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Campus officials shrugged off student leaders’ 10-page proposal requesting reduced punishments for students caught with marijuana on campus, saying the university is unlikely to loosen punishments for drug use.
Student leaders must now submit the proposal to Resident Life and the University Senate — a process that could take up to a year. John Zacker, the director of the office of student conduct, said he doubts the university will move toward loosening the punishments for marijuana use.
“I encourage students to become involved in these issues, but I’m not very encouraging [on this topic] because I don’t think it will end in the result they would like,” Zacker said.
The proposal would differentiate marijuana from harder drugs under the university’s student code of conduct, said Stacia Cosner, president of the campus’ Students for a Sensible Drug Policy.
In a meeting between Vice President of Student Affairs Linda Clement and Cosner, Clement said students were aiming too high in the administrative ranks and needed to submit a proposal to Resident Life and the senate.
“I think we had a good meeting, it was a good exchange of good points of view,” Clement said. “I advised her to go to Resident Life and the senate, where changes to the code of conduct take place.”
Officials’ distaste for the changes was a blow to the chapters of SSDP and the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, which have been pushing for the policy change since last spring.
Clement added although the campus embraces debate, she thinks there will be strong points on both sides of the issue, and she disagrees with Cosner on the issue.
“Change will be very difficult,” Clement said.
After a non-binding referendum on the Student Government Association’s election ballot showed 65 percent of voters favored loosening current punishments, SSDP and NORML began penning the proposal Cosner presented to Clement.
“My main proposal was made up of two different proposals,” Cosner said. “It was to make changes in the residence hall policy to make marijuana offenses a ‘B’ violation instead of an ‘A’ violation, and also to exclude it from the list of prohibited behaviors on the university’s student code of conduct by differentiating between marijuana and other harder drugs.”
The university currently considers marijuana use or possession in the residence halls on campus to be a first-class offense, meaning offenders immediately lose their housing, financial aid status and face suspension or mandatory drug testing. Marijuana is also included under the umbrella term of “illicit drugs” in the list of prohibited substances in the university’s student code of conduct.
“We are arguing that the policy is unduly harsh and doesn’t reflect the nature of the so-called crime,” said Kris Krane, executive director of SSDP’s national office in Washington. Krane has been assisting Cosner with the proposal.
Cosner said she was not discouraged by Tuesday’s meeting and will immediately begin working on proposals to present to Resident Life and the senate. She was advised the senate would probably take a semester to a year to look over her proposals.
“I knew it would take a while, because they don’t change the student code rapidly,” Cosner said.
The effort from NORML and SSDP on this issue has won the university the top spot in High Times magazine’s list of the top 10 counterculture schools, an annual collection of the top schools in the nation working to reform drug policies on their respective campuses.
The list, appearing in the October issue of the magazine, hit newsstands this week. High Times votes on schools based on level of student activism against the war on drugs.
“The list is based on the level of activism regarding policies, not just schools at which students use a lot of pot,” Krane said. “Maryland is certainly not the No. 1 stoner school, but has more activism than most universities in the country.”
Cosner said this honor is motivating and that administrators’ skepticism is not discouraging her and her colleagues.
“We’re not going anywhere,” Cosner said. “We’ll do what needs to be done.”
Newshawk: BluntKilla - 420 Magazine
Source: DiamondBack Online
Pubdate: September 01, 2006
Author: Kelly Whittaker
Copyright: 2006 Diamondback Online
Contact: whittakerdbk@gmail.com
Website: The Diamondback
Student leaders must now submit the proposal to Resident Life and the University Senate — a process that could take up to a year. John Zacker, the director of the office of student conduct, said he doubts the university will move toward loosening the punishments for marijuana use.
“I encourage students to become involved in these issues, but I’m not very encouraging [on this topic] because I don’t think it will end in the result they would like,” Zacker said.
The proposal would differentiate marijuana from harder drugs under the university’s student code of conduct, said Stacia Cosner, president of the campus’ Students for a Sensible Drug Policy.
In a meeting between Vice President of Student Affairs Linda Clement and Cosner, Clement said students were aiming too high in the administrative ranks and needed to submit a proposal to Resident Life and the senate.
“I think we had a good meeting, it was a good exchange of good points of view,” Clement said. “I advised her to go to Resident Life and the senate, where changes to the code of conduct take place.”
Officials’ distaste for the changes was a blow to the chapters of SSDP and the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, which have been pushing for the policy change since last spring.
Clement added although the campus embraces debate, she thinks there will be strong points on both sides of the issue, and she disagrees with Cosner on the issue.
“Change will be very difficult,” Clement said.
After a non-binding referendum on the Student Government Association’s election ballot showed 65 percent of voters favored loosening current punishments, SSDP and NORML began penning the proposal Cosner presented to Clement.
“My main proposal was made up of two different proposals,” Cosner said. “It was to make changes in the residence hall policy to make marijuana offenses a ‘B’ violation instead of an ‘A’ violation, and also to exclude it from the list of prohibited behaviors on the university’s student code of conduct by differentiating between marijuana and other harder drugs.”
The university currently considers marijuana use or possession in the residence halls on campus to be a first-class offense, meaning offenders immediately lose their housing, financial aid status and face suspension or mandatory drug testing. Marijuana is also included under the umbrella term of “illicit drugs” in the list of prohibited substances in the university’s student code of conduct.
“We are arguing that the policy is unduly harsh and doesn’t reflect the nature of the so-called crime,” said Kris Krane, executive director of SSDP’s national office in Washington. Krane has been assisting Cosner with the proposal.
Cosner said she was not discouraged by Tuesday’s meeting and will immediately begin working on proposals to present to Resident Life and the senate. She was advised the senate would probably take a semester to a year to look over her proposals.
“I knew it would take a while, because they don’t change the student code rapidly,” Cosner said.
The effort from NORML and SSDP on this issue has won the university the top spot in High Times magazine’s list of the top 10 counterculture schools, an annual collection of the top schools in the nation working to reform drug policies on their respective campuses.
The list, appearing in the October issue of the magazine, hit newsstands this week. High Times votes on schools based on level of student activism against the war on drugs.
“The list is based on the level of activism regarding policies, not just schools at which students use a lot of pot,” Krane said. “Maryland is certainly not the No. 1 stoner school, but has more activism than most universities in the country.”
Cosner said this honor is motivating and that administrators’ skepticism is not discouraging her and her colleagues.
“We’re not going anywhere,” Cosner said. “We’ll do what needs to be done.”
Newshawk: BluntKilla - 420 Magazine
Source: DiamondBack Online
Pubdate: September 01, 2006
Author: Kelly Whittaker
Copyright: 2006 Diamondback Online
Contact: whittakerdbk@gmail.com
Website: The Diamondback
