A computer specialist for the Fresno (CA) Central Unified School District quit Wednesday after a fellow employee reported him for an email message that was sent from his district email account, the Associated Press reports today. The fellow employee was offended by the email, district spokeswoman Courtney Roque-Bautista said. Other employees may face disciplinary action.
KFSN-TV said that the email was racist, challenged recipients to forward the message and included the following sentence:
"You are proud to be black, brown, yellow, and orange, and you're not afraid to announce it. But when we announce our white pride you call us racists."
The full text was not reported -- and even if it was, I would not dignify it by printing it here. But, superintendent Marilou Ryder gives some insight when she said, "Messages that depict racial slurs, obscene language or violence have no place in our school environment."
My concern is that the action took place AFTER the email was "reported by a fellow employee who was offended." By the time that happened, I am guessing that the message was forwarded on by other people and more people got offended. Real-time notification systems are available at academic prices. They can be set to protect privacy, monitor only for certain things, and report only to certain people. Our company does it (InBoxer) and others do too.
I would never recommend stopping the free flow of ideas that is essential to any academic environment. Therefore, I do not believe in restricting access. But, the speed at which email can spread calls for new measures. We can be alerted to problems in a careful way. Therefore, we should not have to wait until dozens of people are offended and one takes the time to report a rogue email.
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