018: Florida Atlantic University reported false numbers to the government, exaggerating how many women played for its sports teams, just a year after it ranked among the worst in the country for female representation in sports. In 2016, women represented more than half of the Boca Raton school's enrollment but only 31 percent of its athletes. The percentage was the lowest of all 127 schools participating in the highest level of college sports. Just one year later, FAU claimed it had erased its female participation gap. It told the U.S. Department of Education in 2017 that 51 percent of its athletes were women. (link)

May 16, 2018: A federal grand jury has indicted the surgeon who leads University Health's trauma center in Shreveport in the theft of more than $200,000 in disability benefits. John T. Owings, 58, of Shreveport was charged Wednesday with one count of theft of government property and one count of concealing that he was ineligible for Social Security disability benefits. (link)

May 15, 2018: The former student billing clerk at a tribal community college pleaded guilty on Tuesday to embezzling more than $13,000 from the institution over a six-month period. Jennifer Lynn Brown, 34, would write checks to herself under the guise of scholarship awards from Blackfeet Community College. The seven checks written to herself, along with two $570-tuition waivers she issued to family members without authorization, totaled $13,393, according to court documents. (link)

May 10, 2018: Tutors employed by Texas Christian University are being accused of providing forbidden material to students who are now suspended in a cheating scandal. The allegation comes from the attorney hired by the students to get them back in class. The university said a dozen students were suspended during finals exams. It didn't say how long the alleged cheating went on or for what classes. A popular app called Quizlet is at the center of the cheating investigation. Senior Taylor Wirtz, who is not involved in the investigation at all, said almost everyone used the app. (link)

May 08, 2018: A former Bemidji State University employee was charged with a felony Tuesday after he allegedly used his university-issued credit card to make personal purchases. Former Physical Plant Manager Jeffrey Arne Sande, 66, was charged with financial transaction card fraud, nine months after authorities confiscated multiple big-ticket items -- including lawn mowers, a trimmer and other equipment -- from his Bemidji home.According to a criminal complaint, university officials learned that Sande had been using the card for non-university-related purchases after the university received a customer survey about a lawn mower purchased in June 2013 with his BSU Payment Card. (link)

May 05, 2018: A former University of Wisconsin-Madison employee has been charged with stealing more than $100,000 from the university over three years through fraudulent checks, personal purchases and other means, according to a complaint filed in Dane County Circuit Court. Kevin O'Donnell, 54, faces 12 felony charges and two misdemeanors for allegedly stealing $113,890 while he was a purchasing manager for the Division of University Housing. For more than a year, O'Donnell wrote checks meant to look like housing refunds for students that he would mail to his office. He would then forge the students' signatures, sign the checks with "pay to the order of Kevin O'Donnell" and cash them, according to the complaint. (link)

May 04, 2018: A former director at the University of Texas at Austin's law school was arrested Thursday for claiming he was showing up for work while he was actually galavanting in tourist hot spots like Cozumel, Las Vegas and the U.S. Virgin Islands, according to court documents and local law enforcement authorities. Jason Shoumaker, the law school's facilities director until November 2017, is the subject of an ongoing probe by the Travis County District Attorney's Office and the Texas Rangers. Though Shoumaker was taken into custody Thursday over tampering charges, he is at the heart of a major fraud investigation -- one that potentially involves "several million dollars of questionable expenses," a source familiar with the probe said. (link)

May 01, 2018: A Lisle woman has pleaded guilty to forgery and perjury for duplicating signatures when she made a bid for the College of DuPage board. Rafath Waheed, 62, may be able to get the charges dropped if she successfully completes DuPage County's diversion program, according to Chicago Tribune. Waheed was arrested in March 2017 after college administrators said she turned in two pages photo copies that she tried to pass off as authentic signatures to get her onto the board. She was subsequently charged with two counts of forgery, four counts of perjury via and two counts of issuing a forged document. (link)

