The Stetson Reporter

new look | Welcome to the first edition ofthe all-new'Reporter.' Hopefully, you'll find it a bit more user- friendly. Check out page 6a to find horoscopes, a calendar, and the much- *ch requested return of Shout. Send your §11 ;1H. gg Ba'pj comments and criticisms to us at —='=- = *r - =* [email protected]. ■D Cmfide -tel fh ^=1 ay g we jan-00 issue 13 volume 112 NEW LOOK: Construction began Dec. 15 in the Commons. PHOTO BY VALERIE FUTCH Commons upgrade completed by julie gowan | Walking into the Commons, you probably won't notice the .amount of changes that occurred over the past three weeks while students were away for winter break. Upgrades in equipment and ventilation systems were only part of the construction that took place. The Commons closed on Dec. 15 to complete phase two ofthe master plan for the university's dining services. Facilities Management attempted to complete phase two last summer, but the fear of not being able to finish before students returned to campus made Noyes and ,his team to rethink the construction .plans and look for another time period. "The urgency superseded putting the project off, and all of us agreed this time frame would work best. The construction schedule has been followed to a tee," said Noyes. "We had a tight window of opportunity. Strategically this was the best time for the construction to take place. Also a majority of the students were not on campus. The Commons was still open for full breakfast and students ate lunch and dinner in the Hat Rack," said Paul Marcaurelle, director of Dining Services. This was the first'time meals— and not just meal points — were honored in the Hat Rack due to the extent of the construction. Some students felt that their interests were being compromised by the. construction. "There were students on campus still and it felt like the Hat Rack was overrun with customers," commented one student, who agreed to speak only on condition of anonymity. "The Hat Rack is designed to .accommodate 350 students, and from looking at the numbers we had no. day during which over 200 customers were there for the lunch and dinner meals," said Marcaurelle. ' [ see COMMONS, page 3a ] UJ -i _i ui O. < U ft < E "The Hat Rack is designed to accommodate 350 students, and from looking at the numbers we had no day during which over200 customers were there for the lunch and dinner meals." i* x '■ I PP.r- t'.:, ■". . .one of the most unlikely incidents that I have seen in all my years working with information technology., ." SHAHRAM AMIRI VICE PRESIDENT FOR INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY Confidential info placed on shared drive over break z < UJ z < (9 Tilrie Line Dec 31;1999 * Reporter editor-in-chief Jeff * Hamrick discovers the database in The Reporter's - separate folder on the shared drive.-"' • Jan. 6, 2000 Vice. Presidents Beasley and Amiri meet with The Reporter, staff and inform them of the- university's policy concerning personnel information.' '^s^mm^^^^m^ mgmmmmiimsmm Dec. 22,1999 X An* unknown employee accidentally places the. human resources - database in a shared - folder, accessible to all -network users. Jan. 5, 2000 The Reporter staff makes a preliminary decision to publish only the salary , information. CIT is notified of the breach and removes the information from the shared drive. Jan. 7, 2000 The Reporter staff' ultimately decides not to publish the salary ■ information. -VP Beasley issues a directive to Hamrick forbidding publication of the information and ordering the . destruction of any copies of the database.- The Council of Vice Presidents e.mails a version of the directive to stetson-announce. BY JEFF HAMRICK | A file containing personnel data was placed in a shared folder on the university network during winter break, Reporter staff members discovered recently.. The database contains social security numbers, full names, salary figures, American Banker's Association (ABA) routing codes, medical and insurance information, and information related to employee deductions. In response to the breach, the Council of Vice Presidents issued an e.mail last Friday, Jan. 7, to the university community. In the e.mail, the Council ordered "any student or employee of the university who may possess any electronic or print copies of this confidential information...to deliver those copies to the office of Sally Dowling, Director of Administrative Services." The shared folder, called "SCT-list," was created about two years ago to "make available common documentation related to Banner training," said Dr. Shahram Amiri, Vice President for Information Technology. According to the September 1998 issue of The Spirit, the Banner system is "based on the Oracle relational database, and is installed at... over one thousand other colleges and universities across the nation." The first conversion—the conversion of the university's finance module—occurred earlier this year. The database was accidentally placed on the shared folder during testing of the module for the Department of Human Resources, said Amiri. Both Amiri and Nick Ganesan, Director of Network Services, said