Dean of the College James Larimore announced in a letter yesterday that he had accepted the Greek Leaders Council's proposal "with minor modifications," thus paving the way for a limited number of Safety and Security walk-throughs in Greek and undergraduate society houses.
The last remaining details concerning walk-throughs were ironed out on Tuesday, ending weeks of discussion between representatives from the GLC and members of the Department of Safety and Security and the Office of Residential Life.
In a victory for the GLC, the walk-throughs will be announced to house officers at least 48 hours ahead of time, will occur only once a week during specified time windows and Safety and Security officers will wait "a minute or two" at the door of the house for an escort to walk them through the house.
ORL had initially announced that walk-throughs were to be unannounced and would occur more frequently.
However, the new policy succeeded in publicly rejecting some perceived differences between Greek housing and residence halls, allowing for "greater consistency" in ORL practices for most of the undergraduate residential system.
In the initial GLC proposal, Greek leaders argued that the college proposed policy "refuse[d] to recognize the inherent differences between such housing and dorms."
According to the final agreement, from Aug. 20 to Aug. 28, each CFS and Undergraduate Society physical plant will receive one safety visit from DOSS officers. The visits will continue through the interim break and into the start of the Fall Term.
"Safety visits will consist of walking through common area spaces (defined as lounges, television rooms, hallways, multipurpose rooms, stairways, study rooms, basements, etc.)," the agreement says.
Chi Heorot President John Campbell '03 said he was still unhappy with yesterday's policy.
"I feel like it's by no means the end of the road," Campbell said.
Mark Bubriski '02, a former member of The Dartmouth staff who represented the Class of 2002 at the implementation meetings and is a member of Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity, said that in the eyes of most Greeks, the compromise was the best of a bad situation.
"I think people are accepting of it, but nobody's all that happy with it. Nobody's happy with the idea of having Safety and Security walking through their house. It seems unnecessary," he said. "There are not going to be any more protests of this proposal. Nobody wants it to happen, but if it's going to have to happen, this is the best option."
Representatives from the GLC, Safety and Security and ORL began meeting after the GLC submitted a proposal to ORL on July 20 describing an alternative to the frequent and unannounced "safety inspection" walk-throughs initially announced by ORL at the beginning of the summer.
The GLC proposal argued that the new ORL policy violated their privacy, was devoid of student input and was unnecessary because already "safety checks within Greek houses ... exceed the checks in residence halls." The proposal also suggested that walk-throughs be scheduled and occur no more than twice a week.
The two sides met during July to finalize a copy to submit to Larimore. The proposal that was given to Larimore for his acceptance, said those involved, was very similar to the proposal offered by the GLC.
On Aug. 3, Larimore reviewed and accepted the proposal. He also conferred with staff in Residential Life and Safety and Security. "We agreed that the GLC proposal reflected very thoughtful work and could serve as the guiding framework for the safety visits," he told The Dartmouth last night Larimore announced his decision on Aug. 8 to Greek and Society leaders at an informal meeting at his house.
"It was an opportunity for me, on the one hand, to thank students from the GLC for putting such careful thought into their proposal and also to share the information with them that their proposal had been accepted as the guiding framework for a new protocol," he said.Also at the meeting, he said, people from residential life "let the students know that they still had some homework to do in filling out the fine points in the plan."
This Tuesday, the implementation committee met for the last time to iron out those remaining details. A copy of the final proposal was forwarded to Larimore for his review.
Assistant Dean of Residential Life Cassie Barnhardt said that both sides comfortable with the final agreement."I don't think we walked away with any gaping holes. My impression was that it was agreeable with the implementation committee. And they are the GLC's representatives so if you take that one step further ..." she said.
"We've resolved a lot of things and we're at a place where there's some direction that everyone can live with for the moment. ... We're all coming at it from different perspectives. Do I think there's 100 percent agreement on every issue? No. ... I don't think it's the most harmonious thing we've ever done but I certainly think it's better than what it started out as," Barnhardt said.
In mid-October, ORL will reconvene students, alumni and appropriate staff to evaluate the procedures for conducting the safety visits and to refine the safety visit process specifically.
"In October we will need to examine how this affects the privacy of students and if this does in fact make residential life any more consistent or if it's just going to make it more inconsistent," Bubriski said.
"When we have the opportunity to make another adjustment ot the changes the school is trying to make, that will undoubteldy happen," Campbell said.
Larimore's letter will be in student Hinman Boxes late today or, at the latest, by Friday. His letter also appears as a full-page advertisement in today's issue of The Dartmouth.
"It is very important that we now focus our attention on the report and recommendations of the Greek Life Steering Committee," Larimore wrote. "Some progress has been made, but we should not lose sight of the fact that more work remains for the year ahead."
Larimore expanded on his hopes for the future of the relationship between the College and its CFS organizations.
"Greek organizations offer a number of important benefits to students and to the college," he said. "At the same time the organizations have responsibilities to the college. There is a relationship there that needs to be more carefully understood. And the best way to do that is to bring people together for some really focused conversation."
"There are some things that I can learn and that others can learn and I would hope that there are some things that students and their advisors may think about differently as a result of discussion. It really does serve as a good starting point."
