College President Removes Racy Photos From Facebook After Being Questioned By State

Thursday , October 18, 2007

SALISBURY, Maryland —

The president of a small university has removed her profile from the social networking Internet site Facebook after being questioned about unprofessional captions posted alongside photos on the Web page.

Janet Dudley-Eshbach, president of Salisbury University, had a photo on her profile showing her pointing a stick toward her daughter and a Hispanic man with a caption saying she had to "beat off Mexicans because they were constantly flirting with my daughter."

A caption accompanying a photo of a tapir referred to the large size of the piglike animal's genitalia.

Dudley-Eshbach removed her profile from the social networking Web site hours after reporters asked her about the captions on Monday.

Dudley-Eshbach said that the photos were taken during a family vacation to Mexico and that she wrongly thought the public could not see them.

"I never thought there was any problems with them nor did I know they were in the public domain. I do apologize," she said.

In a statement, Dudley-Eshbach also wrote, "Many of us are learning about the positives and negatives of public networking sites such as Facebook. I regret that some of these family vacation photos, with captions that were only intended to be humorous, were included on Facebook."

William Kirwan, chancellor of the University System of Maryland, said he talked to Dudley-Eshbach about her postings and did not anticipate any disciplinary action against the president.

"I think she's acknowledged that this was a mistake. I think both her statement and her action in taking the pictures down are appropriate," Kirwan said.

Dudley-Eshbach has been Salisbury's president since 2000. The school had 7,581 registered students in the fall of 2006.