FOI Blog Post #6

This assignment was kind of frustrating, to be honest. I feel like I didn’t put as much effort into it that I should have.

With Law and Ethics, one thing that I got out of this class is that people are sometimes reluctant to give out information. I kind of learned this throughout my experience as an Intern. Not only did I find problems gathering some information from other people, but as a company, there are many times we do not disclose information to people, or we say that we will call them back later. So therefore I was never surprised that I ran into difficulties throughout this assignment. 

I think that what disappointed me the most was the fact that I got a spreadsheet regarding information on the topic I was looking for, yet it still didn’t have information about two of the schools I was looking for. 

I think with this semester being busy, I could have put more effort on this assignment. Once I got the information I needed, I just stopped, which is kind of unacceptable for a journalist. You’ve got to dig deep in order to get the information you need. 

So my advice for people who do this assignment in the future: Don’t drag your feet and don’t just stop when you think it’s over. 

FOI Blog Post #5

So since the school board did not help me out in terms of giving me the information that I wanted, I took the time to try and get information from the School District, because I knew that would be the smartest thing to do if no one was following back. I honestly wasn’t expecting a response, but I was able to gathering this type of information that was sent to me through an Excel Spreadsheet:

I found out that there are no vaccinations needed at Woodway and a total of 680 elementary school students.

There are 439 students at Versia L. Williams and there no information was gathered regarding the vaccine exemptions.

There are 640 students at Westcreek Elementary school and no information was gathered regarding the vaccine exemptions.

So, I guess that overall there was a 50% success. Feel free to check out my final blog post for some final thoughts on this assignment...

FOI Blog Post #4

It’s unfortunate that I haven’t been able to update you all more often, because I should have written this blog post quite some time ago. 

Basically I took the time to reach out to the school through phone and my responses weren’t that great. I did a few phone calls and people kept saying they would get back in touch with me. On one of the calls, I did get an estimate of 700 students at Woodway (which seems a lot because my elementary school was smaller, but I guess Texas schools are bigger), but that was an estimate. I didn’t even get in contact with one of my schools because no one picked up (it might have been because I did it at a later time than usual) Unfortunately, I didn’t hear anything back from the schools about what I was looking for. 

I tried doing some Google Searches regarding the situation because I thought maybe I would be able to get my hands on something that would be able to help. 

It’s crazy to think 86,000 elementary students are in FWISD Schools and with 83 total, that should put each school at about 1,000. But one thing I have learned is to NEVER ASSUME. 

However, I did get my hands on something important that did help me out... but that is for an upcoming Blog Post...

FOI Blog Post #3

No response yet. 

No response from Westcreek.

No response from Versia L. Williams.

No response from Woodway. 

It’s not looking good so far. 

I’m honestly not surprised. Do people really want to take the time to find out this information? I think you just have to take a minute and step into the shoes of the people at my required schools who got this letter: They probably saw it, laughed and tossed it to the side. They might have even thrown it out. Or they could have just been like “Eh, I’ll get to it later.” 

Well, now I have to make some moves. The first step for me is to call them and explain what I am looking for and the situation. If that doesn’t work, I will probably have to email them and hope they can forward me to the right people. 

I have emailed plenty of schools before. I was requested by Fort Worth Magazine to find administrative emails that we can place in our “school guide." Some of the schools didn’t respond, so I had to call. Even then, they said they would “call me back.” So I am kind of expecting this to happen when I call the schools and ask for requests. 

This situation kind of reminds me of the film Spotlight, when all of the characters were trying to get information and it took them so long to find everything out. For people who think it is easy to gain any records, it’s not, it requires work. 

FOI Blog Post #2

The letters have been sent. Well, they have been for a few days ago, but this is my blog post to confirm that they went out. I haven’t gotten any response yet, which isn’t surprising. 

Here is what my letters looked like:

***I refrained from placing in the addresses of the school and my own address, but both of them are also mentioned in this letter. 

I think it’s not going to be easy getting this type of information. Even though what I am requesting is so simple, elementary schools do not want to place the effort to give this information. They have to go through so many people in order to get this information. My next step this week is to call the schools and ask if they have received my letter. 

FOI Blog Post #1

Hello to anyone who is reading this. Welcome to my Law and Ethics blog. 

I probably should introduce myself, my name is Andrew Van Heusden and I’m a journalism student at TCU. Throughout this semester I will be blogging about my Public Record Request scavenger hunt. Our assignment is to send out requests to three schools for the number of students who have received what is called a Vaccine Exemption Affidavit form in the 2017-18 year as well as the number of students enrolled at the following schools. 

The schools I was assigned are Westcreek, Versia L. Williams, and Woodway. I’ve never heard of any of them (because I’m in the Fort Worth area), but hopefully they will be easy schools to get public records from. 

I wouldn’t be surprised if I have a difficult time getting access to these records, because I have seen plenty of journalism movies where reporters don’t have the easiest time getting access. But on the other side of the spectrum, I wouldn’t understand why people wouldn’t be hesitant to hand over public records about vaccines. Why do you need to hide anything about that? 

I’m also curious what I will find. I’m not sure if the results will be “predictable” or “exciting.” Kind of hoping for some fascinating results, but only time will tell. That is if I do gain access to these records. 

Well, I guess that is all for now. Wish me luck as I take on this adventure and hopefully I’ll make it out alive at the end of the road.