Discipline for Students with Poor Attendance Reconsidered

Following their recent reevaluation of Exeter’s disciplinary response for students with poor attendance, the Deans’ health team proposed to shift to a more holistic and less punitive process. Under the current system, minor attendance cases are handled by the Attendance Committee. Restrictions are issued to students who have obtained four or more dickeys in one term, and if their attendance problem persists, the student is offered counseling services. When a student continues to struggle with attendance, they are referred to the Disciplinary Committee.

 “I think often that attendance problems usually have some underlying mental or physical health issues.”

The dean’s proposal prioritizes measures that help students over ones that require immediate disciplinary action. “We collectively feel this will be a more logical and compassionate approach to attendance issues,” Dean of Student Health and Wellness and architect of the proposal Gordon Coole said. “It links an established therapeutic response with a disciplinary response.”According to Coole, the motion has been approved unanimously by the Deans’ Health Team, whose members include the Dean of Students, medical providers and members of the counseling and psychological services staff. “I believe there will be support by both faculty and students, as well as parents,” Coole says.Discipline Committee member and senior Connie Cai described the benefits of a process that provides support for students struggling with their attendance. “I think often that attendance problems usually have some underlying mental or physical health issues,” she said. “Once the students receive the appropriate support and care for that, they can begin to effectively and properly address their attendance.”Dean of Residential Life AJ Cosgrove also supported the proposal and described the need for a review of the current disciplinary process. “It’s been about twenty years or so since we’ve reviewed the DC process,” he said. “I’ve thought about reviewing it, and a lot about the things we want to do. This year we’ve just got too much going on, and we want to make sure we do it right.”He went on, saying that students need to have more time to correct their attendance issues before being referred to the Disciplinary Committee. “We’ve put some intermediate steps in along the way, to figure out what issue sits behind their attendance issues before they have to go before the committee,” he said.Many students reacted positively to the proposed measure. Upper Rylan Tuttle praised the revised protocol. “I think having more intermediate steps in between AC and DC will make the process less intimidating for everyone,” he said.Lower Numi Oyebode agreed. “If a person needs advice from a counselor, it’s better than sending someone straight in front of the committee that could possibly make [the problem] worse,” she said.According to Cosgrove, the Disciplinary Committee hopes to offer students in good standing a second chance without immediately resorting to punishing them. He suggested the possibility of implementing principles of restorative to the revised disciplinary system and highlighted the importance of a holistic process. “It’s pretty rare when we have a student with significant attendance issue[s] when they’re choosing not to go to class, out of negligence,” he said. “There’s usually a bigger story there, and we’re going to try to help them before we punish them.”