A year and a half is a long time to wait for most things, but especially something that the state of North Carolina requires be given to you quickly.
On Thursday, the University finally complied with a public records request I made in the fall of 2011 — a whopping 514 days after submission.
A lot has changed in 17 months. Most importantly, the records I sought have become — not surprisingly — largely useless.
On Nov. 7, 2011, prompted by widespread speculation about the role of the Department of African and Afro-American Studies and its chairman in the athletic controversy of the day, I requested grade distributions for all classes in the department for the previous five years.
The request is a relic, a demonstration of just how little we knew then about what would months later be called one of the worst academic scandals in the University’s history. I knew nothing of the fake classes or forged grade rolls detailed in UNC’s own report on the department released six months later.
Of course, the request was also rather large. But N.C. public records law dictates that all requests be filled “as promptly as possible.” I can’t conceive of a way in which 514 days meets this standard, especially when multiple UNC-sponsored reviews have analyzed data similar to, if not the same as, what I was seeking.
I write this not to lambast administrators for their slow response time, but to argue that the low priority they place on accountability in this respect is a great disservice to the public they serve.
Had my Nov. 7, 2011 request been filled earlier, it could have provided valuable answers to the questions of the time. And, more importantly, it would have demonstrated a sense of accountability by the University to the public that pays its bills.
I accepted that my oldest request was a lost cause a long time ago (around its first birthday). But I haven’t lost hope on the following pending requests, which could still fill in the blanks on some critical issues:
