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Carnegie Mellon Student Government
Campus Events Media Policy

Preamble

Members of the Carnegie Mellon University community must have access to information with which to make informed decisions in their daily lives if they are to be engaged and active citizens of their community. Just as we must support freedom of speech, assembly, and exchange of ideas, Carnegie Mellon University, its students, faculty, and staff have a fundamental interest in protecting the freedom of student media organizations to report campus news.

Policy

This policy grants student media unrestricted and open access to all publicly promoted, student-funded campus events. Sponsors of all campus events funded entirely or in part by the Student Activities Fee shall allow students to make visual recordings of publicly promoted events, unless the event involves a negotiated contract between the university or sponsor and another party such as a performer or speaker which legally restricts media recording access. Furthermore, sponsors of all campus events funded entirely or in part by the Student Activities Fee are strongly encouraged to permit student media to make audio recordings of all of all publicly promoted events.

Definitions

Sponsor: The organization(s) or individual(s) responsible for planning, hosting, and advertising an event.
Visual recording: Physical or digital preservation of a visual representation including, but not limited to, photography and video
Audio recording : A physical or digital preservation of sound

Notification

The sponsor of any event funded either by the Joint Funding process or by special allocations from the Undergraduate Student Senate or Graduate Student Assembly that limit the access of student media organizations to make recordings for any reason must advertise these limitations outside all official entrances of the event.

Media Organizations

Sponsors shall under no circumstance remove representatives of recognized media organizations from any campus event, unless the representative is actively, intentionally, and persistently disrupting the event.

Violations

Any activities fee paying student may present an official complaint of a violation of this policy to the Student Body Vice President for Finance.

Investigation

The Vice President for Finance shall work with the Committee on Student Organizations to:

1. Gather affidavits from complainants regarding violations of this policy.
2. Investigate the complaints and issue a report to the funding body or bodies that issued the allocation.

Sanctions

If a sponsor is found in violation of this policy, the funding body that issued the allocation may:

1. Remove any or all part of the allocated funds from the account of the sponsor of the event.
2. Recommend further disciplinary action for the sponsor to the Undergraduate Student Senate, Graduate Student Assembly, Committee on Student Organizations, or Joint Funding Committee.

Adopted by Student Senate and Graduate Student Assembly 2006