Conduct Procedures

The following is a brief overview of Southwestern College’s student conduct hearing procedures.  A complete explanation of these procedures can be found in Student Policies section in the Southwestern’s Policy Manual www.sckans.edu/policy.

It should be understood that the Southwestern College disciplinary system is not a court of law and strict rules of evidence do not apply.

Procedure

1. Potential violation is reported.
2. Incident Review Committee reviews the report, investigates, and determines if there is reason to proceed.
3. The accused student is sent a notification to meet with a hearing officer for a student conduct hearing to discuss the incident.*
4. Following the student conduct hearing, the hearing officer will prepare a decision letter stating the findings and any imposed sanctions.

*If the student does not respond to the meeting request, an appropriate sanction and decision letter will be sent to the student. The student is still responsible for the decision, sanction, and related deadlines.

Preponderance of the Evidence

The hearing is an administrative proceeding and not related to a criminal process.  The vice president of student life and/or dean of students will evaluate information presented by all parties and determine which is more convincing, credible, and of greater weight.  Preponderance of evidence is used and rules of evidence and criminal standard of proof are not applicable.  This standard is met when a reasonable person, after reviewing the evidence, would conclude that a violation has more likely occurred than not occurred.     

Sanctions

The college recognizes that each individual is unique and each incident occurs under varying conditions. Therefore, specific sanctions for each violation are not established.

The following sanctions may be implemented individually or in any combination by the appropriate disciplinary authority. This list is representative and is neither inclusive nor binding.

Interim Suspension: The vice president for student affairs (or designee) may suspend a student from the college for an interim period pending investigation, diciplinary, or criminal proceedings, or for medical evaluation.  During the interim suspension, the student will not be allowed on campus.

Parental Notification:  Parents may be notified when a student is charged with a Level 3 incident or when a student is suspended or expelled during the discipline process.

Warning: A student may receive an oral or written warning that engaging in continued violations may result in increased sanctions.

Creative Discipline: Sanctions may be designed to fit the circumstances of a particular case such as a research paper, letter of apology, reflection paper, and/or educational seminar.

Dining Hall or Campus Facilities Suspension: A student may lose privileges of entering selected campus facilities for a specific period of time.

Restitution Compensation: A student may be required to pay restitution compensation for damages to persons or property caused by the student’s actions.

Individual Student Suspension: A student may be removed from the college for an assigned period of time.

Victim Notification

Southwestern College will disclose to the alleged victim of any crime of violence, or a non-forcible sex offense, the report on the results of any disciplinary proceeding conducted by the college against a student who is the alleged perpetrator of such crime or offense with respect to such crime or offense. If the alleged victim of such crime or offense is deceased as a result of such crime or offense, the next of kin of such victim shall be treated as the alleged victim.

In hearings on sexual misconduct, Southwestern College will inform both accuser and accused simultaneously in writing of the outcomes, appeal procedures for both, any change to the results when results are final.

Appeals

A student may appeal the decision or sanction resulting from any level of violation - within three (3) school days from the date of the decision letter. The appeal is requested by completing an Appeal form in the Student Life Office.  A student must provide detailed justification for the appeal that goes beyond mere dissatisfaction. 

The appeal must fall in the following categories:

a) A procedural error was made that had a significant influence on the decision.

b) The code of conduct and/or policy were not interpreted correctly and substantially prevented the student’s opportunity for a fair hearing.

c) New information or relevant facts have surfaced were not available at the original hearing. The absence of this information has significant influence on the decision.

d) The sanction imposed was inappropriate for the violation.