Dive Brief:
- An investigation into campus student judicial systems has uncovered a long list of instances where they meted out light discipline for violent crimes and failed to report alleged crimes to the police.
- The investigation, by the Columbus Dispatch and the Student Press Law Center of Arlington, VA, also concluded that most higher education institutions don’t follow laws that are supposed to make information about their cases open to the public.
- In response to the investigation’s findings, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine has pledged to examine how the state’s public higher ed campuses use their judiciary boards and train their members.
Dive Insight:
This article provides some excellent illustrations about the problems with student disciplinary panels. In general, the recent media focus on the campus sexual assault issue has also illuminated the problems with the discipline boards and egregious examples of slaps on the wrists, such as assigning an essay, for students who commit heinous crimes. As the Dispatch article points out, the U.S. Department of Education’s student-privacy law is often used incorrectly to restrict access to the names of students found responsible for violent crimes, even though that access is allowed by the law and required by some states. The investigation queried 110 colleges for disciplinary records in cases involving violent crimes, but only 25 colleges provided records.