Carleton and the Ottawa Citizen are in dispute over whether the university should make its student grade records public.
An Access to Information request filed last year by the Citizen requested all grades Carleton assigned each student in every course since 1999.
Carleton denied the request, stating an invasion of privacy and potential for economic harm, according to their legal submissions quoted by the Citizen.
The Citizen appealed the denial and the case is now before Ontario’s Information and Privacy Commissioner for adjudication.
“Carleton’s legal arguments are based on our respect for the privacy of our students, first and foremost,” said Carleton media relations co-ordinator Chris Cline. “They have chosen Carleton with an expectation that their personal information will be kept confidential and that is codified in our academic record policy. Carleton does not display grades publicly.”
Because the request did not ask for information like student names or dates of birth, Glen McGregor, the Citizen reporter who filed the request, said the information is anonymous and does not violate privacy.
He said this was not an issue for the University of British Columbia or Simon Fraser University, who have made their students’ grades public.
“Carleton University is a publicly funded institution,” he said, “and there should be public oversight on everything that is done at the university.”
“We should know that Carleton is awarding about the right number of [each grade]. They should not be out of line of provincial norms,” he said.
According to the Citizen, Carleton said the release of grades could cause economic harm to the university.
“If Carleton’s grades were seen to be ‘softer,’ this “reputation as an ‘easy’ school would harm Carleton’s ability to attract investment in new programs or research by diminishing the credibility of the work being done at Carleton,” Carleton’s lawyer wrote in legal submissions to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner quoted by the Citizen.
“Instead of a fulsome consideration of all factors, choice for students may be reduced to a comparison of the number of ‘A’s’ awarded in a particular program at a particular school,” said Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA) co-ordinator for Carleton Robert Moher.
McGregor said he doesn’t believe students base their decision to attend a university on the grades they expect to receive, but even if they did, that this is more reason to make the grades public.
“If students are, as Carleton submits, making their decisions on where to go to university based on the likelihood of getting a good grade, then that information should be as public as all the other information they consider when they make the choice of where they’re going to go to school,” he said.
McGregor said if Carleton’s FIPPA exemptions from providing the grades — which are invasion of privacy and economic harm — are disregarded by the adjudicator, the decision will be made on public interest.
“Our newspaper always believes that sunshine disinfects, and organizations that are funded by the government and by student tuition fees should be as transparent as possible,” he said. “I don’t think Carleton is doing that in this case.”
McGregor said that if the adjudicator finds in favour of the Citizen, they will have a precedent from Carleton to take to every other university in the province.
“If we get a clear ruling from the adjudicator on the Carleton case it would be very foolish of any other post-secondary institution to anonymize student grade records,” he said.