Compliance/Regulatory & Legal Events

May 29, 2018: The Trump administration plans to shorten the length of validity for some visas issued to Chinese citizens, the State Department said Tuesday, as President Donald Trump works to counter alleged theft of U.S. intellectual property by Beijing. The changes begin June 11. The State Department said that under the new policy, U.S. consular officers may limit how long visas are valid, rather than the usual practice of issuing them for the maximum possible length. (link)

May 25, 2018: A federal District Court judge in Chicago has dismissed claims by participants in two Northwestern University 403(b) plans that the university violated its fiduciary duties under ERISA due to its management of investment choices and fees. The original complaint was filed in August 2016. Among the allegations, participants said Northwestern violated its fiduciary duties by keeping what plaintiffs alleged was an underperforming, high-fee CREF Stock Fund from TIAA-CREF. (link)

May 24, 2018: The University of Chicago has agreed to settle a retirement-plan lawsuit for $6.5 million, becoming the first of about 20 prominent universities facing allegations over 403(b)-plan mismanagement to take such a step. Plaintiffs filed the lawsuit, Daugherty et al v. The University of Chicago, in May 2017. They claimed the university caused its plan participants to pay excessive record-keeping and investment-management fees, depleting their retirement savings. (link)

May 23, 2018: The Arizona Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the state can't criminally charge public college students for having and using marijuana on campus if they have a medical marijuana card. The high court said a 2012 law banning medical marijuana on college campuses violated the Arizona Constitution's protections for voter-approved laws. The court also vacated a marijuana possession conviction for the student, Andre Maestas, who fought the law. (link)

May 23, 2018: Tuskegee University assistant football coach Ramone Nickerson, 33, has plead guilty to possession of a firearm during a drug deal. U.S. Attorney Louis Franklin previously said Nickerson's alleged actions were a concern due to his work with Tuskegee University's football team. Franklin said evidence will show Nickerson was involved in drug activity at the distribution level. (link)

May 17, 2018: University of Kentucky officials are trying to fire a tenured professor because they say he made students buy his book for classes he taught and then kept the proceeds without telling administrators. The move against journalism faculty Buck Ryan -- who was sanctioned for inappropriate behavior in 2016 -- is nearly unprecedented for tenured faculty in the last 50 years at UK, and will be a test of UK's tenure policies and procedures. (link)

May 17, 2018: The University of Denver has agreed to a $2.66 million settlement in a lawsuit filed on behalf of seven female law professors who say they were illegally paid less than male colleagues. According to the lawsuit, the mean salary of female professors at the Sturm College of Law was nearly $20,000 lower than male professors in 2013. The agreement requires the school to create a password-protected site listing faculty salaries, position, date of hire and demographics. Names will not be included. (link)

May 16, 2018: Michigan State University will pay $500 million to settle lawsuits brought by 332 victims of Larry Nassar, the former associate professor and doctor who sexually abused hundreds of young girls and women. The terms of the settlement include $425 million paid to current claimants, and $75 million set aside in a trust fund to protect "any future claimants alleging sexual abuse by Larry Nassar," according to a joint statement from plaintiffs' attorney John Manly and Michigan State University. Michigan State University is expected to pay the $500 million out of pocket and then sue their insurance company to get the money back, according to a source with knowledge of the settlement. (link)

May 16, 2018: For nearly 30 years, the University of Southern California's student health clinic had one full-time gynecologist: Dr. George Tyndall. Tall and garrulous, he treated tens of thousands of female students, many of them teenagers seeing a gynecologist for the first time. Few who lay down on Tyndall's exam table at the Engemann Student Health Center knew that he had been accused repeatedly of misconduct toward young patients. (link)

May 15, 2018: A tenured East Tennessee State University professor could face consequences after an internal investigation found he crossed the line with a student, according to a newly released university discrimination and harassment complaint investigation. The investigation found Associate Professor and Accountancy Department Assistant Chair Dr. Anthony Masino created a hostile environment and retaliated against a woman he started dating while she was a student in his class. The investigation found Dr. Masino repeatedly shared personally identifiable, private and defamatory information about the student with other students, faculty and staff. (link)

