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JD Kaim, University of Washington computer science student and HuskySwap app developer.
The University of Washington resolved a disagreement with a computer science student who went viral on LinkedIn for calling out the UW’s reaction to his development of an app to help students trade coveted spots in full courses.
The student, JD Kaim, posted Friday that the university removed the hold that would have prevented him from registering for classes to complete his final quarter needed for graduation.
The apparent resolution followed three days of back-and-forth over the UW’s initial response to the app, conflicting interpretations of the university’s intentions, coverage on the local evening news, and a groundswell of support for Kaim in response to his LinkedIn posts about the situation.
“It’s been an overwhelming experience and I’m going to grow from it,” Kaim wrote.
So what really happened here? Understanding that requires a quick rewind.
As described by Kaim in his original post, on Wednesday of this week, HuskySwap was “a simple app designed to help students find partners to trade spots in critical classes after they filled up.”
Reviewing the open-source documentation for technology integrations with the UW registration system, he was encouraged to see language that seemed to encourage solutions such as his, providing access to “course data, registration data, section data, person data, and term data (general academic data).”
However, after requesting an access token, he received a notice from the UW directing him to take down the demo site and related materials.
The reason: Officials determined that it violated a registration policy against “buying or selling one’s seat in a class, holding seats for another student, or otherwise registering for a section that one has no intention of taking.”
Kaim described himself as “heartbroken,” but he complied, taking down the site.
At the same time, he called out the university for going “nuclear” in its response by placing the registration hold, which he described as effectively expelling him.
“All I want is for them to lift the hold and stop harassing me so I can graduate next quarter and move on with my life,” Kaim wrote in an email to GeekWire before the situation was resolved. “But one thing I am not doing is meeting with the administration while they’re holding my diploma hostage.”
A UW spokesperson, Victor Balta, said he was prohibited from discussing the specifics of an individual student’s situation due to federal privacy laws. However, he said, the UW Registrar will occasionally place “a temporary registration hold in order to prompt a meeting with a student about a potential policy violation.”
This is “standard practice,” he said, noting that the UW Registrar “does not make threats regarding disciplinary action, other than to state what potential consequences could be for violating policy.”
In other words, in the UW’s view, a temporary registration hold is not an expulsion.
A slide by JD Kaim explaining the motivation for the HuskySwap application. (Click to enlarge)
Another subject of disagreement: the UW’s suggestion that Kaim participate in an official project to develop an app to improve the registration system.
Kaim provided GeekWire with a copy of the Wednesday email in which UW Registrar Helen B. Garrett thanked him for taking down the HuskySwap site and app, acknowledged that the UW’s registration tools are outdated, described efforts by two other students and the UW to improve them, suggested a follow-up meeting — and said she was placing a registration hold on his record in the meantime.
The email read, in part:
“The idea is that we can partner on your innovations and potentially adopt them for all students. While we cannot compensate for these innovations, if we were to adopt your innovations this could become your calling card for job interviews and creates a recommendation opportunity from us in the job search or graduate school application process.
“I am placing a Registrar’s Hold on your record to have a productive conversation with you … to talk about what the Husky Swap tool was intended to do and to assess if you want to partner with us to consider adopting your innovation for the good of all students.”
It’s one thing to request a voluntary meeting, but Kaim didn’t understand the need for the hold when he had already complied with the university’s takedown request. At that point, as he saw it, there was no longer any violation.
To him, the approach was an attempt to coerce him into working without compensation — under threat of a punitive action that he likened to expulsion — effectively forfeiting his time and intellectual property to the institution.
However, Balta said the UW “cannot and would not aim to effectively steal intellectual property from a student.”
Balta added, “There have been instances where a student’s class project has turned into a potentially useful tool that UW-IT could help them develop into something that could serve other students. In any such case, appropriate partnership, ownership or credit for such a collaboration would be determined jointly with the student.”
But there was one more issue.
As detailed by Kaim in a follow-up post on LinkedIn, the UW on Thursday added a bold clause to the policy that seemed to directly address his situation: “Additionally, the creation of any service that enables any of the above behaviors is strictly forbidden and constitutes a violation of this policy.”
GeekWire followed up with the UW on Friday morning, asking about the process that was followed to update the policy, whether it was normal procedure to update its polices dynamically like this, and whether the UW considered it proper to hold a student to a provision added to a policy after the fact.
“The timing of the update to the policy’s website was unfortunate, given the interest in the topic at the moment due to recent social media posts,” Balta responded. “However, the update was only intended to further clarify the policy and is not an addition to the policy.”
Balta added, “The UW clearly prohibits any tampering with the registration process, including holding, trading or selling spots in a class. This is a matter of fairness to all students.”
He continued, “We are aware that students with higher registration priority will register for a class with no intention of taking it, and then sell the spot to someone else. This is a violation of policy, and any service or process that facilitates such activity is also prohibited.”
Finally, he wrote, “Registration for spring quarter begins on Feb. 13, therefore any holds lifted before that date would not negatively affect a student’s academic progress or their ability to register for classes.”
That foreshadowed the resolution that was reached Friday afternoon.
“The university has determined that I have satisfactorily complied with their request to take down the site, and I’ve said publicly that I do not plan to pursue anything like HuskySwap, so the hold has been removed without a meeting and I am back on track to graduate next quarter,” Kaim posted on LinkedIn. “I have thanked them for closing the matter.”
The end result of all this? Well, Kaim will certainly stand out in the job market.
As he wrote in the conclusion to his original post, “If you know of anyone looking for a full-time software engineer with a knack for getting the attention of senior leadership, please send them my way! I can start full-time in June.”
