Issues board faces opposition

By MICHELE E. JOHNSTON
Collegian Staff Writer

After a semester of people posting personal letters complaining about specific individuals rather than relevant issues, Council of Commonwealth Student Governments Coordinator John Gosart has requested the CCSG issues board be removed from the Gopher network.

When repeated attempts to control negativity and correct misuse of the issues forum failed, he decided keeping the issues forum on the Internet was no longer in the council's best interest, Gosart said.

"The issues forum had become a computer boxing ring," he said.

Gosart contacted Chester M. Smith at the Center for Academic Computing to have the board taken off. Smith, assistant professor of computer science, said he received the request from Gosart around Feb. 28. However, the issues forum has not been removed.

Smith said he purged the old postings from the system, but the menu is still available and people can still post in the forum. A new posting was placed in this category on Wednesday.

"My inclination is to just leave it there," Smith said, adding that despite Gosart's request to have the forum removed, it will remain on the system.

"(The forum) has its pros and cons and you have to take the good with the bad," he said.

Smith said CCSG has options other than having an issues forum. He said the organization could place postings in the general news board for the University, but this would mean the postings would be in a list of many other issues.

Another option the group has, Smith said, is to open the board as a moderated issues forum, in which someone could serve as a moderator for the postings and judge whether the postings are acceptable.

Steve Landon, Penn State Erie Student Government Association commuter council president, posted on the Gopher issues forum last semester. Landon said he stopped posting because his points were not being listened to -- only argued against.

"The purpose, as I understood it, was to discuss issues, but others used the board to argue," he said.

Landon said he sees a need and value for the issues forum, but guidelines need to be made known and leadership is necessary.

"We as CCSG need to determine what we are going to use it for," he said.

Gosart said a regional posting board may be implemented in the future to replace the issues forum, but it will not happen during his term. In this type of board, postings would be made about events and issues at the various Commonwealth Campuses.

"This is not a primary concern in my mind," Gosart said, adding that other issues, such as budget cuts, are more relevant right now.