According to Inside Higher Ed, a new report about the Virginia Tech shooter puts the blame on college lawyers:
“Throughout our meetings and in every breakout session, we heard differing interpretations and confusion about legal restrictions on the ability to share information about a person who may be a threat to self or to others,” states the Report to the President on Issues Raised by the Virginia Tech Tragedy, released Wednesday and compiled by the U.S. Departments of Education, Health and Human Services and Justice. Fears of violating state privacy laws, statutes designed to prevent discrimination of people with mental illness — and, of course, the federal Health Insurance Portability Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy Rule and the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) — can serve to “chill legitimate information sharing,” the report reads.
“It was almost universally observed that these fears and misunderstandings likely limit the transfer of information in more significant ways than is required by law,” the report says.
OK, I’m reading a little bit into that, because I have long-standing complaints with a number of academic practices that I think are based in a much-too-cautious approach to various state and federal laws. I tend to blame lawyers for that, mostly because the meetings explaining those policies inevitably involve lawyers who refuse to give any definitive answers to questions, and that drives me right up the goddamn wall.