May 15, 2018: A controversial wolf researcher will accept a $300,000 settlement to leave Washington State University, the school said. Robert Wielgus, director of the Carnivore Conservation Lab, sued the Pullman school for infringement of his academic freedom. Wielgus angered ranchers with his research of wolf behavior. He concluded the state's policy of killing wolves that preyed on cattle was likely to increase cattle predation because it destabilized the structure of wolf packs. (link)

May 14, 2018: The animal rights activist group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is suing Texas A&M University President Michael K. Young, alleging that the university blocked the group on Facebook and calling the move a violation of the First Amendment. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which filed the lawsuit Monday on behalf of PETA, said it believes Texas A&M has deleted or blocked comments PETA tried to post to the university's Facebook page. (link)

May 14, 2018: A former Carroll University instructor has been found guilty of disorderly conduct on allegations he harassed staff there about this termination, which led to his calling indicted Florida high school shooter Nikolas Cruz "his hero." A psychological evaluation found that Timothy Hoeller, 57, who, according to court records suffers a bipolar mental disorder, was competent to proceed with the Waukesha County criminal charge against him. Hoeller was hired in January 2017 as an adjunct instructor to teach a physics class and and lab, according to court records. Carroll terminated him in April. He is under court order to stay away from campus. (link)

May 14, 2018: A University of Colorado police officer accused of stalking a Boulder campus dispatcher pleaded guilty to first-degree official misconduct on Monday. Sgt. Michael Dodson, 60, was sentenced to 18 months of probation and 100 hours of community service as part of the deal, according to Catherine Olguin, spokeswoman for the Boulder County District Attorney's Office. (link)

May 11, 2018: One of the ringleaders of an unauthorized fraternity operating last year off campus at The College at Brockport pleaded guilty Friday to four criminal charges related to hazing. Leo Woon Keul Chai appeared before Village Justice Christopher R. Martin and entered guilty pleas to charges of first-degree hazing, third-degree assault, intent to cause physical injury and torturing/injuring or failing to feed an animal. (link)

May 10, 2018: When investigators reported in 2015 that 10,000 migrant construction workers employed at New York University's campus in Abu Dhabi had not been paid money they were owed, and were subject to substandard working conditions, the university vowed to reimburse the workers and provide regular updates on its compliance with labor standards. Three years later, thousands of workers may still be owed millions of dollars. And until this week, the university had not released a compliance report. (link)

May 10, 2018: A Court of Queen's Bench judge has rebuked the University of Regina for falsely alleging its carbon capture business partners had committed fraud. In 2012, the university sued HTC Pure Energy and the South Korean-based Doosan group of companies, alleging the two companies had secretly entered into an agreement to commercialize the university's carbon capture technology in exchange for payment, but failed to pay royalties to the U of R. For years HTC and Doosan have been been arguing that the university was falsely alleging fraud in its lawsuit. They said the university knew about the payment all along. And in an October ruling, Justice Kalmakoff agreed. (link)

May 09, 2018: Three teenagers have been arrested in connection to calling 911 and falsely saying there was an active shooter on the campus of West Hills College in Lemoore. Earlier today law enforcement placed the college on lockdown after receiving a report of an active shooter situation. Police say they tried to call back the number, but there were no answers. (link)

May 07, 2018: Professors and staff members at Massachusetts colleges can be sued if they fail to act after learning a student was considering suicide, according to a ruling issued Monday by the state's highest court that for the first time outlines the institutions' legal duty to prevent students from killing themselves. While the decision created new liability for colleges and universities, Justice Scott L. Kafker's ruling did not eliminate all legal protections for schools, professors, and support staff. (link)

May 04, 2018: A senior manager at Rio Salado College is resigning after an investigative report concluded that he touched female employees' breasts and buttocks, stared at them inappropriately and made sexually suggestive comments. The report by the Maricopa County Community College District, obtained by The Arizona Republic under the Arizona Public Records Law, said the investigation substantiated many of the complaints made by "several women" against LeRodrick Terry, Rio Salado's vice president of student affairs. Terry has denied the allegations. (link)

