Thanks to the Jeanne Clery Act, a bill that requires all universities that participate in federal financial aid programs to disclose criminal activity on campus, an annual crimes report is released by PSU yearly. But when the “Drug Law Violation,” on campus increased from 13 in 2010, to 69 in 2011, many wondered, why? More drugs? More students? More enforcement?
Yet the dramatic discrepancy between 2010 and 2011 wasn’t all that it seemed. Sean Bogle, the Coordinator of Student Conduct and Community Standards, said before he started at Plymouth only arrests were filed in the statistics, but now “if it’s not a non-arrest violation, we will report those numbers.”
“I came in [to Plymouth] and said, ‘we are going to report everything where it is deemed a violation,” Bogle continues, “where there is some level of a criminal violation, then we report, whether there is an arrest made or not.”
Last year, 2011, on-campus, there were only 12 actual arrest, which was the same number of arrests in 2010. So despite the numbers in the Cleary Statistic, in actuality, little has changed.
Prior to the 2011 statistics, citations for suspicious odor or other less serious offenses weren’t counted on the report, but as Jeff Furlone, Associate Director for Student & Judicial Services, says the change in reporting, “has to do with the best practices of interpreting what is a reportable statistic or not.”
The Clearly law allows any given institution to determine what is reportable and what is not (besides actual arrest).
Bogle believes the new way of reporting incidents will maximize a students learning experience in their judicial process, and hold every violation accountable.
“Every incident that gets reported on there [Cleary Statistics] means we hold those students accountable,” Bogle continues, “We are holding students accountable to our policy and expectations,” regardless of an arrest.
The new way of reporting gives a more accurate account of the policy violations here at Plymouth. Direct arrest reports can still be found at the Plymouth Police Department.