Academic Senate Questions Decision To Allow TOMMY LEE To Film Realty Show In Nebraska

November 3, 2004

Maggie Stehr of the Daily Nebraskan is reporting that Chancellor Harvey Perlman formally addressed members of the Academic Senate on Tuesday (Nov. 2) about Tommy Lee's reality TV show filming this semester at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Acknowledging the risks involved with taping, Perlman said the benefits of exposing UNL to a national audience would help offset the trend of declining enrollment.

"People think Nebraska is somewhere out there in a cornfield and assume the University of Nebraska is too," he said. "We are a place now because of this show. Students we are recruiting watch reality shows."

Patrick Shea, senate secretary, presented a resolution expressing the senate’s displeasure at Perlman's lack of communication with the Academic Senate about decisions leading up to a contractual media agreement.

Sen. Gerry Harbison called the reality show a misguided public relations agenda, because the reality show is not consistent with UNL's academic mission.

"All of us will be measured by this stupid show until popular memory moves on," he said. "The decisions which do affect the teaching mission of the university were done in an egregious manner without consultation with the faculty. The world was told about the show before the faculty was."

Perlman said the confidentiality of the NBC contract and the time constraint to approve filming prevented administration from revealing details of the show to faculty. Read more.

Find more on

Prev More News Next

Comments Disclaimer And Information

BLABBERMOUTH.NET uses the Facebook Comments plugin to let people comment on content on the site using their Facebook account. The comments reside on Facebook servers and are not stored on BLABBERMOUTH.NET. To comment on a BLABBERMOUTH.NET story or review, you must be logged in to an active personal account on Facebook. Once you're logged in, you will be able to comment. User comments or postings do not reflect the viewpoint of BLABBERMOUTH.NET and BLABBERMOUTH.NET does not endorse, or guarantee the accuracy of, any user comment. To report spam or any abusive, obscene, defamatory, racist, homophobic or threatening comments, or anything that may violate any applicable laws, use the "Report to Facebook" and "Mark as spam" links that appear next to the comments themselves. To do so, click the downward arrow on the top-right corner of the Facebook comment (the arrow is invisible until you roll over it) and select the appropriate action. You can also send an e-mail to blabbermouthinbox(@)gmail.com with pertinent details. BLABBERMOUTH.NET reserves the right to "hide" comments that may be considered offensive, illegal or inappropriate and to "ban" users that violate the site's Terms Of Service. Hidden comments will still appear to the user and to the user's Facebook friends. If a new comment is published from a "banned" user or contains a blacklisted word, this comment will automatically have limited visibility (the "banned" user's comments will only be visible to the user and the user's Facebook friends).