Students Express Frustration Over Christmas Break Room Searches

Routine room inspections over Christmas Break sparked an unusual amount of conversation among students who, after arriving on campus, noticed personal items missing from their residences. Every school year during long breaks, the resident directors of each dorm and apartment check the rooms for safety hazards. The process, officially known as a "health and safety inspection," makes sure that the safety checklist is complete and that the room is ready for incoming roommates.

The reason students began speaking up this year as opposed to previous years extends beyond the commonly confiscated candle. Housing contracts, floor meetings, emails and the safety checklist remind all students about the coming inspection. What the students found surprising were the missing personal belongings such as photos that decorated the walls, posters of celebrities, a birthday card.

Patti Morin, junior, had a birthday card removed from the wall above her bed. Though the card, which had been signed by many of her friends, featured scantily clad men, Morin didn't understand "why they couldn't just tell me to take it down. I can understand why they might find it offensive, and I guess we signed something saying we couldn't have certain items in our rooms, but I would rather have them tell me 'this is inappropriate, can you please take it down immediately.'"

Despite the fact that many students, like Morin, feel as though the inspection is more of an intrusive "search" through one's personal space for such items, Director of Resident (Res) Life Amy VanDerWerf states that "anything that has been taken would be in plain view. We're not 'searching' for anything. We're not doing a search specifically for violations, but if violations are in plain view then they need to be dealt with."

According to her roommate, the way that Morin's violation was dealt was "over dramatized." Morin asserts that "honestly, when we put it up, we didn't think that it was violating some contract we signed nor was it offensive to anyone in our room."

A meeting was set up with to discuss the birthday card with Morin, her roommates, one of whom sent her the card, and two residence directors. Speaking of the 30-minute meeting, Morin recalls that "we weren't going to argue with them that it was against the rules. We just didn't appreciate being placed into a position that made us feel like we had to justify why we found humor in it or why we thought it was acceptable. They were really nice about it, nicer than they could have been."

She continues: "It's hard, because I understand that they're just doing their job, but I feel like I'm being treated like I'm seven years old. We're in college, and here, with all the rules and guidelines that they place on us, it's so hard to be who you are and not feel guilty about it. During the meeting, it was like they asked us why we thought it was funny. Normally, people wouldn't have to justify these things."

Doug Wood, Associate Dean of Students, works to combat these kinds of responses. "We try very hard not to go in and take things. We want to respect the space these students have. What brings us in is the health and safety inspection. Think of it as similar to a health inspector coming into a restaurant to make sure that things are OK."

Besides the health and safety aspect, another frustration students voiced was the startling impression that Res Life was "cracking down" harder during the inspections this year than in years past. However, Wood states that the "number of violations from year to year has been pretty comparable," and that, according to VanDerWerf, "[the RDs] weren't asked to do anything more this year than in the past."

Some statistics seemed to contradict these assurances: the campus fire safety video, which students with candles in their room have a choice to watch or collectively pay a fine, had been checked out of the library 23 times as of Monday, February 11. It was checked out three times during the entire spring semester of 2007 and only twice the year before that. However, Wood and VanDerWerf clarified that in previous years, they have shown mass screenings of the video.

In regards to inconsistencies between apartments with shot glasses in the kitchen that passed inspection while other students received fines for candles, VanDerWerf re-states that the purpose of the inspection is not to perform a deep search for specific violations but rather to deal with violations that are in plain sight.

Wood suggests that "there should be a conversation. If we are unaware of frustration among the students, they should talk to us about it. Every student has a right to appeal an RD decision to the Peer Review Board." He also encourages students to go to the SGA's Community Standards Committee if they have issues with residence policies in the future.

"Our hope is that students would learn of their communal responsibilities," Wood says. "We don't want to be punitive about it, but there are some responsibilities that come with living together in a common space. We hope that it's eye opening." In some ways, it definitely has been.

*For more information on room searches and inspections, see your Student Handbook in the Resident Life section.