Here's a
spectacularly bad idea from a journalism-school dean: <p>
News media professions could help journalism schools prevent and cure professional dishonesty if they required applicants for internships and jobs to send a form to their deans similar to the form many law schools require of their applicants. This one-page form asks the dean to certify that the student was in good standing. It also asks whether the student had any disciplinary problems and, if so, what they were. The dean has to send this completed form to the law school as part of the student's application materials.<p>Note that applicants must get this form from the law school and send it to the dean of their undergraduate school. So applicants for admission know that law schools will know about their behavior as well as about their GPA and LSAT score. Applicants know that law schools will take into account any disciplinary problems they may have had.<p>If news media organizations such as ASNE and RTNDA, in cooperation with academic organizations such as AEJMC and ASJMC, could develop and adopt a similar form, requiring applicants for internships and jobs to send the form to their deans and denying interviews until they received a completed form from their deans, they would send a powerful message to students.