Students vote on new co-ed visitation policy

From residence halls with gender separated floors to boys and girls living on the same halls, GC&SU’s new 24-hour visitation option in residence halls yields another turn towards gender mingling.

The Residence Hall Association (RHA) recently proposed a residence hall visitation policy to allow each suite to determine visitation hours that all students living in the suite could agree to.

“The suites could either agree to keep (their policy) with the university’s policy for the weeknights or they could adapt their own policy,” said Amanda Gunter, Napier residence hall director. “It is up to the residents of the suite to reach a decision on that.”

The extended visitation hours option in the residence halls left very few suites selecting anything less than 24-hour visitation.

“I think there is one or two people that I know of who did not go with 24-hour visitation,” said Ashley Whiteside, GC&SU sophomore and Foundation resident.

The 24-hour visitation option allows students to determine how they will use their time without feeling constrained by visitation rules.

“We can have study groups if we ever need to do that,” Whiteside said. “Sometimes you just come out and it happens to be midnight and you have to get out of the rooms. This way you can socialize more.”

Freshman Ryan Greene said he felt that the policy could really not be any better catered toward students than it is now.

“I think it is what every resident wants and I think it is because the resident gets to make the decision,” Greene said. “It is a fabulous idea and a fabulous policy. You can change it anytime you want to and it’s very flexible to the students needs. I really think you couldn’t have a much better policy.”

RHA began discussing the possibility of a policy change last year after the Educational Benchmarking Institute (EBI) survey was administered by University Housing.

“One of the questions on (the survey) dealt with last year’s visitation policy,” Gunter said. “A lot of students put on there that they would like to see change in (the visitation) policy.”

As president of RHA, Greene spent many hours leading student forums and putting together the visitation policy proposal to be submitted to University Housing.

“We are the voice of the students in the residence halls,” Greene said. “They talk to us about things and we talk for all of the residents.”

Greene said he felt that it was very important to ensure during student forums that residents understood the reasons for having visitation policies.

Keeping in mind that not all the students wanted a 24-hour visitation policy, RHA set out to form a policy that would meet the needs of all students.

“If we made it 24-hour visitation, students felt that it would be like they had no choice and anyone could come into their room at any point in the night,” Greene said. “So, we made it so that it was a decision between suites so that everyone had to agree on what the visitation hours would be.”

Although each suite has the opportunity to determine their own policy, the old policy will still come into place if any conflict arises.

“The visitation policy hasn’t changed (in the books),” Gunter said. “There is a policy on the books that visitation Sunday night through Thursday night ends at midnight and then weekends it is 24 hours. So, it’s not that the policy is not there. If there is a problem, a roommate conflict or something like that, the policy is still in place and can be enforced.”

The student forums played a key role in some of the main developing ideas included in the policy proposal. RHA spent hours piecing together all of their collected information.

“The idea having the policies be by suite was actually an idea that was developed through the student forums,” Gunter said. “Also, out of the forums and through the work that the officers of RHA put in, it really showed housing that they were going through an overly good process and considering everything.”

The decided policies for each suite become effective as soon as the suite returns paperwork. The new policy option may also reduce the workload for the residence hall staff.

“It makes our job easier,” said Daniel Seibel, sophomore resident assistant (RA). “It is less like babysitting people and more like being there for them if they have problems with their roommates. It makes the RA’s job easier and makes the residents more trusting.”

Seibel said his main concern with the extended visitation option is that residents will feel there is no action that can be taken if a conflict arises with the agreed upon suite visitation hours.

The extended visitation option also puts pressure on the Residence Hall Staff to facilitate a living community that encourages students to take their classes seriously.

The safety precautions are not expected to change much with the implementation of extended visitation hours. Gunter said that she does not expect the extended visitation hours to change the security of the residence halls as long as students abide by the current rules.

“The (security precautions) are really the same thing we have always encouraged students to do,” Gunter said. “If they are not in their room or asleep, leave the door dead bolted. Don’t prop open the building doors or let people in who don’t live here. If you are not sure if they live here, don’t let them in. Those are the kind of security things that apply anytime. Anybody can walk in the building day or night. Everybody is being cautious and watching out for their own security. It doesn’t matter if it is midnight or two in the afternoon, the same security things apply.”

RHA does not expect to see many if any major problems arise from the implementation of the new suite visitation contracts.

“We tried to think about any problems before we actually submitted it,” Seibel said. “For the most part, we could not think of any very large problems. If someone is having a problem they can always go to their RA. They are still there to keep everything in line. As long as everyone is communicating fine there should not be a problem.”

Overall, residents enjoy the setup of the residence halls having men and women on the same floor and extended visitation hour options. This new freedom calls for increased individual responsibility among students.

“I think we should be responsible since we are in college,” Whiteside said. “If people are responsible there probably won’t be any problems.”

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Jan 27 2006. Filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry