Each of the eight NCAA allegations UNC responded to were correct, both in the accusation and the penalties the University proposed for them. The same cannot be said of the ninth allegation, which got the response it deserved.
Of the nine infractions, only one was contested: the allegation that the athletic department failed to adequately monitor social networking. Athletic director Dick Baddour acted appropriately in calling this allegation “unprecedented,” doing everything in his power to protect UNC from more punishment than the violations merit.
Social media is a relatively new phenomenon. It changes every day, with the “ever-multiplying” number of sites, as the University noted. The NCAA has not only been silent on what is expected of a university’s social media oversight, but it also has yet to penalize an institution for failing in this duty. Given UNC’s cooperation during the investigation, the NCAA should show an understanding of the challenges social media pose and should make a more concrete rule for what is expected of universities in this arena before carrying out any punishment.
But that isn’t the extent of the issue. There are important First Amendment considerations to take into account when a university limits social media use, as the UNC football team did last year by banning Twitter.
Does a university or the NCAA have a right to tell a student athlete that he can’t tweet about what he had for lunch? Because athletes enter into an agreement with the school of their choice, the universities do have the right to do this. But universities take their students’ rights into account, making social media oversight anything but a clear-cut issue.
The NCAA needs to reinforce its social media policy before it makes an example of UNC, as the existing rules are murky at best. Universities can be expected to monitor social media use to ensure that their athletes aren’t creating a bad image for themselves and their schools. But the NCAA can’t expect UNC or any other university to have a policy for that oversight without clearly articulating its expectations.
That should be taken into consideration as the NCAA decides what UNC must ultimately pay for its mistakes.
