The Northwestern women's soccer players had no idea what a stir afew pictures could cause.
They should have.
Teens, tweens and college students are using the Internet as theirprimary means of communication these days, posting personalinformation, photos and random thoughts to share with friends. Butit's not only friends and acquaintances getting the all-access pass,and some athletes are finding themselves overexposed.
"People are under the assumption that whatever they post is onsome top-secret Web site that nobody can get to. It's not," said JohnPlanek, athletic director at Chicago's Loyola University. "The wholeworld can see it. That's why there are three letters at the beginningof it: the World Wide Web."
Schools are scrambling to adjust. Last December, Planek toldLoyola's athletes to get off Facebook.com, a social-networking siteprimarily for high school and college students, or risk losing theirscholarships. The Ramblers also are strongly discouraged from postingon similar sites such as MySpace.com or Webshots.com.
Earlier this week, a high school district in suburban Chicagoapproved disciplinary action against athletes and students in otherextracurriculars for inappropriate or illegal activity on blogs andWeb sites. Universities throughout the country are reminding studentsto think before they post.
"One of the suggestions I make to athletic departments is toinform your athletes that when you're using Facebook or other socialnetworks, or even blogs, they're subject to public scrutiny," saidMichael Bugeja, director of the Greenlee School of Journalism andCommunication at Iowa State and author of "Interpersonal Divide: TheSearch for Community in a Technological Age."
"You might as well be talking to a reporter if you're a studentwho participates in the public arena," Bugeja added. "Think ahead oftime about the possible consequences of your actions. If you're ableto live with the consequences, then you do it. If you're not able tolive with the consequences, then you don't."
Never was that more clear than with last week's rash of photosshowing athletes behaving badly. On May 15, the badjocks.com Web sitepublished photos of the Northwestern women's soccer team in analleged hazing. Players were dressed in T-shirts and underwear inseveral of the pictures, while team members were blindfolded and hadtheir hands tied behind their backs in others.
Two days later, badjocks.com posted photos of alleged hazing byclub or varsity athletes at 11 other schools, including Princeton,Michigan, Wake Forest and UC-Santa Barbara. Iowa is investigating itsbaseball team for possible inappropriate behavior after photos ofcollege-age men standing naked with hats over their genitals werefound on another Web site.
Hazing is forbidden at most schools, and Northwestern suspendedthe soccer team pending an investigation. In an apology releasedearlier this week, the players said they were surprised andembarrassed at the attention they've drawn.
"We never foresaw that what began as a well-intentioned night ofteam unity and celebration would have such severe consequences," theplayers wrote in the letter, published Monday in the school's studentnewspaper, The Daily Northwestern, "and we are embarrassed that ouractions have become the source of such harsh criticism."
While some grumble that attempts to crack down on posting is aninvasion of privacy or a violation of First Amendment rights,educators say they're well within their rights. Nobody is tellingstudent-athletes they can't post, said Prentiss Lea, the associatesuperintendent at Community High School District 128 in suburbanChicago, which voted this week to make inappropriate posts subject todisciplinary action.
They just want kids to be smarter about it.
"As I told it to our student-athletes, parents entrust the well-being of their student-athletes with the university and with theathletic department," Planek said. "I look at it as protecting andmaintaining the well-being of the student-athletes, and making surethey're in a safe environment."
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