3. Students' Right to Know
A.3.01 - Graduation Rates:
Each College shall produce and make readily available, through appropriate publications and mailings, and electronic media to all current students, and to any prospective student upon request, the completion or graduation rates of certificate- or degree-seeking, full-time students entering the System. The information shall be updated at least biennially.
A.3.02 - Crime Statistics:
Each College shall collect information with respect to campus crime statistics and campus security policies. Each College shall prepare, publish and distribute, through appropriate publications or mailings, to all current students and employees, and to any applicant for enrollment or employment upon request, an annual security report as required.
A.3.03 - Reports:
Each College shall make available to the Coordinating Board, upon request, the
Information required to be reported by the federal Student Right-To-Know Act and the Campus Security Act for the previous year. The information must be reported in the form required by the Act.
4. Preservation of Electronic Records for Litigation Matters
A.4.01 - Requirements:
"Discovery" is the process by which relevant information is exchanged between parties in a lawsuit. It is conducted via production of documents and the taking of depositions.
Federal and state courts have long recognized that electronic data is subject to the same discovery rules as other evidence relevant to a lawsuit. The issue has received substantial national attention recently, however, because of a series of court rulings resulting in the imposition of huge sanctions for failure to preserve electronic data and because of amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure scheduled to take effect formally on December 1, 2006. Upon notice that a lawsuit has been commenced against LSCS or one of its employees, or reasonable anticipation that a lawsuit may be brought, LSCS and all employees are now under a legal duty to preserve all evidence, whether hard copy or electronic, that might become relevant to the lawsuit.
The new federal rules requires the suspension of routine or intentional purging, overwriting, re-using, deleting, or any other destruction of electronic information relevant to a dispute, including electronic information wherever it is stored.
This electronic information must be preserved so that it can be retrieved - if necessary - at a later time. The information must be preserved in its original electronic form, so that all information contained within it, whether visible or not, is also available for inspection.
A.4.02 - Preservation of Electronic Records:
When the Lone Star College System (the "System") "reasonably anticipates" litigation, through the receipt of notification or other information identifying the possibility of a lawsuit or upon the actual service of a summons and complaint ("notification"), the System must take actions to preserve all electronically stored information that may be relevant to the claim.
As soon as practicable after notification, the System's General Counsel ("GC") will notify the Chief Technology Officer, and if applicable, the respective College President and Dean of Technology, as well as the individual(s) who may have firsthand knowledge and electronic records for the potential or actual claim.
The Chief Technology Officer and the System's Information Technology Department will work with the local Dean of Technology to begin the central and local holds and preservation of electronic records, as appropriate.
As soon as practicable, GC, the Chief Technology Officer, and local Dean of Technology will meet to discuss case and develop an initial course of action.
GC will meet with local representatives (involving Human Resources as appropriate) to discuss immediate needs, identify data unique to the case and to reiterate the need to preserve "paper" data as well.
GC will send specific information handling instructions as may be appropriate in
a particular lawsuit to all affected individuals to ensure future data are
appropriately preserved and easily retrievable.
A.4.03 Discovery Requests for Electronic Records:
Upon receipt of a discovery request for information and data pertaining to a lawsuit subject to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure electronic discovery rules, the System must take action to develop and produce a response to this request.
The GC will work closely with the Chief Technology Officer to develop an appropriate response. The response may be to supply the requested information, attempt to obtain a modification of the request as to a different set of data or search terms, or to decline to provide some or all of the requested data based upon expense, or current retention policy for destruction, or any other basis they see fit.