I would like to thank all of those who attended last Tuesday’s Office of Student Conduct and Conflict Resolution (OSCCR) meeting and offered suggestions on reforming the Code of Student Conduct. Although the format of the forum was not to anyone’s liking, the overall quality of life at Northeastern will benefit from your activism.

This has been a good year for change. While individual students who have sat before the Conduct Board will speak only to the inflexibility of OSCCR, when faced with a display of widespread dissatisfaction the Office of Student Conduct has shown a surprising willingness to work with the student body. Last week marked the first meeting of the Code of Student Conduct Review Committee, which will ostensibly recommend reforms to the Code of Student Conduct.

Since I began soliciting student concerns about the Code of Student Conduct and OSCCR, I’ve spoken with and received feedback from literally hundreds of students. Nearly all supported a substantial overhaul of the code. The dozen or so who did not were either employed by the Office of Student Conduct, Resident Assistants or otherwise somehow involved in Northeastern’s judicial system. The common response from the judicial establishment is that the system “is the way it is for a reason” and if the student body were merely “educated” enough as to the theories and rationalizations behind the code, all of our objections would disappear and OSCCR would become just another haphazard branch of campus bureaucracy.

While those who stand behind OSCCR and the code of Student Conduct are certainly respectable and well-intentioned, this situation will never come to pass. The vast majority of the students on campus do not loathe the Office of Student Conduct due to some vast, self-perpetuating misunderstanding. They loathe it because it enforces a disciplinary code that is widely regarded as unjust, using methods that are similarly unfair. Should the unfairness go away, so will the stigma. Of course, there are differing views as to what is and is not unfair about OSCCR, so I will lay out mine: the segments of the code that have lost OSCCR the “consent of the governed” and have seen the most protest from the student body at large are the ones in dire need of substantial change. It’s as simple as that. Everyone realizes the need for basic safety and security; however, in quite a few areas, Northeastern’s disciplinary measures go far above and beyond, into the realm of infringing on our basic rights.

There is a flaw in my logic: OSCCR is not forced to take the student body into account, as our attendance at Northeastern obligates us to obey the current incarnation of the code of Student Conduct. OSCCR claims to act “in loco parentis,” in lieu of our parents, taking responsibility to ensure we become productive young people, avoiding violent crime and excessive socializing. Fair enough. This philosophy may appear a bit patronizing to some, myself included, but let’s assess it at face value.

OSCCR exists because we aren’t seen as mature adults who are capable of making our own choices and accepting legal responsibility for said choices, so we must be occasionally fined and punished by Northeastern, our stand-in “parents.” For this line of thought to make logical sense, it must follow that the code of Student Conduct and the OSCCR experience, as it now stands, genuinely benefits the average Northeastern student and subtly molds him or her into a better member of society. I’m serious about this. Stop laughing.

It’s a bit hard to be subtly molded while Northeasterners are so fed up with the manifold unfairnesses of the current judicial system that they fail to see it as rendering a legitimate verdict in the first place. A notoriously hard-nosed Code of Student Conduct and a judicial process that stacks the cards against the student may satisfy pithy public relations truisms like “supporting the visions and values of Northeastern,” but it does not add to the academic experience, nor does it make students into better citizens, nor does it increase the value of a Northeastern degree.

It is widely asserted that our harsh conduct policies help Northeastern’s relations with our “neighbors in the community.” But this can be called into question, and either way, we inflame their victimization complex in so many other ways that OSCCR’s positive effects are negligible. Most importantly, the disciplinary process in its current state merely contributes to the feelings of resentment and alienation many Huskies hold against their future alma mater.

To reform and re-legitimize the current judicial system, students have come forward with a broad list of suggestions that can be implemented by the code of Student Conduct Review Committee. The same student concerns are raised again and again: an expansion of the medical amnesty policy; the requirement of a higher standard of proof to find students responsible for violating the code; an end to “double jeopardy” off-campus OSCCR referrals; a policy to expunge the record of those who have a single minor offense; the retention of our Constitutional rights; and an overall modernization of the code.

Reform doesn’t come easy. There are those who wish to maintain the status quo, and unfortunately they are in the position to do so. With each of these proposals for change, the status quo-ers bring on a slew of various conditions, assertions and hypothetical “what-if”s. However, to most logical minds it seems quite clear that, should we implement these reforms in a prudent and sensible fashion, the liberalization of the Code of Student Conduct would not endanger Northeastern students, nor would it harm the reputation of this university. As a dynamic, up-and-coming institution in “the Athens of America,” a progressive judicial system is something toward which we should aspire.

Mercy is always a better policy than vengeance, especially when those shown mercy will one day be writing checks to the endowment. I look forward to the day when Northeastern students can be proud of every aspect of this university, even dear old OSCCR, the present-day grouch.

– Derek Miller is a middler economics and political science major and the creator of the “Respect our Rights, Northeastern: Reform OSCCR” Facebook group.