Two top positions in the Undergraduate Judicial Affairs office are changing hands with the departure of director Nathan Miller and assistant director Meredith Smith, who both left at the end of spring term.
Miller will take up the post of senior class dean and judicial affairs coordinator at Swarthmore College on July 8. Miller left at the end of the academic year five years at the College.
Smith, who has been at Dartmouth since June 2011, will work at Northwestern University's student affairs division while completing her graduate degree in higher education administration and policy.
The search is underway for a new director, and the search committee hopes to secure a candidate by July 1, assistant dean for campus life and committee chair Kate Burke previously said.
The Undergraduate Judicial Affairs director oversees disciplinary action for students and organizations in accordance with the processes outlined in the Student Handbook.
The departure of both Miller and Smith represents a significant administrative turnover, as there are only three full-time staff members in the office of undergraduate judicial affairs in all.
Administrative positions in student affairs commonly switch hands, and this transition most often occurs during the spring after an academic year.
Administrators with equivalent positions are also leaving their posts at Northwestern, Smith said. Northwestern's director of the office of student conduct and conflict resolution will pursue a doctorate in higher education, and the assistant director will serve as assistant dean of students at another Chicago university, Smith said.
"For me personally, this is just the right time to go on and get this done," she said.
Students have expressed frustration with the failure of the Committee on Standards to release a community report in three years and a perceived lack of transparency from judicial affairs.
Burke previously said that the lack of annual reports stems from the office being "in transition."
While she acknowledged student concerns, Smith said she was motivated by a desire to improve transparency, highlighting the Committee on Standards' mock sexual assault hearing last year.
"Personally, what drove me was transparency with students to tell them as much about the process as I could," she said.
The institutions that Miller and Smith are leaving to are having their own difficulties.
Two Northwestern students committed suicide this year, and a third died in a drowning incident. Students called for improved mental health services on campus and held awareness events after the death of sophomore Dmitri Teplov in May. The university approved funding for three new therapist positions in the counseling and psychological services office.
Smith said that her time at Dartmouth inspired her to support students struggling with mental health issues, as she noticed that students suspended for academic reasons often have a mental illness. Her research at Northwestern will focus on what can be done to support high school seniors struggling with depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder and other mental health issues.
Swarthmore's campus was engulfed in discussions of sexual assault at the end of the year, and two female students filed Clery Act and Title IX complaints against the college.
Their campus debate mirrors Dartmouth's, where students filed a Clery Act complaint against the College in the spring. The act, signed in 1990, requires higher education institutions to report information regarding campus crime.
Interim judicial affairs positions will be staffed over the summer to carry out disciplinary procedures, Smith said. She declined to comment further because she said she was unaware of information that had already been released to the community.
Miller and Burke were unavailable for comment by press time.
