Choate Apologizes for Sexual Abuse

Choate

Private school Choate Rosemary Hall, in Wallingford, CT, has uncovered sexual abuse by 12 faculty members. According to a report commissioned by the board of trustees, abuse going back to the 1960s was mishandled:

"Sexual misconduct matters were handled internally and quietly. Even when a teacher was terminated or resigned in the middle of the school year because he or she had engaged in sexual misconduct with a student, the rest of the faculty was told little and sometimes nothing about the teacher's departure and, when told, was cautioned to say nothing about the situation if asked."

Some faculty were given recommendations to transfer to other schools.

In a "Message to the Choate Rosemary Hall Community," posted on the website, the board chair and headmaster review the facts, thank the victims for coming forward, apologize, and promise action. The school hired Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) to review its policies and make recommendations. One conclusion in the letter follows:

RAINN has noted the strength of Choate's current confidentiality, amnesty, retaliation, and mandatory reporting policies; progressive training and education for students; and faculty and staff who are caring, empathetic, and supportive while preventing and responding to sexual misconduct on campus. Their recommendations call for continued codification of policies and procedures for reporting and investigating incidents, further review and refinement of adjudication processes, and additional training for faculty and staff who respond to incidents of sexual misconduct. We believe a commitment to constantly improving standards will provide more understanding and protection for our students.

Discussion:

• I'm skeptical reading the excerpt above. So, your policies are great? You just need to follow them? And of course, you need to do training, which everyone seems to say in these situation. Read the entire letter and form your own opinion. Am I too harsh?
• Should Choate have this letter prominently on its website? I followed a link from The New York Times, but I don't see any reference to the statement. What are the arguments for and against posted something, say, on the home page?

Facebook Responds to Video of a Murder

Facebook is on the defense after a video of a murder was posted to the site. Steven Stephens filmed himself shooting a 74-year-old man for no reason except a dispute with his girlfriend, and he said it was his fourteenth killing. Stephens shot himself as police where closing in after a tip from McDonald's drive-thru employees.

Facebook is criticized for taking more than two hours to remove the video. CEO Mark Zuckerberg extended his sympathy to the victim's family: "Our hearts go out to the family and friends of Robert Godwin Sr., and we have a lot of work - and we will keep doing all we can to prevent tragedies like this from happening."

On its website, the company posted an article, "Community Standards and Reporting," about the incident and included a message from Zuckerberg. "Mark Zuckerberg, speaking at F8, Facebook's developer conference said today, 'We have a lot more to do here. We're reminded of this this week by the tragedy in Cleveland. Our hearts go out to the family and friends of Robert Godwin Sr. We have a lot of work and we will keep doing all we can to prevent tragedies like this from happening.'" The article also listed a timeline of events:

Timeline of Events
11:09AM PDT - First video, of intent to murder, uploaded. Not reported to Facebook.
11:11AM PDT - Second video, of shooting, uploaded.
11:22AM PDT - Suspect confesses to murder while using Live, is live for 5 minutes.
11:27AM PDT - Live ends, and Live video is first reported shortly after.
12:59PM PDT - Video of shooting is first reported.
1:22PM PDT - Suspect's account disabled; all videos no longer visible to public.

Here's Facebook's commitment to improving its process: 

In addition to improving our reporting flows, we are constantly exploring ways that new technologies can help us make sure Facebook is a safe environment. Artificial intelligence, for example, plays an important part in this work, helping us prevent the videos from being reshared in their entirety. (People are still able to share portions of the videos in order to condemn them or for public awareness, as many news outlets are doing in reporting the story online and on television). We are also working on improving our review processes. Currently, thousands of people around the world review the millions of items that are reported to us every week in more than 40 languages. We prioritize reports with serious safety implications for our community, and are working on making that review process go even faster.

Keeping our global community safe is an important part of our mission. We are grateful to everyone who reported these videos and other offensive content to us, and to those who are helping us keep Facebook safe every day.

Image source.

Discussion:

• In the post, Facebook says it disabled the man's account 23 minutes after the video was reported. What do you think of that time frame?
• According to the post, the first video, in which Stephen says he plans to kill, wasn't reported until 1 hour and 50 minutes after it was posted. Why do you think it took so long?

United CEO Speaks Out

After an insufficient apology, United CEO Oscar Munoz has changed his tune. In an interview with ABC News, Munoz said, "This first thing I think is important to say is to apologize to Dr. Dau, his family, the passengers on that flight, our customers, our employees. That is not who our family at United is. You saw us at a bad moment."

Munoz also changed his view of the passenger. In a letter to employees, he seemed to blame the passenger, but in the interview, he said Dr. Dau wasn't at fault at all, although he did pause before saying so.

