A federal judge in Kansas on Wednesday ordered Johnson County Community College to reinstate a nursing student who sued after being dismissed for posting a picture of a human placenta on Facebook, The Kansas City Star reported. The student who sued, Doyle Byrnes, had argued that she and three other students who were also suspended believed they had their instructor’s permission to post the photo. The judge, Eric F. Melgren, said that that was a key issue in the case, and that the college had not established that the students’ action was a clear violation of professional conduct. The college said in a statement that it would abide by the ruling and reinstate all four students.
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9 Responses to Judge Orders College to Reinstate Student Who Posted a Placenta Photo Online
2011phdstudent - January 7, 2011 at 8:47 am
Given the due process violations, this is the right decision. However, the school must now make clear the expectations it has regarding student behavior. I do hope that the students (and those looking to hire them) recognize the breech of professionalism and make appropriate changes.
manshipg - January 7, 2011 at 10:08 am
This new development in the ongoing episode disturbs and frustrates me. First and foremost, the students’ actions were unethical, and hence, unprofessional, insofar as in the role of students within the nursing profession they exploited their access to human biological specimens and satisfied voyeuristic appetites by “posing” for a portrait with a placenta and then posting the images on the most widely used social networking medium. The argument that the students did nothing wrong because they did not violate HIPAA laws is ethically and professionally irrelevant. The conclusion that an act is not unethical or unprofessional because it is not illegal is a non sequitur and patently false. Thus, the college administration should not have summarily expelled the students, thereby removing any opportunity to instill and nurture professional ethics. Instead, the college should have modeled virtuous professionalism by admonishing, sanctioning, disciplining, and promoting ongoing development of moral agency of the students. Regrettably, the college’s actions allowed the students to take legal recourse, which led to the judge’s absurd conclusion that an act is not unprofessional because a code of conduct (i.e., code of ethics or school policy) does not explicitly prohibit the act. I can easily imagine the gargantuan tome resulting from this reasoning. As an adjunct instructor of ethics in a school of nursing, my students and I have wrestled with the reality that rules, regulations, policies, procedures and laws are not the cornerstones that orient and anchor a foundation upon which to build personal and professional behavior. Rather, the cornerstones are the critical thinking skills, values, and commitments to human flourishing in all of its manifestations that anchor a foundational worldview upon which to build the edifices of personal and professional behavior. Society has entrusted the nursing profession with the care of body, mind and spirit in order to promote human flourishing. Nursing professionals have a fiduciary responsibility to behave in a manner that does not discount, disregard, demean, denigrate or devalue trust and those who trust. In a world filled with human beings who have a penchant for succumbing to the gratifications of virtual reality and “viral” notoriety, health care professionals, generally, and these nursing students, specifically, have the responsibility to embody virtuous behaviors to promote social well being, and avoid self-promotion.
dmcarthur - January 7, 2011 at 10:37 am
This was a tempest in a teapot. Anyone who clicked on the link in the first story could see that the photo in question was not in the least bit offensive nor unprofessional. The judge’s ruling was appropriate for the case. Nothing in the photo identified the location or any person other than the student, and the student was not engaged in any behavior that was questionable. She was merely standing next to the specimen, looking only like a student who was enjoying her educational experience. Her nursing education program is a defining part of her identity at this point in her life. My Facebook photo for a time was a picture of me delivering my thesis lecture. I was engaged in my academic program, just as this student was.
I’m certain that school (and most others) will institute new policies related to photography in a clinical setting, but these students should never have been expelled from school for this incident.
3224243 - January 7, 2011 at 10:50 am
manshipg – was it the placenta that offended you? would you have been as bent-outta-shape if the organ had been a kidney or an appendix?
jarnold119 - January 7, 2011 at 11:24 am
This is disappointing. The key issue here is not whether or not the picture, or the students’ actions, were in appropriate. The issue is whether a judge or a professional educator and practitioner is the most qualified to determine what is appropriate conduct within a given profession. If the educator, in his or her professional judgment, deemed the conduct unprofessional, and the published institutional policy allows for dismissal on such grounds, and the college followed said processes, then there has been no violation of these students’ due process rights. This is an unfortunate example of a judge “educating from the bench.”
dmcarthur - January 7, 2011 at 3:15 pm
Check the story again, jarnold. [You can read the full story from the link.] The students asked permission first. The professional educator determined “appropriate conduct” when she gave the students permission to use their cameras. Later determining that this was inappropriate, and punishing the students for it, is indeed a violation.
panacea - January 7, 2011 at 6:41 pm
manshipg: punishment needs to fit the crime. What these students did was immature, yes. But what the faculty SHOULD have done was to have a “come to Jesus” meeting with them about expectations of professional behavior in a public setting (Facebook), and put them on a contract for behavior (one more screwup and you’re done).
What these students did was understandable. People have been taking pictures of themselves with body parts ever since the camera was invented. They just wanted to show their enthusiasm for what they were doing, “look, isn’t this cool!” was the impression I got from the photo.
I agree it was poor judgment. I agree it was unprofessional. But expelling them was the equivalent of throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
jarnold119: Way back when nursing schools were hospital based, the program directors had the power to dismiss students on character issues. We don’t want to go back to that: it lends itself to arbitrary decisions based on personalities rather than policies and procedures with an appeals process.
The students didn’t just hare off and do this. They asked permission and were not given a definitive NO. They cooperated when instructed to take the pictures. That tells me they were teachable.
If they had been told no and did it anyway, or refused to follow instructions, it would be a different story.
crucible - January 9, 2011 at 12:40 pm
Johnson County Community College and its Nursing Department were judicially admonished. They live in a world of merciless perfection.
Well they screwed up! They exposed the school (and the taxpayers who fund the school) to substantial financial liability. The administrative participants of this fiasco should apply the same standards of perfection to themselves and resign. If only someone could terminate them without due process. They need to go. There are much less than perfect.
nybound - May 2, 2012 at 9:06 am
Yep, gravity still works on pianos… how exciting. Is there really no more productive use for an old piano and their intellects?