Alcohol, academic infractions increase

Two students were expelled last year, and 108 students were penalized for alcohol policy violations — among disciplinary actions that have been on the rise since 1999.

In all, 291 disciplinary actions were taken last year — the most since the 1996-97 academic year — according to the Discipline Report recently released by the Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Students.

Last year was the first time a student had been expelled since 1998-99.

One of the expulsions resulted from a student committing 20 academic violations during four years, and the other from a student plagiarizing several papers in one semester, according to the report.

Though the number of academic violations increased from 13 in 1998-99 to 32 last year — mostly cases of plagiarism — Associate Dean of Undergraduate Students Marianne Waterbury said there was no single reason for the increase.

"When students write papers, because so much of what they do now is on the computer . . . they lose track of where they got the language from," Waterbury said.

A student can end up forgetting whether he wrote a phrase or if it came from someone else, she added.

Though such plagiarism may not be intentional, it is nevertheless an academic violation.

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"It's reasonable to know this is not your language," Waterbury said.

In other cases, students plagiarize from materials on the Internet — a new trick that has quickly become old.

"The faculty has finally caught up with the students," Waterbury said. Faculty members are looking up questionable content on the Internet much more than they had been in the past, she said.

Other violations included submitting the same coursework for multiple classes without permission and submitting an assignment without appropriate footnotes.

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Thirty-two dean's warnings were issued and 76 students were put on disciplinary probation for alcohol policy violations, considerably more than the 77 total violations the year before and twice the number issued in 1999-2000.

The number of Public Safety referrals for alcohol violations in 2001 doubled from the previous year, according to annual crime statistics.

The violations were for possessing or consuming alcohol in common spaces of campus, serving alcohol to students under the legal age, possessing a keg or driving while intoxicated, the report said.

The number of penalties for alcohol violations dropped by more than half from 112 in 1998-99 to 54 in 1999-2000 after the penalties for serving alcohol were made more severe. A first serving violation changed from a dean's warning to three months of academic probation.

The changes were instituted as a result of the Trustees' Alcohol Initiative, which aimed to reduce drinking on campus.

But the numbers have gone back to what they were before the changes, Waterbury said.

She said alcohol played a large part in other violations of University policy, including assault and property damage — both up since the previous year.

Though many penalties were issued, Waterbury said she wants students to feel comfortable bringing alcohol-induced health problems to University officials.

"It's not against the law to be intoxicated, so it's not against University regulations," she said.

Waterbury clarified that conduct, not intoxication, can lead to a penalty.