GW Student Judicial Services oversees non-academic student discipline with jurisdiction covering everything from alcohol violations to sexual assaults and countless more infractions. But students dislike the secrecy of GW’s judicial proceedings. Students often perceive the policies surrounding SJS activities as constructed to allow administrators to impose their will on students without accountability because no one knows the ultimate outcome of discipline cases except the student involved. Prying open the closed door of the University judicial system – if only slightly – would provide educational benefits to students, show us the system does work and improve relations between students and SJS.
Despite repeated requests by The Hatchet, SJS refuses to give out information regarding the charges and resulting sanctions, if any, in a particular case. Administrators often site the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 as the basis for their reticence, but that law only prohibits colleges and universities from releasing “educational records” in conjunction with “personally identifiable information” like a name, an address or a student ID number. SJS is able to release information about what sanctions have been handed down in each case, as long as personal information of students is not also provided. In violent incidents and sex offenses, Congress actual encourages more transparency, waiving the restriction on personally identifiable information. But the law does not require GW to release anything. GW must decide on its own to be open.
Releasing basic incident-specific information while still protecting students’ identities shows students the system works by demonstrating that sanctions are appropriate to the offenses committed. This information could also deter future similar incidents by providing an example of behavior that could result in suspension, expulsion or some other serious sanction. Maybe releasing this data would cause a student to think twice about his or her actions; what better educational benefit could the University seek in a disciplinary case?
And in cases of violent crime, such as a University police officer who was assaulted earlier this year, students deserve to know if violent members of our community are still among us.
Secrecy breeds distrust, which is exactly the current student perception of SJS. Allowing students to see serious consequences do result from serious behavior problems would comfort students upset at the behavior of their peers. Already this year, University police and Metropolitan Police officers have been assaulted and three sexual assaults have been reported. GW students deserve to know how the University protecting us and our environment in the wake of these serious offenses, and releasing information is the first step in that process.
