Conduct unbecoming

'U' regents to receive Code reports this month

While students are off campus during break, an important process that can affect the life of every student will be going on - the University Board of Regents will begin a preliminary review of the Code of Student Conduct. The Michigan Student Assembly and the Office of Student Affairs will present their reports on the Code to the regents. The University's administration should use this opportunity to either revise the Code extensively or abandon it altogether because not only is it ineffective, it violates various doctrines that American society holds dear.

Under the Code, the University can try to convict students for offenses already handled by the criminal justice system. But unlike the justice system, the Code does not allow students the rights they have as citizens: legal counsel, appealing to precedent, burden of proof, among others. The University should not have the right to hand out punishments that add to those that have been deemed suitable by a court of law; this basically amounts to double jeopardy. And as the majority of University students are legal adults, the administration should not have a punitive system that tries to act as a parent.

The secrecy of the Code is another of its flaws. All participants in Code hearings are required to sign a statement of confidentiality, resulting in the lack of evidence that the Code is effective at all. In fact, the only time the Code is in the public spotlight is when it fails to work. The secrecy of Code hearings means that there is no way of seeking precedent for appropriate punishments, which is an important part of the criminal justice system. The result is that there is no basis for determining the proper sentence or procedure, making the sanctity of the Code's processes questionable at best.

In addition to the unfairness and ineffectiveness of the Code, it is also suspect that the University has selected a time when the student population will be off campus to begin reviewing it. Given the general lack of student knowledge of the Code in the first place, this scheduling makes student input on the process incredibly unlikely. But since public review of the Code will probably not begin until January, students should make an effort to get involved in the process.

In addition, the two regents-elect, Kathy White and David Brandon, will likely get their first exposure to the Code within the next couple months. Since they will be involved with the many important decision on this policy in the coming months, it is important for them to take an objective stance on the topic. They should not allow votes of boards past to crowd there decision-making - instead, they should try to see the Code for what it really is.

The University should be a place where students prepare for life in the outside world. And since they must face the same laws as any citizen, it is not the University's place to continue to enforce those laws when the legal system has already done so - that violates students' constitutional rights by effectively placing them in double jeopardy. Furthermore, the secrecy of Code hearings makes it impossible to know for sure whether or not the Code works, and may be a hindrance to determining fair sentencing. When the regents formally review the Code, significant changes should be made to solve these problems - or, better yet, it should be abolished entirely.

12-11-98