The Honor Committee unanimously approved the formerly temporary bylaws governing the implementation of informed retraction with nine changes on Sunday evening, along with 13 other bylaw changes.
Informed retraction, which was passed by the student body in February, permits reported students to admit to an honor offense and leave the community for two semesters.
The 22 changes ranged from purely grammatical, such as eliminating redundant phrases, to highly modern in nature — the Committee approved using email as the official form of notice for those reported for an honor offense.
“The University has shifted to understanding email as an official mode of communication,” said Committee Chair Evan Behrle, a third-year College student.
The largest change to the previous bylaws was deleting language allowing two or more honor offenses which are “inextricably linked” to fall within one informed retraction. Honor offenses that fall under the same “nexus of events” will still fall under one informed retraction.
“The nexus of events language covers those incidents in which honor offenses are dependent in some way and the inextricably linked language covers honor offenses that are [only] linked in some way,” Behrle said.
Behrle said that cheating on an assignment and then pledging it will be understood as coming from the same nexus of events, because “the act of lying is contingent upon the action of stealing.” A student’s cheating on a midterm which was discovered due to a professor’s investigations after discovering they cheated on a final would not fall within the nexus of events language.
Behrle said informed retraction was initially meant to allow students to make amends for a singular honor offense, but closely connected honor offenses deserve special treatment.
“I think we do justice to student opinion by not expanding it to the inextricably linked,” Behrle said.
The Committee approved a list of four non-binding examples as an attachment to the Committee’s bylaws which Behrle said would give guidance to future Honor Committees on how to practically implement informed retraction. Members of the Committee decided to include additional language specifically clarifying that the examples were nonbinding and merely illustrative.
Whether or not offenses are closely enough related for them to fall within one informed retraction ultimately falls to the discretion of the Vice-Chair for Trials and the Vice-Chair for Investigations.
The bylaw changes also addressed the relationship between informed retraction and conscientious retraction, which allows students to admit to an honor offense if no one suspects them of having done so and stay in the community.
If a student who filed a conscientious retraction is reported for the honor offense they admitted to, an investigative panel determines whether the student knew he was suspected of an honor offense at the time of admitting guilt, which would make the conscientious retraction invalid. If it is invalid, the student has an opportunity to then file an informed retraction within the new bylaws.
“It just allows students the option to exhaust their options,” Behrle said. “[Students may] pursue the conscientious retraction option and the informed retraction option if their conscientious retraction is found invalid by the investigation panel.”
The Committee’s largest change not related to informed retraction was combining its Community Relations Committee and its Diversity Advisory Board into one Community Relations and Diversity Advisory Committee. Vice-Chair for Community Relations Michelle Butler, a third-year College student, said the new committee would act as an advisory panel representing student opinion to Honor.
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