May 04, 2018: Ottawa police said Friday morning they've laid an additional 43 charges of sexual assault and 40 charges of voyeurism against a Chelsea doctor who used to work at the University of Ottawa Health Services Clinic. Dr. Vincent Nadon had previously been charged with 12 counts of sexual assault and voyeurism earlier this year. The initial charges stemmed from a complaint made to police in January by a woman in her 20s, who had been seen by Nadon during an appointment at the university clinic's Rideau location earlier that same month. (link)

May 03, 2018: An 18-year-old woman was charged Thursday with filing a false police report in reference to a Coker College student's arrest last weekend for allegedly raping another student in the bathroom of the school's dorm. Online records from the Darlington County Detention Center state Lauren Emily Pearson was booked at 7:20 p.m. Thursday night for filing the false report. Hartsville Police Lt. Mark Blair indicated Pearson allegedly lied about the sexual assault that led to the arrest of 19-year-old Cesar Antonio Lopez, who was charged with first-degree criminal sexual conduct and kidnapping. (link)

May 03, 2018: An Ohio-based watchdog group has accused the University of Rochester of killing or mistreating dozens of animals in University of Rochester Medical Center labs. Stop Animal Exploitation Now (SAEN), a nonprofit group that monitors U.S. research facilities for animal abuse and violations of laws, on Thursday claimed it has uncovered animal deaths, animal abuse and research malfeasance, which may have involved more than 100 animals. The group also alleges that the university attempted to cover up the incidents, which reportedly occurred in 2016 and 2017. (link)

May 03, 2018: The student newspaper at Del Mar College in Corpus Christi, Texas, says its editor's finals-themed column was "light-hearted." But some are calling it pornography. The column, which The Foghorn News stands by, was titled "Finals aren't the only thing going down," and was published Monday. Finals at Del Mar started on Thursday. The accompanying images have become a hot topic of conversation around the college, as at least one professor has suggested that printing them along with the column could leave Young and the Foghorn susceptible to charges of disseminating pornography to a minor, since the Del Mar campus is also home to Collegiate High School. (link)

May 02, 2018: Allegations of sexual harassment, intimidation, lewd behavior, and racist comments are the subjects of two federal lawsuits filed against Columbia International University's president and his son following the president's tenure at an Ohio university. In those two federal suits, Dr. Mark Smith and his son, Doug Smith, are named as defendants alongside several senior members of Ohio Christian University's staff while Dr. Smith was president. According to one suit, the plaintiff, Cynthia Dove, alleges Doug Smith made numerous sexually charged and racist comments while the two worked together in the school's IT department. (link)

May 02, 2018: University of Illinois at Chicago officials told faculty, staff and students Tuesday that research misconduct by Dr. Mani Pavuluri, one of the campus' star faculty members, was an anomaly and that there are no systemic oversight problems at the institution. The message came after a ProPublica Illinois investigation revealed that the National Institute of Mental Health recently ordered the university to repay $3.1 million in grant money it received to fund one of Pavuluri's studies on bipolar disorder among children. The federal agency demanded the refund in November after finding "serious and continuing noncompliance" by the UIC psychiatrist, as well as failures by a university institutional review board, a faculty panel responsible for reviewing research involving human subjects. (link)

May 01, 2018: Nevada State College President Bart Patterson has been arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence. Patterson, 56, was arrested at 9:45 p.m. Friday near Green Valley Parkway and Warm Springs Road in Henderson after he was involved in a single-car crash. He was driving home from a charity event. (link)

May 01, 2018: The director of the Office of Student Conduct at Central Connecticut State University was placed on administrative leave after being charged with kidnapping and strangulation. On Monday, CCSU officials said Christopher Dukes was placed on administrative leave and notified that he is not allowed access to campus at this time. (link)

May 01, 2018: Roman Fryderyk Urban went from visiting math professor at Purdue University to unemployed over the course of three days and two public intoxication arrests. Forty-eight-year-old Urban appeared confused when he showed up an hour early Friday morning to teach his linear algebra class, according to a student who was there. (link)

