On Sept. 6, an email from the Dean of Students Karen Donoghue informed students of updates on University Policy. Though you may not check your student handbook regularly, several important changes to University policy have been introduced in the 2012-13 school year.
Changes apply to “sexual misconduct, class attendance, and damage policies,” according to the email. In addition to the email, faculty forums were held on Sept. 12 and 19 in Alumni House concerning the class attendance and sexual misconduct policies, respectively.
Sexual Harassment
Vice President of Student Affairs Thomas Pellegrino, who led the faculty discussion on September 19, explained the exact changes in university policy to The Mirror.
“Many colleges and universities responding to what happened at Penn State took a look at what their policies said about those things,” Pellegrino said. “So, we took a look at that and did that.”
Pellegrino was referencing the occurrences involving Penn State football coaches Jerry Sandusky and Joe Paterno in late 2011. Paterno was alleged to have purposefully not reported Sandusky’s serial molestation of underage boys on university property, according to the Associated Press.
“We wanted to take what’s required under federal law and also adapt it to make a University policy that expands the requirements basically to all employees,” continued Pellegrino. “To have sort of like a baseline requirement that if you’re made aware of a crime, particularly a crime of sexual assault, you need to do something with it.”
In the old policy, the responsibility of faculty members and students to report these crimes was derived from their role, according to statutes such as Title IX and the Jeanne Clery Act.
The policy now reads: “While a University employee may advise the victim of sexual misconduct that any conversation they have with the victim will be private … they may not tell a victim that the conversation will be confidential unless that employee is subject to privilege by law to maintain confidentiality of an adult victim.”
Pellegrino went on to explain how the policy also expands upon the scenario of “if the person making the complaint is a minor.” He explained, “We have to remember that we have anywhere from 2500 to 3000 children on our campus using our facilities during the summer months.”
Pellegrino said that “if the claim is about a minor, the confidentiality rules [of certain employees under statutes] essentially go out the window. If you’re presented with a claim by a minor, the confidentiality rules don’t apply.”
Attendance Policy
Donoghue explained the second main policy change that involves the concerns of rules about attendance and excused absences to The Mirror.
The attendance policy now says, “Attendance requirements, as well as the impact of attendance on grading, are determined by the faculty member and specified in the syllabus for each course.”
Donoghue said, “The only person that can really excuse a student from missing class or any work is the faculty member, so that’s why we always told the student to contact the faculty member about missed work or missed class first.”
She went on to explain that although the office of the Dean of Students can “send a courtesy note … saying that this information has come up and this person has gone home for however many days”, the faculty member still has the final call in excusing the absence.
“I think the whole policy is really built on a good working relationship between students and their faculty members,” Donoghue continued. “If we can get anything out to students, it’s to build this relationship now, and it needs to be built on trust.”
Donoghue went on to explain how notes from medical personnel play into this new policy: “If for some reason a faculty member needs a note from a medical … person, the student would have to sign a release of information which would allow the faculty member to contact someone, whether it’s the health service or outside medical provider.”
Pellegrino added his understanding of the policies move away from medical slip, saying, “It’s recognizing that information you get from a third party to verify it, you don’t necessarily want it.”
He further explained how this should prepare students for post-graduation life: “When you get out of here and go get a job, it’s unlikely your employer will ask you for an excuse. You’ll get fired.”
Pellegrino also interjected to note one overall exception to the policy: “In our policy … under the term under released time … if you’re a student athlete or you’rew doing something for the university … you’re automatically released.”
Damages
The final policy change relates to damage charges. Students who are found to have caused malicious damage will be charged an additional $100 on top of the cost of repair, according to Donoghue.
This serves as a deterrent to malicious damage in response to high levels of damage charges in the past.
According to a previous Mirror article, freshman dorm Jogues Hall saw $14,529 in damage charges for the Fall 2011 semester alone.
Students can access the new student handbook through the University website at http://www.fairfield.edu/documents/student/sl_sthandbook.pdf
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