When asked why he didn't communicate "that shame" (he said he was "ashamed"), Munoz said he wanted to get the "facts and circumstances first." He also said his words didn't reflect what they were really feeling.

He explained that the incentive model needs to be re-evaluated because it clearly works better before people have boarded. For the future, Munoz said they will never bring a law enforcement official on a flight to remove a paying passenger again.

Discussion:

• How did Munoz do in the interview? What principles of crisis communication did he demonstrate, and where did he fall short?
• What else should Munoz have said?
• Analyze Munoz's delivery skills. How would you advise him to approach future interviews?
• Southwest and other airlines are taking full advantage of the situation. What are the potential downsides of ads like the one here?

Wells Fargo Blames a Manager

Wells Fargo Traffic

An investigation led by Wells Fargo's board into the practices that led to thousands of false accounts blames Carrie Tolstedt, the former head of the retail division: 

The root cause of sales practice failures was the distortion of the Community Bank's sales culture and performance management system, which, when combined with aggressive sales management, created pressure on employees to sell unwanted or unneeded products to customers and, in some cases, to open unauthorized accounts.

The report also says the former CEO John Stumpf was "too slow" to investigate possible issues. The report is public on Wells Fargo's website.

Tolstedt's lawyers dispute the allegations. Stumpf once referred to Tolstedt as the "best banker in America." Reuters reported:

Tolstedt was perceived by high-level employees as having the support of Stumpf, with whom it was considered best to avoid raising problems with.

"Stumpf was ultimately responsible for enterprise risk management at Wells Fargo, but was not perceived within Wells Fargo as someone who wanted to hear bad news or deal with conflict," the report said.

Duke Law School Professor James Cox told Reuters, "There's a tremendous amount of pressure from regulators to throw someone under the bus. If they don't, then Wells Fargo is going to be even more in the crosshairs."

In a statement, "Wells Fargo Statement Regarding Board Investigation into the Community Bank's Retail Sales Practices," CEO and President Tim Sloan summarized actions the bank has taken: // <![CDATA[ // <![CDATA[ // <![CDATA[ // <![CDATA[ // if this line executes, then javascript is turned on and we'll therefore remove the no-js class from the HTML tag document.documentElement.className = document.documentElement.className.replace(/(^|\s)no-js(\s|$)/, '$1$2'); // ]]> // ]]> // ]]> // ]]</p></div>

New Facebook App for Spotting Fake News

Facebook is launching a new app for spotting what the company is calling "false news and hoaxes." In a blog post titled "A New Educational Tool Against Misinformation," the company explains the new tool:

We know people want to see accurate information on Facebook – and so do we. False news and hoaxes are harmful to our community and make the world less informed. All of us have a responsibility to curb the spread of false news.

At Facebook we have been focusing on three key areas:

• disrupting economic incentives because most false news is financially motivated;
• building new products to curb the spread of false news; and
• helping people make more informed decisions when they encounter false news.

Facebook and Google has been under pressure to address the increasing number of offensive and incorrect posts on their sites. This is Facebook's latest strategy to take responsibility and address the criticism that such sites are not doing enough.

The tool offers the following advice:

1. Be skeptical of headlines. False news stories often have catchy headlines in all caps with exclamation points. If shocking claims in the headline sound unbelievable, they probably are.

2. Look closely at the URL. A phony or look-alike URL may be a warning sign of false news. Many false news sites mimic authentic news sources by making small changes to the URL. You can go to the site and compare the URL to established sources.

3. Investigate the source. Ensure that the story is written by a source that you trust with a reputation for accuracy. If the story comes from an unfamiliar organization, check their "About" section to learn more.

4. Watch for unusual formatting. Many false news sites have misspellings or awkward layouts. Read carefully if you see these signs.

5. Consider the photos. False news stories often contain manipulated images or videos. Sometimes the photo may be authentic, but taken out of context. You can search for the photo or image to verify where it came from.

6. Inspect the dates. False news stories may contain timelines that make no sense, or event dates that have been altered.

7. Check the evidence. Check the author's sources to confirm that they are accurate. Lack of evidence or reliance on unnamed experts may indicate a false news story.

8. Look at other reports. If no other news source is reporting the same story, it may indicate that the story is false. If the story is reported by multiple sources you trust, it's more likely to be true.

9. Is the story a joke? Sometimes false news stories can be hard to distinguish from humor or satire. Check whether the source is known for parody, and whether the story's details and tone suggest it may be just for fun.

10. Some stories are intentionally false. Think critically about the stories you read, and only share news that you know to be credible.

Discussion:

• To what extent do you think this will address the concerns about fake news?
• Which of the suggestions for spotting fake news do you find most and least helpful? Which are more obvious than others?
• What else, if anything, should Facebook do?