May 01, 2018: Two prominent women on University of Minnesota President Eric Kaler's senior leadership team received settlements totaling nearly $300,000 in 2016 after a sexual harassment scandal that ousted former athletic director Norwood Teague, according to newly released documents. Teague resigned from the university Aug. 6, 2015, amid reports that he had drunkenly groped and sexually harassed two women who were not publicly identified at the time. (link)

Campus Life & Safety Events

May 28, 2018: A cell phone video of a former University of Rochester student's arrest on Saturday is making the rounds on social media, with some people questioning whether the arrest was justified and others questioning the actions of a Department of Public Safety officer, who threatened a bystander with arrest for making the recording. The video depicts the arrest by a University Department of Public Safety officer of former student Mohammed Rifat. (link)

May 27, 2018: Royce Foreman was the friend who broke tension and lightened moods, usually by making others laugh. The friend who always said yes to a ride to nowhere. The friend who fit seamlessly into any social group. In the early morning hours of March 30, Foreman texted his parents and younger brother. "I'm sorry," he wrote. "I love you." Two hours later, concerned classmates and campus police at Washington College in Maryland entered Foreman's dorm room and found him unconscious. He had hanged himself. (link)

May 25, 2018: The suspected driver of the SUV that plowed into three pedestrians outside Portland State University earlier this morning has been apprehended by Portland police. Witnesses say the Mazda drove onto a sidewalk near the intersection of Southwest 6th Avenue and Montgomery Street on the PSU campus and hit at least three people. Portland Police say the victims are in the hospital and that two have life-threatening injuries. (link)

May 20, 2018: A message sent out by the University of Oregon's Division of Student Life in the wake of a student death during a weekend trip to Shasta Lake is drawing angry comments from community members. The university apologized for the message Sunday morning. On Saturday, 21-year-old business administration major and member of the Phi Delta Gamma fraternity Dylan Pietrs was found dead at a boat-in campground on the lake in Northern California. (link)

May 14, 2018: As Sonoma State University students Monday headed to final exams, campus police and Petaluma detectives prepared for a morning press conference regarding Sunday's stabbing death at a campus dorm. Officers arrested a "student-aged" man for the death of another man of about the same age range. Police have released no further details about the victim and suspect, including whether the two were students or what led to the violence. (link)

May 08, 2018: On Monday, two employees of Duke University's Joe Van Gogh location had their contracts terminated after vice president for student affairs Larry Moneta and executive director of dining services Robert Coffey demanded that the local coffee chain fire them. Their offense? While he was in the store Friday, Moneta heard a rap song that he found offensive.The incident highlights the precarious relationship between the university and its contracted employees, who are not afforded the same benefits and protections as Duke's full-time employees, but whose employers are not in a position to defend them out of fear of losing business with the university. (link)

May 07, 2018: The University of Florida's apology has fallen short for the graduates whom an usher yanked off the stage this weekend as they danced to celebrate their achievements during a spring commencement ceremony. University of Florida President Kent Fuchs acknowledged that the school had been "inappropriately aggressive" when rushing graduates across the stage Saturday, a videotaped incident that has stirred controversy online amid suggestions that the white usher was motivated by race because the students were black. (link)

May 04, 2018: A University of Alberta student has been charged by police after bomb threats were discovered on a social media app last month. On April 19, police were contacted by University of Alberta Protective Services after a post was discovered on a social media app called Chillabit. The post was made on April 17 and threatened to blow up two university buildings on a future date, possibly on April 30, police said. Police began investigating immediately after the post was detected but found no evidence of any explosives on campus. Police said an evacuation was not necessary. (link)

Other News & Events

If you have any suggestions, questions or feedback, please e-mail me at robinmk@auburn.edu. We hope you find this information useful and would appreciate hearing your thoughts. Feel free to forward this email to your direct reports, colleagues, employees or others who might find it of value. Back issues of this newsletter are available on our web site at https://www.auburn.edu/administration/oacp.

If you have any suggestions for items to include in future newsletters, please e-mail Robert Gottesman at gotterw@auburn.edu.

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