Administrators at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Conn. have threatened to fire a student newspaper editor after he criticized a university policy that prohibits the newspaper from publishing stories online between print editions.
Quinnipiac officials made the threat after Jason Braff, editor of The Chronicle, wrote an editorial about the publication’s required online policy and gave an interview about it to a local newspaper, The New York Times reported Dec. 2. According to the Times,
The policy was established the previous school year, after the paper reported a story, about an off-the-court incident involving players on the men’s basketball team, first online.
Braff had argued publicly that the policy restricted the newspaper’s ability to report breaking news. But school administrators claimed the policy was meant to “reduce the potential for serious error in light of a student’s enthusiasm to release ‘breaking news.’”
Braff told the Times that he received a letter Nov. 2 from the school’s vice president and dean of students, Manuel C. Carreiro, threatening his job. The letter reportedly read in part:
“Please understand that any disregard for university or Student Center policies, or any public statement by you expressing disagreement with such policies, will seriously place your position and organization at risk with the university.”
If fired, Braff would likely lose an $8,000 stipend, or scholarship, he receives for his position on the paper.
Margarita E. Diaz, faculty adviser to The Chronicle, told the Times:
“Any attempt by the university to control the statements by any student leader, whether it is about university policies, or anything else going on on campus, I see as an attack on freedom of speech on campus.”
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