that they did not entirely understand why SCT-list was available to student users on the network. Ganesan, who was employed at the university after the creation of SCT-list, said that he "assumed at the time that the documentation would also be used by students." "A shared drive is a workspace that enables computer users to exchange files and information," said Amiri. Members of the team that is [I] assumed at the time that the working on the documentation human resources would also be used by students." IH IH < payroll, in one of the most unlikely incidents that I have seen in all my years working with information technology,, accidentally placed the database in the publicly accessible drive," said Amiri. According to Amiri, the database was placed on the network around Dec. 22. Amiri said that the employees, whom he declined to name, were under the impression that SCT-list was a secure shared folder. Amiri emphasized several times that "the network itself is completely secure...Novell is robust, strong software...this was a very terrible, terrible human error." Ganesan said that there "is a less than one- in-a-thousand chance of something like this happening." "We really don't know who put the information out there.. .there are multiple people working with this information," said Ganesan. A member ofthe faculty, speaking to The Reporter on [ see DATA, page 3a ] Administration committed act of prior restraint, says staff BY JEFF HIDEK | When university officials forbade The Reporter to publish salary information, they were committing an act of prior restraint, The Reporter staff announced. Last week, The Reporter staff obtained a copy of a human resources database from the university's public shared drive.' On Wednesday, the staff met to determine if the salary information in the database should be published. "After weighing the ethical and legal issues and considering the sustained history of faculty interest in the publication of this data, the staff made a preliminary decision to publish only the salary information," said Editor-in-Chief Jeff Hamrick. "The staff was concerned about the ethical implications of their decision," Leslie McMasters, assistant director of Student Life and staff adviser to The Reporter, said. "There ONLY ONLINE Head to 'The Reporter Online' (http://reporter.stetson.edu) to see copies of: Faculty petition calling for salary publication Privacy Policy 4.11.005 Excerpts from the Board's constitution Lee's memorandum to Beasley Beasley's memorandum to Hamrick Hamrick's response to Beasley had apparently been some interest [in the salary information] at some prior time, which the staff considered newsworthy." In 1997, Dr. Kevin O'Keefe generated a petition signed by 102 faculty members requesting publication of faculty salaries. Vice President Jim Beasley cites "the protection, of privacy and confidentiality" of university employees as the reason why the university does not publish this information At 10:00 a.m. on Jan. 6, Hamrick met with Beasley and Vice President Shahram Amiri. "They asked me what the staff intended to do with the database. This is probably inappropriate, because The Re- [ see BREACH, page 3a ] X.'j r. FRAG could increase by valerie futch | The State Board of Education recently approved an education budget that included an increase in the Florida Resident Access Grant (FRAG) from $2074 to $3000. This increase will result in benefits to not only students, but to state universities as well, according to press releases from the Independent Colleges and Universities of Florida organization (ICUF). It costs the state of Florida and taxpayers 60 percent less to send students to private universities as opposed to state universities ICUF also reports. Ultimately, if this budget passes, it will result in savings of approximately $27 million, according to a press release from ICUF. According to Mary Napier, associate vice president of enrollment management, the university supports the increase in the FRAG. She said that the university is a member of ICUF and therefore helps provide lobbying and publicity for the issue. [ read this story in News, page 2a ] 'Mr. Ripley' well-acted Mpp ■** -Bpppp ^-^mLW!&-:u^Pi£% ■ ^ I \:\9 OSCAR-WORTHY?: Gwyneth Paltrow, Jude Law and Matt Damon in The Talented Mr. Ripley.' photo courtsey of TROIKA ENTERTAINMENT [ read this story in Life, page 2b ] Samford Bulldogs defeat Hatters 73-53 by andrea maginot | Starting at tip off and carrying right through the rest ofthe game the Samford Bulldogs had control of the court. With a tight defense and a consistent offense, the Bulldogs defeated the Hatters 73-57 last Tuesday night. Up against the defending TAAC championship team, the Hatters played well, but Samford steadily controlled and soundly defeated the Hatters. Starting for Stetson were Kelly Hite, Ravii Givens, Sebastian Singletary, Derrick DeWitt, and Santos Hampton. Givens put Stetson on the board with a three pointer at 1:56, putting Stetson ahead by one. What followed was a close match where each basket by the Hatters was matched by a basket by the Bulldogs. [ read this story in Sports, page 4b ]