Colleges Keeping Tabs on Student Athletes Using Facebook
More and more college coaches are signing up for Facebook accounts, but not because they want to fraternize with students. Rather, college administrators and athletic directors are asking them to monitor athletes’ profiles and Facebook activities. Some have gone as far as banning their athletes from having Facebook profiles altogether, and kicking them off teams for “inappropriate” Facebook behavior. While it is understandable that colleges would like to maintain their reputations, I think that this going a bit too far.
If college’s can get away with tracking student athletes’ Facebook profiles, what’s next? Tracking the debate team? The obsession with tracking individuals through Facebook is not just limited to the corporate world anymore it appears, where for sometime now human resource management has been spying on students’ profiles and using them to determine hiring. Allowing the “adult” world into Facebook seems to have defeated the entire purpose of the site, and now people’s profiles are being held against them in more ways than many would have thought of.
Even if Facebook didn’t allow corporate people, instructors, coaches, and so on into the system, there wouldd still be spies. So, I guess this just goes to show you to be aware of what kind of information (and photos) you put online because it will come back to haunt you in one way or another. Big Brother is watching.
November 12th, 2007 at 4:18 pm
In a way coaches do have the right to keep track of the athletes. But looking at their facebook is almost like stalking. Who wants their coach watching there every move? I have 3 siblings that played Division I sports and I am pretty sure ever though they didn’t have anything to hide, they would want someone always looking at everything they did.