Hidden among the hype of the women’s basketball team making it to the national championship, the University Senate passed a new riot policy Monday, giving the university license to expel students not necessarily convicted in a court of law.
While the policy has been in the works for most of this semester, it did come to fruition rather quietly with very little to zero concern voiced by the student body. Though the policy seems like it would be strict enough to deter many potential rioters, students must make themselves aware of the new rules and student and university leaders must be vigilant in ensuring that the university’s newfound power is not recklessly abused.
Earlier this year, the University System of Maryland Board of Regents decided to pass the responsibility on to individual schools in the system after mulling over how to change the systemwide riot policy in order to more effectively quell rowdy post-game celebrations. The regents charged each school to craft its own riot policy but required that it not depend on a criminal conviction for expulsion for riot-related offenses.
This is a dangerous power for the university to be armed with, and while university leaders built in a safeguard by requiring at least a police report that documents a student’s involvement with rioting, the policy essentially overrides previous rights afforded to students and gives the university power to assume guilt before proving innocence. Awareness is a student’s No. 1 protection in this case.
The senate passing this policy also brings to mind the fact that no student leader has yet unveiled an alternative to post-game rioting. Last night, students proved that rowdy postgame celebrations are certainly not dead at this university, flooding Route 1 after the women’s victory over Duke last night. Now would be the ideal time for student leaders – some of whom have previously vowed to accomplish this – to buckle down and present a real solution and start building a postgame celebration tradition now before riots again become the No. 1 destroyer of the university’s reputation.
