the record in this matter there are several presumptions which arise from both the act and the and the case law should be considered by the court first of all there is a presumption of access to public records in the state to the extent that the redaction of the record would remove any to exempt material so the disclosure of not exempt material can be accomplished exemption as required i'm s penalty on universities who have a practice or a policy of releasing private educational records and i'm sure the university would argue that that penalty is owners but it is not specifically prohibit the disclosure of rutgers is noted in the breeze some courts have found the first it does prohibit disclosure and some have found that it is not the university argues that it's it's essentially a contract argument by taking the money from the federal government we have obligated ourselves not to release these records frankly in illinois we have rejected the court rejected that kind of contract analysis both in the carbondale case which is cited in the records and also in a case involving care more pharmacy in which the pharmacy claims that the costs charged to the state the records can not be redacted which would allow the release of nonexempt materials it appears on this record but the trial court after its review of the records and during the oral argument before the court was not into university makes the argument that the identity of the student or students involved in these incidents is so bitter toyed with other materials that redaction is impossible to transcript reveals in several places but the trial court disagree for instance the trial uses proper course use of the term malarkey to describe the intertwined argument fails to reinforce that anything pollution but the university or didn't say what's the problem with disclosing that because that seems to be were consistent with what happened and this gives you a fairly decent idea and why they're no longer employed what about the disclosure of what the coach has said is inappropriate or protected you make the argument it's all wound together and i disagree with that argument there is nothing going for there's nothing from the statements from the coaches that you can possibly bring back to person  there are in this case public policy issues which also weigh in favor of disclosure which can be weighed in the consideration of the privacy exemption obviously the universe except two hundred thousand dollars to resolve a claim by one of these two was based on what what kind of investigation was conducted by the university who made the decision that these coaches would be allowed to resign rather than be terminated what did the administrators when that decision was made what type of downstream liability was assumed or created by the university by allowing coaches to resign and move on in their coaching careers to other determine that a public body made a factory a liability for itself by not warning others of behavior of their employees the final order of this court of the trial court makes no findings  fact relating to the privacy of the court simply concludes without stating any factual basis that the privacy xenophon prohibits the disclosure of these records and again this court has the opportunity to conduct prohibits the disclosure parliamentary documents in which policies are formulated or opinions are pros and get i remind the court that exemptions are to be read narrowly the university describes the remaining undisclosed records as brief make clear that the statement does not extend to factual statements nor does it extend to opinions expressed by others not related to the university such as parents  are not covered by the terms of the exemption again at war argument after the court's review of these documents the trial court seemed to reject the application of th opinions or policies of a public body these are the opinions or policies of a public body they are these are not the opinions or policies of a public body they are the statements of witnesses coaches who may be involved victims who may have been involved and i don't see how that constitutes constitutes opinions or policies of the public but my reading of it is that those specific facts what is discovered or a new i r s investigation into the into the sexual assault allegations is not opinions were policies of a public body and therefore disposable under seven one half the trial court's final order they didn't come predicts those more detail findings mean after his review of your honor university welcomes the de novo review of this matter and the records and urge the court to do so this this case is really a first impression in illinois it's to the salmon the intersection of the freedom of information act and the family education privacy rights act what we call for our research indicates stead the united states supreme court has not considered the impact of state freedom information was on for  of exemptions that we read here but first does some have something to this while the presumption is that things have records are supposed to be public shifted stacking of the deck it says student records educational records as the statute says are private they are confidential they are not to be disclosed except for certain exceptions and through certain processes and the right to obtain those records with the exceptions can only arise when the party requesting them meets a very heavy burden that this interest outweighs the privacy interest now it is true that federal courts and state courts that we've cited in our brief have pointed out that you will only way this can have mean is that once you enter into the relationship with the federal government to get federal funds you are obligated by federal law not to disclose those records says this in a way it doesn't matter if provides the coalition that we believe that it doesn't we urge the court to find federalized the supreme law of the land whether it fits into that exemption nicely or not we believe that it does but it it's really not a sara lee a question that has to be turned federal law prohibits these once we enter into the relationship as practically every university in the nation certainly every university in the state has with the federal government for federal funds there's an obligation not so it's in purpose trying to keep universities from disclosing information about their students a voluntary basis and so our  if you leave here go to the supreme court order the disclosure of these documents and they rejected protect privacy of the student when their protector give you a defense any type of effort by the federal government to withhold f oh i believe it would protect the sharbat globally and that would be a fair reading of the statute with all due respect in fact the iowa supreme court addressed that very issue in case we cited our brief regarding the university of iowa and the court stated there i his you independent issue pertaining to that of a geisha for instance if there was a crime committed and the records produced that contain relevant evidence to whether the guilt or innocence they could be turned over but for the issue of whether the records can be turned over by themselves that isn't necessarily a proper proceeding but it would give us protection no question about it however i would also point out in the miami university case the supreme court of ohio and this  cited in our brief said to the man university attorneys records over at that point the department of education united states government sued miami university and said you are not allowed to do that so while it protects us necessarily from from possible he funding by the federal government it doesn't shield us from the suit by the federal government not to turn those folks not the records over and i would add at this point that we're dealing yet like ohio did clear direction your honor there are three issues the first that this court needs to address one is just for provided out not prohibition for the recent release of educational records we believe that it does the second issue is our educational records and the third issue is and i will address that is educational records have two elements are they directly related to a student and are they maintained by the institution not directly related to this quite broad it does not mean primarily really in