CHAPEL HILL – About a dozen students rallied at the Board of Governors meeting Thursday, upset over two policies passed by system leaders. Students say they won’t let the matters go and will keep showing up at Board meetings until they feel their voices are heard.
UNC-CH Senior Kate Davis-Jones was one of the students who gathered at the Board of Governors meeting in protest of changes made to the drop/add policy.
“The Board of Governors has been consistently just stepping into the University, micro-managing, and sort of twisting things to the way they think the University should run,” Davis-Jones said. “They are completely by-passing any sort of criticism or input of people who are actually at the University. “
Passed by the Board of Governors in April, the policy established a system-wide drop period. It shortened UNC-CH’s current drop period from eight weeks to ten days. Any course dropped after the 10th day of the semester will appear as a withdrawal on students’ transcripts. The policy is required to go into effect by the fall of 2014.
“The wonderful thing about the eight-week drop/add policy is that it allows students to challenge themselves, and take risks with their education,” Davis-Jones said.
Davis-Jones said she wanted more transparency from the Board of Governors and also wanted the student voice to factor more into their policies.
Jan Boxill, UNC’s Faculty Chair, said at a Board of Trustees committee meeting in September that it was a “one-size-fits-all” policy that will not help Carolina’s students succeed. She said receiving a “W” on a transcript created a stigma concerning the student’s academic credentials.
Student Body President Christy Lambden told the Board of Trustees that he also was against the policy.
In 2004, UNC lengthened the drop period from six to eight weeks, according to a University publication.
When the policy was introduced in the fall of 2012, it was met with resistance from then UNC Student Body President Will Leimenstoll and the Faculty Executive Committee, who voted unanimously against the proposal.
“It implied that students shouldn’t be pushing their education to its limits,” Davis Jones said. “They shouldn’t be challenging themselves, and they shouldn’t be courageous with their electives.”
Students outside the meeting were also protesting the Board of Governor’s ban on gender-neutral housing, a program that would have allowed males and females to live together in the same University dorm suites or apartments.
The UNC Board of Trustees voted last November to allow gender-neutral housing. Former UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp backed the Trustees’ decision, saying it would help keep students safe.
However, in August, UNC System leaders overturned the Trustees’ decision, and halted the program before it could begin the pilot year. The measure passed unanimously without discussion.
UNC Senior Kevin Claybren served as the Student Coordinator of the Gender Non-Specific Housing Coalition. He was set to live with three other females in Ram Village Apartments, the first four students to participate in the program at UNC.
“Right now we are just trying to show the Board of Governors that we care about this issue,” Claybren said. “We are not going to stop talking about this issue. We will continue to keep showing up as long as it is something that matters to us. We also want to make sure that students who don’t have voices are really heard and are visible.”
The program would have allowed males and females to share bathrooms and common areas in suites or apartments, but not share the same bedroom. The program was voluntary and only available in designated buildings.
Fifty-five University departments and groups supported the program, including the UNC Parents Council, student government and the executive branch of the student government. More than 2,000 students signed a petition in favor of gender neutral housing.
Chair of the Board of Governors, Peter Hans, said at the August 9th meeting that to enacting a policy change is a two-step process. First, the measure is taken up by the Governance Board, which was done in June, and then it goes to the full Board. Hans said there was no opposition to the policy change “whatsoever.”
“Our board wants every student to be safe and comfortable and included. The Board believes there are more practical ways to achieve those goals than assigning young men and young women to the same dorm rooms and campus suites,” Hans said on August 9.
http://chapelboro.com/news/unc/students-say-bog-is-micro-managing-unc-ch-policies/CHAPEL HILL – The UNC System Board of Governors is set to meet Thursday, this coming the after the group received criticism from many UNC-Chapel Hill students and administrators concerning a change to the drop/add policy.
Passed by the Board of Governors in April, the policy established a system-wide drop period. It shortened UNC-CH’s current drop period from eight weeks to ten days. Any course dropped after the 10th day of the semester will appear as a withdrawal on students’ transcripts. The policy is required to go into effect by the fall of 2014.
Jan Boxill, UNC’s Faculty Chair, said at a Board of Trustees committee meeting in September that it was a “one-size-fits-all” policy that will not help Carolina’s students succeed. She said receiving a “W” on a transcript created a stigma concerning the student’s academic credentials.
