Anonymous reporting jeopardizes validity

By Andrew Haesloop

Last month, Santa Clara introduced its new method for economizing and standardizing the reporting of incidents of bias, discrimination and harassment. This new system, while completely legal, potentially violates the relationship that we, as students, should expect from a university of Santa Clara's caliber.

On Wednesday, Jan. 23, students received an e-mail from the Office of Student Life which briefly outlined the new system. The school is using the Ethicspoint.com Web site, where anyone -- and I literally mean anyone with Internet access -- can fill out a short, simple form, which EthicsPoint promises to forward to university officials.

Sounds easy, right? Perhaps a little too easy.

The e-mail encourages students to report "all incidents," providing examples but no criteria for which incidents should or should not be reported on the site.

The site is designed to be used by students, faculty and staff of the university. However, EthicsPoint offers its users the option of creating a report anonymously. Furthermore, the site utilizes no mechanism for even determining whether a report is genuine or just the product of someone with a grudge.

The only requirements for making an anonymous report are Internet access, the knowledge that Santa Clara subscribes to the Web site and the ability to type "Santa Clara University."

The level of anonymity provided by this system is magnified by the fact that it operates online, and uses a set form to collect information.

Anonymous reporting is designed to provide protection to those who are victims of threats, and who might otherwise be intimidated from making a report to the university.

However, when determining the validity and seriousness of the claims made against members of our community, shouldn't the university know who is making the accusation?

It is certainly within the power of university officials to keep secret the identity of those victims or witnesses of bias and hate incidents who come forward in person, by phone, e-mail, letter or otherwise.

Finally, I find it reasonably concerning to note that university officials will be reading anonymous online reports about members of this community, and attempting to discern their validity, even when the reports provide little or no hard evidence.

This reminds me of the absurd online reports that accuse Barack Obama of hiding a secret extremist Islamic ideology (he has been a practicing Christian and going to the same church for 20 years).

These reports have the potential to ruin a person's reputation, relationships and standing in the community, whether or not they are a public figure.

The university should make it clear that we will stand by the victims and witnesses of hate and bias if they come forward, but we will never be able to take anonymous reports seriously enough when something so fundamental as a person's reputation is on the line.

The bottom line is that universities such as Santa Clara provide an important arena for open discussion about issues of identity, race, bias and our civil rights.

Such an arena should do more than provide a safe, anonymous place for the reporting of these incidents.

The university should encourage open and honest reporting and discussion so that we can tackle these issues together as a community. No victim should feel that they must remain anonymous in reporting an incident of bias or harassment.

If we can get these issues out into the open, making it clear that we are united against hate, anonymous reporting will never be necessary.

Andrew Haesloop is a senior political science major.