Duke Student Government members scrutinized issues ranging from campus safety to academic freedom and representatives of the University administration defended Duke’s policies in the light of recent controversies at DSG’s meeting Wednesday night.
The submission of a resolution affirming academic freedom, motivated by debate over the University’s decision to allow the upcoming Palestinian Solidarity Movement conference, led to contentious discussion among senators and members of the University community. After a lengthy discussion of the validity of such a resolution, DSG voted 20-18-1 to approve it.
Both Provost Peter Lange and John Burness, senior vice president for public affairs and government relations, spoke to defend the University’s decision to host the PSM conference. Burness quoted President Richard Brodhead’s outlook on the controversial forum. “All ideas are not equal. All ideas should have equal opportunity to be heard,” Burness said.
The original rationale for the resolution—which cited the PSM controversy as a test of academic freedom and reaffirmed the intellectual independence Duke has shown by agreeing to allow student group Hiwar to host the conference—was amended so that all references to the PSM were stricken from the document.
“In general I was pleased with the outcome, both the discussion and passing of the resolutions,” said DSG Senator Chris Chen, who submitted the resolution. “I recognize where the proponents of the [resolution’s] amendment were coming from. That they didn’t want it misconstrued that DSG was taking a stance on the merits of PSM.”
Junior Tom Musgrave, a DSG senator, saw the vote’s narrow margin as a consequence of the fact that it lacked any concrete recommendation.
“It wasn’t really going to have that much of an impact on anything. It was more of a statement than designed to make a change,” he said. “It just seemed like it was so pointless.”
Kemel Dawkins, vice president for campus services, made an appearance before DSG to discuss recent updates to campus security. Dawkins announced that following recent incidents on- and off-campus, the University was extending the joint security patrols by the Duke University Police Department in collaboration with off-duty Durham police officers from three to seven days per week. He also noted that 10 additional officers have been added to the patrol forces and that investigations into updating campus safety conditions are underway.
“I won’t promise you the moon,” Dawkins said in response to student concerns over topics like police behavior, safety in Edens Quadrangle and a recent incident at Café Parizäde that involved Durham and Duke police intervention. He did, however, pledge to fulfill as many realistic goals as possible and said it is important “that we hold ourselves to some sort of standard.”
“I’d like to create some sort of a code of conduct for Duke police,” Dawkins said in response to student allegations of inefficient security force deployment, security officials falling asleep in their cars and police attention to party-busting over crime prevention.
Dawkins discussed his visit to the University of Pennsylvania to learn about other universities’ security forces and explained how effectively that university has utilized available technology. He also said Duke is especially vulnerable because of the permeability of the campus, but he noted that Duke would remain an open campus.
“The one thing that’s kind of upsetting is the lack of a time-line for getting things done, and it’s disconcerting,” said senior Dave Rausen, chair of the Student Organization Finance Committee chair.
Junior Jesse Longoria, DSG vice president of athletics and campus services, has worked with Dawkins in a joint student-administration safety initiative. He noted that Dawkins has been especially concerned with student input in the decision-making process and with “ensuring that there is constant communication concerning possible future initiatives concerning campus safety.”
“There’s not going to be an easy answer to campus safety,” Longoria said. “While immediate responses are necessary to solve security issues, we must assure that we are addressing the most pressing security issues. And that’s why it’s important to have the communication of the students to let the administration know what our top priorities are, so they can create a timetable which represents student concerns.”
Musgrave said he wished Dawkins’ presentation had included more specifics. “I felt like he was very vague, and he gave some pretty dissatisfying answers in reference to the Parizäde’s issue,” he said. “He talked about how a lot of the information regarding that incident would not be available to students in a timely fashion.”
In other business:
DSG passed both the DSG Surplus By-Law and the Amendment to the SOFC By-Law for the Creation of the Bartender and Alcohol subsidy fund after a second reading of those bills.
The DSG Surplus By-Law allows for the creation of a five-member trustee board composed of the DSG president, executive vice-president, chief of staff, treasurer and SOFC chair. The board will oversee the management of approximately $120,000 in surplus funds, which were discovered last spring in an audit.
The Bartender and Alcohol subsidy is an amendment to a previous SOFC bylaw stating that SOFC funds cannot be used for the purchase of alcohol. The amendment, which allows for the use of money from the surplus fund to be spent on alcohol, is a pilot program to sponsor kegs for chartered groups. The legislation limits sponsorship of kegs to two organizations per week, with two kegs at each event.
The amendment sparked debate between some DSG legislators who said under-21 students would not benefit from the alcohol subsidies and therefore should not have their student activities fees spent on alcohol funding, and other DSG legislators who felt that the funding would benefit all students. “This is really used as a push to get attendance up,” Rausen said. “I’m not saying that you have to drink to enjoy an event on campus.”
Charters for the Inferno, a group of Duke sports fans, and Justice, a broadly focused human rights group, were both approved.
DSG also approved $3,790 in funding for a concert sponsored by Students Against Terror. The group is bringing the band Sister Hazel to campus Oct. 14 and sponsoring a rally with various speakers who have experienced the effects of terrorist actions.
DSG held two elections, filling SOFC committee memberships and student justice positions. Ten students ran for six positions on SOFC and nine students ran for three justice positions.
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