At Tyler Junior College, violation of student code, not only can result in a temporary warning, but also a deferral suspension.
According to Director of Student Judicial Programs and Support Services Damien N. Williams, any student who makes a violation of student conduct on or off campus is subject to disciplinary.
“The student is an ambassador of the college, wherever they are, and (if they vio- late code) they would come see me,” said Williams.
Violations include cheating, misconduct, academic dishonesty, theft, damage or unauthorized use, using profanity language. Off campus violations include breaking federal, local or state laws.
“Records for the students violations are kept for up to seven years and are not shared with anyone,” said Williams. Recorded files may be retained longer than seven years if a special circumstances, such as, suspension or expulsion or as deemed necessary by the Vice President of Student Affairs Johnny M. Moore.
At any time, a student has the right to request to review their disciplinary Students who violate the conduct policy are given a written warning or disciplinary probation, which means a student’s behavior is being checked for a period of time. “If student violates a deferred suspension as a final warning, then it can be moved to a suspension,” said Williams.
“Now this is not high school, and the suspension will not be three days, it can be a semester or a full year. If it gets really bad then they could be expelled from their in- stitution where they would not be able to come back to TJC.”
For students who have financial aid, once a suspension takes effect, they will then owe money to the institution.
This semester some students have been sent to the student judicial coordinator.
“Even though our number of students have went up, I haven’t seen that big of a change” said Becky Branch, staff coordinator student judicial programs.
Problems have included students violating the policy of wearing an id/lanyard, criminal trespassing and other student code violations. On September 23 two students were observed outside Potter Hall without their lanyards/id, then a student reported
that another student took her lanyard. Violations are to be reported by any faculty member on campus. Such as sending a student out of class for misuse of conduct and then reporting it to the judicial coordinator. The decision of the judicial coordinator is final, however the Vice President Johnny Moore can make changes after reviewing the report filed for the student. The office for support services is held on the second floor of the Rogers Student Center building. Also considered for personal counseling, academic service assistance and tutoring request.
“The support services on campus is excellent, with personal experiences, I can guarantee the support achieved can get any student in line to further education,” said Vanessa Vega business major.
“We are student advocate,” said Wil liams. The department stretches all depart- mentswithanystudentissues.”Wearehere to help students move to the next level and ultimately graduate from this institution with an Associates Degree and go in to a four year degree institution somewhere.”
The information for student code conduct can be found online under student handbook at the TJC website.