fact there are cases that say records can be directly related to a student and also if you're really related to an employee for instance that doesn't necessarily mean that they're not educational records educational records are not restricted to academic performance records the financial aid back great records there is a record that directly relate to a student and are maintained by the university in this case information which is described in the regulations but that's socially obvious information or loan or in combination that is linked or linkable with other information that a reasonable person could use to identify a student so that leads us to the next question redaction we have argued that redaction is not available or appropriate in this case the council read a record to the court there's clearly what before him the law the arguments the records themselves to make a final determination not only the right but the obligation what he said in oral argument he did say after the review of the records again he made these determination i don't know what's unusual i think asking questions and expressing things is what this process is all about anyway your honor was far better to redaction him because of other released records or other publicly available information redaction is insufficient to prevent any patient the whole record need be withheld that's what the department of education says and that's what the courts would look at this issue say is well is it appropriate here to come to the conclusion that illness would remain within those records even if we blacked out the student names are there elements remaining within those records that would i get a five who is the students are the campus it you are yes it's a small campus less than five thousand students and two thousand and nine and this event occurred thirteen students are on the on the women's softball team five women are on the  now these records pertain to factual events in some cases this past said we don't deny that there are detailed accounts in fact that's what the newspaper is seeking the detail that counts it knows essentially what happened it just lacks the detail that pounce and that's what we're talking about here these things are so highly personal and so highly attributive to these individual students that you cannot remove all of the elements let me give an example the golf coach that was the subject of some of these records and there's no question and we've invented in the record there was some sort of inappropriate contact if the records released showing what all of that occurred we could we could black out the name of the student but there's so much other information in there that would lead a reasonable person either by linking it with public information that's already been given or other information from other sources to again five that student his example would be a shared relationships they they had certain people in common that they knew something that's just an exam on impossible toit determine even without knowing the name who these individuals are we're talking about a very small set of individuals so those are the three issues are they subject to scrutiny are they prohibited from disclosure by furka we assert they clearly are are the educational records i don't believe it's even been contested if they are are they is redaction available in this case we don't believe that it was protected well your honor in fact there is a court from all the cases i'm citing are not from illinois obviously but there's a case that says that very thing if you can remove all of the identifying information they  may not be educational records so for may not cover reason per person which the privacy interests oh wait any legitimate public interest as the illinois supreme court has said the very purpose of this example is to protect personal privacy or denying that but that's what the newspaper said if that's true what could be more private to the students that buy in and of itself shows this is personal this is highly objectionable that any nobody would want this information about themselves released these records disclose the activities of the students some of these activities were involuntary some of them were volunt newspaper said their interest in this is to show that whether or not prison abuse of power by the coaches and whether the university properly handled this investigation the records at the newspaper hesse clearly demonstrate that that that interest has been satisfied all they want now are the specific details the facts and i believe that's what we said they are because that's what they are although we also say that there will be opinions recommendations and so forth but there are clearly what they're looking for very specific details they've got the amount of the settlement two hundred thousand dollars they know the name of the lawyer that represented the particular student athlete they know the coaches involved they know the time and place they've they published several newspaper accounts about it but they don't know if the exact details the privacy interests of those students outweigh the public interest at this point in time this disregarding for this is that the privacy that we're concerned about is the students not the coaches their knees bent suppose from the outset we don't necessarily care about them they're no longer employees but we do care about our students and what happens to them and  question i'll get to very briefly that is to demonstrate the give and take between staff members so that there can be a franken open communication about how to deal with a particular issue there it pertains to to show how it was how the came to bob who made the recommendations for certain actions what were the opinions were otherwise you would still worry about the open candor becoming public at a later date and saying that  outline after the season has been made it's no longer a part of a deliberative process oh i agree with that i agree with that yes your honor we're looking for on your budget cooperation here from the witnesses who happen to be students from other well i would have to defer to the court i my memory says that it was one of the parents but i could very well be wrong your honor i would suggest that if it doesn't identify a current student then it probably is not under f and it may not involve personal privacy if that letter identified students or led to the identity of students then i would say that it still would be covered under the certainly the first two exemptions maybe not the deliberative process else was we're back during the administrative process and the public access housewares office the university released that letter redacting the name of the st that alone or in combination is learned or legal to reste the civic student that would allow a reasonable person in the school community who does not have personal knowledge of the relevant circumstances to identify the student with reasonable sir i went to a much smaller school than you i yes i couldn't tell you the name of a golfer i couldn't despite the passage of time i couldn't if it isn't it's five thousand five thousand people campus all they say yes it's a small campus it might happen that's not very convincing evidence and doesn't meet the standard of the statute it's the roster of the coffee and the baseball team  roster of the golf team and the roster of the softball team are probably in the media guy published by the university right and so i think that was why isn't that covered by for if we're so worried about further isn't it you know this and that would know based on the five offers that it's one or two are how many out there are those people those particular five that had this conduct perpetrated you know that simply because the golf there's a presumption openness of the burden is on the person by clear and convincing evidence that exemption apply and we go from that intertwined argument is malarky i disagree with that argument if you can't use any of that information from the coaches to track back to student to person anyway we go from those statements and those conclusions during oral argument without further explanation to a finding that the university has met its burden by clear and convincing evidence that's not changing bob that's not rethinking something that's just simply not explained in the order of the