Students, professors and honor committee members met yesterday in Gilmer hall to discuss the purpose and future of the single sanction at the University.
Much of the debate on the policy, which mandates expulsion for students convicted of honor offenses, centered on a question posed by third-year College student and honor counselor Lucia Cruz.
"Is the purpose of the single sanction to punish students or to reform them?," she asked.
Single sanction doesn't allow for students redeem themselves after making a mistake, Astronomy Prof. Charles Tolbert said.
Tolbert suggested a system in which students convicted of an honor offense would be suspended from the University for a semester and lose all credit hours from the semester in which they were convicted of an offense. Second convictions would carry a penalty of expulsion.
Commerce Prof. William Kehoe disagreed.
"Honor does allow for a lapse," Kehoe said. "Conscientious retraction allows for a student to make a mistake and still remain in the community of trust."
Conscientious retraction allows a student to admit to an honor offense before any accusation has been made against him or her and not face expulsion.
Others argued that the single sanction should be strengthened.
The 1997 committee decision to consider the seriousness of an act separately from determining the validity of the accusation and the intent of the accused has weakened the enforcement of penalties against those who commit lesser offenses, said Thomas Bird, Honor representative from the School for Continuing and Professional Studies.
"It is certainly possible to commit an honor offense and still be walking around Grounds," he said. "I would like to see the system go back to what it once was, if only in myth, to a true single sanction."
Andrew Painter, representative from the graduate school of architecture, agreed that the current system contributes to a culture in which minor offenses, such as using fake ids or falsifying information on course action forms, are largely tolerated. However, he argued that a multiple sanction system would be more effective at dealing with lesser offenses.
Students and professors are often reluctant to accuse those they suspect of committing minor violations because they fear having them expelled, Painter said.
A multiple sanction system would reduce this inhibition while still providing the latitude for Committee members to expel students in serious cases, he argued.
Tolbert agreed that many members of the University community often choose to avoid bringing cases to the Committee when they feel the offenses are not serious enough to warrant expulsion.
This sense of faculty disconnection contributes to student disillusionment with the honor system, said third-year Architecture student Tyler Scriven, president of the Black Student Alliance.
Many professors don't afford students the privileges the Honor system promises, such as taking unproctored exams, Scriven said.
"We are subject to expulsion," Scriven said. "It's not worth it to me as a student when there isn't a single standard of providing an environment of trust to go along with the single sanction."
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