Student Body President Christy Lambden told the Board of Trustees that he also was against the policy. He said once the policy is implemented, UNC’s drop/add period would be shorter than many peers institutions and could cause Carolina to fall behind academically.
In 2004, UNC lengthened the drop period from six to eight weeks, according to a University publication.
When the policy was introduced in the fall of 2012, it was met with resistance from then UNC Student Body President Will Leimenstoll and the Faculty Executive Committee, who voted unanimously against the proposal.
Board of Governor meetings are not public hearings, so if students do protest, they will likely be kept outside.
The Board of Governor’s meets at 9:00 a.m. at the Spangler Center in Chapel Hill.
http://chapelboro.com/news/unc/bog-to-meet-thursday-unc-students-criticize-its-adddrop-policy/UNC System Seal
CHAPEL HILL – UNC System leaders have mixed feelings about a pilot program that proposes to counter falling enrollment at six campuses by allowing a greater number of out-of-state students.
The UNC System Board of Governors discussed the measure Thursday that could allow up to 30 percent of newly enrolled students to come from outside the state, effecting the campuses of ECSU, Fayetteville State University, North Carolina A&T State University, North Carolina Central University, Winston-Salem State University, and UNC-Pembroke. Those campuses have historically served minority students.
A final decision on the measure is months away, and the policy is designed to be on a 5-year trial run.
Board member Marty Kotis said he feared the proposed policy would shift the focus away from in-state students.
“I think you have to continue to remember the citizens of this state and why this university [system] exists the way it is and why it’s not a private university,” Kotis said.
Kotis said that the Board couldn’t predict the impact of such a decision and believed that it could instead raise tuition for in-state students by shifting the burden of the cost. The policy also suggested lowering the tuition rate for counties and states that border North Carolina as system-wide measure.
“Without that hard data and without knowing the exact cost of providing that degree to those students, I don’t know if we can make any decision that is not just guessing,” Kotis said.
He added that the policy could violate the State Constitution of North Carolina. By law, enrollment of non-North Carolina freshmen is limited to 18 percent at public universities.
The proposal noted that it wouldn’t cause the number of North Carolina students admitted to decline, rather it would focus on rebuilding enrollment with more out-of-staters. The six campuses all saw revenues from enrollment fall in the past year, according to system officials.
Though the policy won’t effect the flagship university, in context, from 2011 to 2012, UNC Chapel Hill had a 0.5 percent increase in enrollment, with a total headcount of 29,278 students,
Board member Hannah Gage said she believed there were other ways to help the struggling campuses in the system and said recruiting more out-of-state students would only be a temporary fix.
“I think you can look around the country and see campuses that have struggled before and have become hybrids,” Gage said. “They have done creative things with community colleges, and some of that should be a part of the conversation before we ramp up the out-of-state numbers.”
A possible economic advantage of the policy is that almost half of the out-of-state students who attend the six campuses stay in North Carolina after graduation, according the system figures.
On a broader level, the Fall 2012 total headcount for the UNC System was 221,010 students, or an increase of 0.3 percent from the previous year. System officials noted that while the increase was notable, it was minor when compared to the previous decade’s rapid expansion.
http://chapelboro.com/news/unc/unc-system-considers-allowing-more-out-of-staters/Pictured and photo courtesy: UNC Senior Kevin Claybren
CHAPEL HILL – UNC Chapel Hill has endeavored to improve student safety through University-wide efforts. Some have said that gender non-specific housing, also known as gender neutral housing, a program allowing males and females to live together in the same University dorm suites or apartments, might have saved some students from facing harassment because of their sexual identities. However, it was banned last week by UNC System leaders before the program could be begin its pilot year.
UNC Senior Kevin Claybren served as the Student Coordinator of the Gender Non-Specific Housing Coalition. He was set to live with three other females in Ram Village Apartments, the first four students to participate in the gender non-specific housing pilot program at UNC, allowing males and females to share bathrooms and common areas in suites or apartments, but not share the same room.
“Our Board of Governors, the University of North Carolina’s System Board of Governors, are not focused on student safety and student success,” Claybren said. “They are focused on other things and other agendas.”
