Meanwhile, The Eastern Kentucky University Progress reports that at the April 23 University Board of Regents meeting, regents were "awarded" championship rings so that they could "feel what it is like to be a winner."

The meeting sparked controversy before, during, and after it occurred.

Regents met for lunch before the meeting in what was believed to be an invitation only gathering at which invited students received awards. Questions emerged about the propriety of the ostensibly closed meeting based on past open meetings disputes involving the University of Kentucky Board of Trustees' pre-meeting cocktail parties.

In the course of the meeting, the regents, who were presumably wearing their championship rings and feeling like winners, exchanged notes and texts while — in a singularly tone-deaf move — they approved a 3% tuition increase as well as increases in housing and meal costs.

Progress reporter Kaylyn Perkins attended the pre-meeting lunch and the board meeting to record the presentation of the rings and the passing of notes and exchange of texts.

After the meeting, The Progress presented the board with an open records request aimed at securing information about the cost of the rings and who paid for them.

The Progress submitted a separate request for copies of the notes and texts exchanged by regents in the course of the board's meeting.

The newspaper has not yet received the board's final response to the request for records relating to this questionable conduct, which can be analogized to public officials' whispering to each other in the course of a public meeting and declared illegal in past rulings of the attorney general.

Curiously, the board has indicated that it needs additional time to gather the notes and texts and issue a final response.

The newspaper received records relating to the purchase of the rings. The records indicate that they were purchased at a cost of $2300 donated by the board chair though the university foundation.

However serious it's breach of good judgment in "awarding" championship rings to regents while approving tuition, housing, and meal increases, the board could not, and cannot, escape The Progess's scrutiny.