Remember that scene in National Lampoon’s Van Wilder where Tara Reid pulls the fire alarm and snags a bunch of educational records? Maybe things at Coolidge College are that easy, but at SMU the thought of getting any sort of records at any time is pretty laughable.

One of the most agitating aspects of studying journalism at SMU is not the curriculum. It is not the teachers. It is not the work. No, what will really make a journalism student’s blood boil at SMU is the fact that the administration answers to no one. Most schools have some sort of protection in the form of FERPA, or the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. In a nutshell, this protects student records from nosy little reporters like me.

But at SMU and other private universities, FERPA isn’t even needed. Private universities don’t have to tell you anything they don’t want to. Think the Freedom of Information Act will help? Think again. You can Google laws left and right and you’ll still be stuck without any records. Ask for a record, and someone may tell you it’s protected under FERPA, but if you do your homework and find out that it isn’t, they still won’t give anything to you.

And don’t think you’ll find a lot online. If you do come across some piece of informational gold, consider yourself highly lucky. You’ve gotten farther than most of us have, and probably ever will at private universities.

You really shouldn’t even bother trying to get police records, either. The police go through the university. Once again, huge steel door blocking your path to information that would normally be considered “public record.”

So basically, you can go to the local or state courthouse to find almost whatever you want on criminal cases, but if you think you can ask the school how many fraternity violations there have been in the past two years you are in for a rude awakening. You may as well ask a brick wall to move over a few feet. It’s just not going to happen.

So let’s review: FERPA, pointless. Freedom of Information Act, pointless. Open records request forms, pointless. Computer Assisted Reporting classes, pointless. Gumshoe reporting, stopped in its tracks.

Next time you want to do any sort of fact checking you may as well give up on SMU. You can pull out your hair, bang your head against the wall or even scream your lungs out. You will still come out disappointed.

You’ll do much better looking up records for a non-university affiliated police department online. You can find really grisly murder details.

-Liz Ford

Managing Editor