2008 Woodie Awards
'Stalker guides' must go
Issue date: 11/19/07 Section: Op-Ed
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The 2007-2008 campus telephone directories are out! Don't know what we're talking about? The stalker guides.
Oh riiiiight, the stalker guides.
The "Stalker guide" seems to be a more appropriate name for the 200-page annual publication than "campus telephone directory." After all, only 34 pages of it are dedicated to the on-campus telephone numbers of faculty, staff and administration. The vast majority of the publication-100 pages-is dedicated to the publication of the private contact information of University students and their families. What exactly is publicized? Well, among pieces of more benign information such as students' initials and area of study, students' full home mailing addresses and telephone numbers are listed.
That's right, your home mailing address - where perhaps younger siblings, elderly grandparents, or both are living - is printed in a "telephone guide" that is circulated on campus. The books are piled in stacks on a table 15 feet from the entrance to Sykes - a building any Joe or Jill could walk into. They could easily reach the hands of an angered or deranged student seeking revenge on another student. The devastating possibilities are virtually endless.
Most students know about the stalker guide. And most concur that it is unbeneficial. But parents probably don't know about the publication, as they are not mailed home and generally do not leave campus. To test this theory, a Quad editor randomly selected ten entries from the 100-page student section of the directory and called the homes of ten students to listen to what their parents had to say about the "telephone guides." Of the 10 homes called, six parents answered - four mothers and two fathers. None of them wanted us to quote their responses, and frankly, some were too unsanitary for publication anyway. All six agreed that we should not have been able to call them and asked how they could get their information removed from the publication. We did not leave messages at the four homes that did not answer the phone.
Oh riiiiight, the stalker guides.
The "Stalker guide" seems to be a more appropriate name for the 200-page annual publication than "campus telephone directory." After all, only 34 pages of it are dedicated to the on-campus telephone numbers of faculty, staff and administration. The vast majority of the publication-100 pages-is dedicated to the publication of the private contact information of University students and their families. What exactly is publicized? Well, among pieces of more benign information such as students' initials and area of study, students' full home mailing addresses and telephone numbers are listed.
That's right, your home mailing address - where perhaps younger siblings, elderly grandparents, or both are living - is printed in a "telephone guide" that is circulated on campus. The books are piled in stacks on a table 15 feet from the entrance to Sykes - a building any Joe or Jill could walk into. They could easily reach the hands of an angered or deranged student seeking revenge on another student. The devastating possibilities are virtually endless.
Most students know about the stalker guide. And most concur that it is unbeneficial. But parents probably don't know about the publication, as they are not mailed home and generally do not leave campus. To test this theory, a Quad editor randomly selected ten entries from the 100-page student section of the directory and called the homes of ten students to listen to what their parents had to say about the "telephone guides." Of the 10 homes called, six parents answered - four mothers and two fathers. None of them wanted us to quote their responses, and frankly, some were too unsanitary for publication anyway. All six agreed that we should not have been able to call them and asked how they could get their information removed from the publication. We did not leave messages at the four homes that did not answer the phone.
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Tim
posted 11/19/07 @ 7:42 PM EST
I agree, we should get rid of the stalker's guide. While we're at it, let's get rid of phone books as well.
Oh, and while we're at it, that Internet thing? It has to go, too. (Continued…)
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