MCOIIIIII Stude nt > Underage drinking policies on campus thicken CAROLYN ZAFFINO senior reporter Penn State University de cided that alcohol consump tion is a major issue and that they need to make some changes in order to protect the students. Since the be ginning of this year Penn State has had a new policy in place for people who get caught drinking on campus. The office of Student Af fairs has started notifying the parents of dependent students after the first alco hol offense, instead of after the second. The point of this policy is to make the parents aware that they should get involved and help prevent future in cidents. This also helps the student to find a support sys tem with both the school and with their parents, because it gives them some comfort. According to the Paren tal Notification Policy issued by Penn State Judicial Af- _.ide of on June 3, In a special to the Observ er, Dennis Phillips writes that Peek n Peak owes more than $3O million to creditors including over $1.2 million in unpaid property taxes. Paul Kiebler IV, the owner of the property, has report fairs, the goal of parental notification is to "Identify additional supportive points of intervention for students; identify at risk behavior thresholds for which notifi cation would be effectively applied; and to educate stu dents about the negative impact that dangerous, un healthy and inappropriate choices have on their educa tion and on others." "I know it's different, but we are just trying to prevent serious trouble," said Kelly Shrout Associate Director of Student Affairs, "it is meant to be more of an aid than a discipline." Before the letter gets sent to the parents, the students are given a chance to warn their parents. On-campus students are required to meet with their Resident Coordinator and commuters with Shrout, to talk about what happened. Through these series of various steps, the students prii*ouS .ownensi lion to 1 0 14 C Bank, $1 Million to taxing authorities, and $1 million for their leases. A marketipg group of Rambaldo Gonda Media of Erie, Pa., issued a news re lease stating that the bank ruptcy is mainly "a result DENIED )GA president Steven Burger exercises the . arely power to veto a -ge funding request by the Society of Undergraduate Economists. Page 2 Produced by the students of enn State Behrend since 1948 t e 11 themselves are highly en couraged to be the ones to break the news to their par ents first, instead of a suprise letter home from administra tion. "All that is sent home is a letter saying there was a violation of the alcohol poli cy," said Shrout. "We cannot send home the incident re port until a waver has been signed saying yes we can." The violations include consuming, providing, or even being in a room where alcohol consumption takes place. "If your parent fills out a FAFSA for you, they will get a letter," said Shrout. In the long run, this will help a lot of students stay out of seri ous trouble. For more information, on guidelines the sanction ing guidelines can be found at http://studentaffairs.psu. edu/judicial/pdf/Sanctioning Guidelines.PDF. "hinhor7 k 3 lOl restructuv , h4l.* The resort will still open and operate despite the bik*rs*cy report. In a statement to Buffalonews. com, Robert Swenson, Pres ident of Peek'n Peak ex pressed the current season. "We're open and operat- oals o the Parental Noti cation Policy (Page 17 of the Procedural Guidelines for the University Discipline Process) IdentifY additional supportive points of intervention for students. 0r- t Become better partners with parents/guardians in support of ' ' their student. ' - To identify at risk behavior thresholds for which notification would be effectively applied. - ' To education students about the negative impact that dangerous, unhealthy and inappropriate choices have on ) their education and on others. . - 1 `, _ To utilize the impacts of family/guardian intervention for de terring further misconduct. Aettvithairta the case from the US bankruptcy court for the northern dis trict of Ohio Eastern divi sion, the court filed chapter 11 which will allow them to still rebuild the company. Chapter 11 allows the resort to rebuild itself and to con tinue daily operations while they repay some of their SPORTS Penn State Behrend Men's Basketball 'egins the season with a 6-0 record, winning this weekend's game against Penn State Altoona. Page B 1 TUESDAY, DECEMBER 7, 2010 CdCOtt ffai rs to to service people in the area. The re sort will continue to func tion on a day-to-day basis without having to shut down completely. The slopes at Peek'n Peak open this coming Fri. Dec. 10. Swenson expects the resorts to continue to make enough money to eventually come out of and get through _MIIMIL SGA gets heat over SRTE fliers • "Got a bad teacher? Rip him/her • • a new one with the SRTEs!" . These words, adorning the top of small flyers distributed across campus, has the Penn State Beh • rend Student Government Asso • ciation (SGA) in hot water from : faculty and staff at the college The flyers were distributed as part of an effort by the Academic •. Affairs Committee of SGA to pro • mote student feedback on their teachers. The SRTEs - Student Reviews of Teaching Effective - are distributed at the end of each semester and provide students a chance to review how good or bad their teachers have been. The way in which the SRTEs were promoted, though, has raised criti cism across the college. "I think it's a case of good inten tions with poor execution," said Ken Miller, Director of Student Af fairs and the advisor of the SGA. "They were trying to increase student participation, story continued on PAGE 3 Club Rush Club Rush, an event usually re : served for the first few weeks of • fall semester, will have an encore • performance this year. Penn State : Behrend's Student Government : Association (SGA), in conjunc t tion with Student Activities plans • to hold a Spring Club Rush event • to get students involved with clubs : and organizations on-campus The event, planned for Jan 13, the first week of Spring semester, •• was spurred by a motivation to get • more first-year students involved on-campus ,;~ °`~, "A lot of first-year students told me they didn't get involved with a club because they just wanted to get acclimated to college," said Ni cole Fedders, Coordinator of Stu dent Organizations and Program Developments. "When they were ready to join clubs in the spring, they really didn't know how to go about it, so they didn't join anything. Some of them joined a club their sopho more year, while others didn't join at all." The event will utilize the entire Reed building, says Fedders. story continued on PAGE 3 Check out a student's • survey of campus housing, including Pro's and Con's of each building and the difficulty of each housing process. TOBY KELLER assistant /11'll` , editor be held Spring CONNOR SATTELY DORMS Page 6
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