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Thursday, March 28, 2024
NEWS  |  CAMPUS

Graduate students project threatened

When Jon Bougher and Roman Safiullin went back to Haiti earlier this month, they shot about 12 more hours of footage for their master’s thesis documentary, which follows Planting Peace, a philanthropic organization.

Unfortunately for the two UF graduate students, not one minute of the footage will be allowed in the final cut, rendering their thesis project incomplete.

In February, the university established a policy banning UF-sponsored travel to Haiti, so all the material gathered after the earthquake cannot be used in the students’ final project.

According to UF spokesman Steve Orlando, the university’s travel policy is meant to ensure student safety. The university is not certain students who travel there would have access to food, water and shelter, Orlando said.

“If you’re watching CNN and watching Anderson Cooper in Haiti, the network is providing for his needs,” Orlando said. “Two students going down there might not be getting the same access to those resources.”

The thesis presentation is scheduled for April 15, and Bougher and Safiullin are concerned about whether they will be allowed to graduate because they feel their project is unfinished.

“It’s very unfortunate that a university that has very high standards wants us to submit something very incomplete,” Safiullin said. “That’s not journalistic.”

Bougher, who was recently named the Outstanding Master’s Student in the College of Journalism and Communications, said he and Safiullin are more concerned with their work than with taking a shot at the university administration.

“As journalists, our goal is to get the best story possible,” he said. “We’re not trying to give the university a black eye; we’re just trying to make the best film that we can.”

In an e-mail to the College of Journalism and Communications faculty, Churchill Roberts, co-director of the Documentary Institute, said the students had two choices — they could either submit a thesis that didn’t have any post-earthquake footage or abandon the thesis track and fulfill their degree requirements by taking comprehensive exams.

According to Roberts, both options “raise serious questions about academic integrity.”

Linda Hon, the executive associate dean of the College of Journalism and Communications, and Debbie Treise, the college’s associate dean for graduate studies, met with Roberts to discuss alternative ways the students could complete their thesis work.

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Hon, through her assistant, declined an interview and said she “doesn’t feel that she can respond since this is a university policy.”

Roberts, who called the situation “a terrible embarrasment” for the university, said Bougher and Safiullin are more than capable of filming in Haiti. While the welfare of students is paramount, the university is setting a dangerous precedent by not allowing student journalists to travel to disaster areas, he said.

“That’s what attracts journalists,” he said. “If this is the university’s knee-jerk reaction every time there’s a natural disaster, they might as well close the door to the College of Journalism and Communications.”

For now, Roberts said he is focused on making sure Bougher and Safiullin graduate and produce the best product they can.

“I would give anything to find a solution that would be acceptable for the university and for [the Documentary Institute],” he said.

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