Claybren said the Board of Governors’ decision, which affects the 16 UNC System campuses, put him in a bind to find housing, and now he is living alone.
“I looked forward to being around other people who would be able to affirm my identity and I could have affirmed their identity. I looked forward to being in that welcoming and inclusive environment where people welcomed the discussion and welcomed these challenging and hard conversations,” Claybren said, adding he believes that feeling safe in a residence hall influences positive academic success.
The Coalition worked for more than two years to make the program a reality, Claybren explained. The group held a sessions in which students shared how they had been bullied.
“We knew that gender non-specific housing was a way to address the bullying and harassment that was happening in our housing experience on UNC Chapel Hill’s campus,” Claybren said.
Terri Phoenix, UNC’s LGBTQ Center Director, served on the Gender Non-Specific Housing Coalition alongside Claybren. She said that residence halls were the fourth most common location where students said they had experienced harassment because of their sexual orientation, gender identity and/or gender expression, according to UNC’s 2011 Campus Climate Report. She said that half of the students who reported harassment identified themselves as heterosexuals. Phoenix said she believed that the program would have benefited a diverse group of students.
Fifty-five University departments and groups supported the policy, including the UNC Parents Council, the student government and the executive branch of the student government. More than 2,000 students signed a petition in favor of the gender non-specific housing. Most notably, the UNC Board of Trustees approved the policy last November, championed by former UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp.
“We were able to demonstrate that this proposed policy had broad-based support from a number of student organizations and other departments. We made the case that this was an approach, one of many approaches, that we wanted to have at our disposal to ensure student safety,” Phoenix said.
Phoenix, who also served on the Sexual Assault Task Force this summer, said the point of gender non-specific housing, was not to randomly assign males and females to live together. She said it was about providing a safe environment, allowing students the opportunity to room with other people who elected to be a part of the pilot program.
“And this group of people then would have had the chance to say I want to live with these specific roommates, regardless of what their gender was, or they would have been assigned with other people who also said, ‘I have concerns about safety, I want to be in a place where people don’t have concerns about rooming with a LGBTQ person,’” Phoenix said. “That what this policy would have done, and that is what was prevented by this Board of Governors’ decision.”
Phoenix said she questioned the timing of the Board of Governor’s Decision, when students were not on campus and without hearing student or faculty comment. It not protocol, though, for the Board meetings to take public comment.
Peter Hans, Chair of the Board of Governors, replied last Friday when asked why the policy was banned:
“Our board wants every student to be safe and comfortable and included. The Board believes there are more practical ways to achieve those goals than assigning young men and young women to the same dorm rooms and campus suites,” Hans said.
Phoenix said his response was a “simplistic representation” of what the policy was.
Both Phoenix and Claybren said that despite the Board of Governors’ decision, they will continue to educate people about why gender non-specific housing is important, with the hope that the Board of Governors will revisit the policy in the future.
http://chapelboro.com/news/unc/student-signed-up-for-gender-non-specific-housing-reacts-to-ban/Pictured: Pro-gender neutral housing protester; Photo by Rachel Nash
CHAPEL HILL – In a controversial move, UNC System leaders voted unanimously Friday to overturn a UNC-Chapel Hill decision to allow students of the opposite gender to live in the same University dorm suites or apartments. Proponents of the gender-neutral housing plan said the UNC Board of Governors’ decision was based on misinformation.
Rick Bradley, UNC Chapel Hill’s Associate Director of Housing and Residential Education, said the Board of Governors’ decision, affecting all of the system’s 16 campuses, was not a surprise. He said his department was alerted by University officials that the Board was considering banning the policy. Though UNC-CH students begin moving back to campus on Aug. 17, Bradley explained the heads-up gave them time to remove the program and find alternate housing for the four students who had signed up, three females and one male.
“My frustration is that if the people were to actually hear what the program is about then they tend to support the idea,” Bradley said.
Some Carolina students championed the policy for more than a year, saying it would provide a safe option for LGBTQ students who might be targeted because of their sexualities. The UNC Board of Trustees voted last November to allow gender-neutral housing, backed by former UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp.
“I would say that it is disappointing, and in most cases, when people take to the time to hear what this program was really about and what it is not about as the Board of Trustees at our university did, they voted unanimously in favor of it upon hearing what is actually involved in it.”
