You Tell Us: Towson Football Twitter Ban

The next time football standout Terrance West makes a game-winning touchdown dash, he'll have to go somewhere other than Twitter to celebrate afterwards.

Football coach Rob Ambrose banned use of the site for his athletes indefinitely, The Towerlight reported earlier this month. The ban took effect nearly two months after to in December. Shortly before that game, Lehigh wide reciever Ryan Spadola tweeted a racial slur aimed at Towson players. The NCAA suspended him for the next game at North Dakota State, which Lehigh would go on to lose.

The ban, Ambrose told the student paper, would remain in place until he's comfortable that students know how to more judiciously use social media.

“It’s not about controlling [the players],” Ambrose told The Towerlight. “It’s about safety. It’s about the appropriate uses of it and how not to be hurt by it."

The ban became a topic of discussion in a Baltimore Sun article this week, in light of state legislation sponsored , among others, that would prohibit colleges from forcing students—including student-athletes—to install monitoring software or make social media posts public.

In an editorial, The Sun said Ambrose should lift the ban, and that there are many outlets besides Twitter where the athletes can express themselves.

"Preventing college students from exercising their right to free speech is not teaching them right from wrong; it's only putting winning ahead of everything a college ought to be about," the editorial board wrote.

Sun media critic David Zurawik was on WYPR-FM's Midday with Dan Rodricks, where the ban was a topic of discussion. That audio isn't up just yet.

So you tell us. Was Ambrose right to institute a ban? What safeguards and penalties should be in place for students and student-athletes, if any? Tell us in the comments and vote in our poll.