Some other institutions have policies to deter students from selling notes to online companies. Harvard University students who sell lecture notes to online companies may be asked to withdraw. Students caught selling notes without permission could face expulsion. A policy condemning the publication of lecture notes online has been amended to protect students, but controversy still surrounds the University's right to enforce such a policy in the first place. Under the new rule, students cannot distribute lecture notes for commercial purposes without the express written consent of the instructor.
Possible punishments range from warnings to expulsion.
The original policy was approved by a faculty committee last spring, but student groups pushed to alter the wording. The new policy does not address students posting lectures on the Web for free with proper attribution. The rapidly growing practice of obtaining unauthorized lecture notes from the Internet may soon be obsolete, if recent legislation banning online lecture notes in California goes national. The new law, signed by Gov. Gray Davis, combats bad attendance and preserves the integrity of professors lectures. Students throughout the country have helped make the online distribution of lecture notes a thriving industry.