Bradley said he has heard a number of assumptions circulating, one being that gender neutral housing was a taxpayer issue, which is something he said is incorrect.
“Our department does not receive any state-supported funding so student rent dollars pays totally all of our overhead. We receive no state funding. I’m not sure it has a connection to a state-funding issue,” Bradley said.
Thirty-two spaces were made available to students as part of the program, two dorms and Ram Village Apartments. It would have allowed students of the opposite gender to share common living areas and bathrooms, but Bradley explained that a male and female still would not have been allowed to live in the same room.
“I think we’ve heard lots of times that people are referencing that a student could randomly be assigned to someone of the opposite gender. This has always been an opt-in program so it would have been of their choosing to live in this environment so there would not have been any surprise assignments from anyone,” Bradley said.
However, for this upcoming school year, males and females will now be able to live together if they are married, siblings or a parent and child.
UNC System President Tom Ross declined to comment on the Board’s decision Friday, but Chairman Peter Hans offered this:
“Our board wants every student to be safe and comfortable and included. The Board believes there are more practical ways to achieve those goals than assigning young men and young women to the same dorm rooms and campus suites,” Hans said.
The Board of Governors passed the policy ban with out discussion.
Thirty-two public institutions and 66 private institutions across the country provide a gender neutral housing option, according to UNC’s website. Three private North Carolina universities offer the option, one of which is Duke.
http://chapelboro.com/news/unc/some-question-if-gender-neutral-housing-ban-was-an-informed-decision/Pictured: Pro-gender neutral housing protester; Photo by Rachel Nash
CHAPEL HILL – The UNC System Board of Governors voted Friday to ban a policy, which UNC Chapel Hill O.K’d last year, allowing students of the opposite gender to live together in housing facilities on the system’s 16 campuses.
The measure passed unanimously without discussion. Recent UNC Charlotte graduate, Gonzalo Agudelo, was one of a few who silently protested at Friday’s Board meeting.
“It is pretty disappointing, and it sends a message, not only to the UNC School System, and the LGBTQ students who are a part of the UNC System, but it also sends a message nationally to LGBTQ Students,” Agudelo said. “Their voice wasn’t heard and it seemed that their voice wasn’t important.”
He also says he questioned the timing of the decision.
“It was during the summer and there really weren’t involved or on campus so a lot of people didn’t really know about this. It kind of passed under the radar for a lot of students,” Agudelo said.
Chair of the Board of Governors, Peter Hans, said their meetings are open to the public, but aren’t public hearings, and that’s why they didn’t take comments. To enact a policy change, it is a two-step process Hans explained. The measure is taken up by the Governance Board, which was done in June, and then it goes to the full Board. Hans said there was no opposition to the policy change “whatsoever.”
“Our board wants every student to be safe and comfortable and included. The Board believes there are more practical ways to achieve those goals than assigning young men and young women to the same dorm rooms and campus suites,” Hans said.
The UNC Board of Trustees voted last November to allow gender-neutral housing. Former UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp backed the Trustees’ decision saying it would help keep students safe.
In April, the General Assembly took up the issue, and a bill emerged that sought to block the gender-neutral housing policy. The bill did not pass, but the policy approved by the Board of Governors mirrored the legislators’ bill.
Hans said the Board’s decision was also prompted in order to retain its own autonomy in student housing decisions, rather than the legislature dictating it.
Carolina students begin moving back to campus on Aug. 17, and students who had been placed in 32 gender-neutral spaces, which were designated in two dorms and Ram Village Apartments, will have to be reassigned.
UNC System President Tom Ross declined to comment on the issue, but he did speak on another important issue—the budget. The Board of Governors approved the spending plan which allocated funds to each institution Friday. He said he hopes to continue producing more degrees for less money.
“I believe that we can do that at the same time that we absorb these cuts. It will not be easy,” Ross said. “There will be consequences, but our campuses will continue to do this in the right way.”
Ross said in Thursday’s budget meeting that he hopes to freeze tuition costs for in-state students in the 2014-2015 school year, despite facing looming cuts in state funding.
http://chapelboro.com/news/unc/unc-system-bog-bans-gender-neutral-housing/
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