Voters approve new honor code

Author: Kara Shurmantine

On May 1, three proposed Honor Code recommendations passed after finally being approved by a two-thirds majority of the student body.

The honor code referendum, however, was at a standstill for over a week. In order to be passed, the code amendment had to be voted on by two-thirds of the student body, and two-thirds of voters needed to approve the changes. Until this two-thirds majority was achieved at around 2 p.m. on May 1, the honor code decision remained uncertain.

All three recommendations passed with at least an 80 percent majority among students who voted. The first amendment simplifies the process by which faculty members can proctor exams, the second aligns the honor code's description of the academic judicial process with that detailed in the College Handbook and the third puts the Judicial Affairs Officer in charge of the first-year honor code orientation process.

In a campus-wide e-mail sent on April 29 - almost a full week after the recommendations were supposed to be decided - Acting Dean of the College Gus Jordan urged more students to cast their ballots, particularly seniors, noting that "about half" of the senior class had voted for the referendum.

"About half" was perhaps a rather generous estimate. In the election that took place between 2 p.m. on April 23 and April 24, which included both the honor code initiative as well as the presidential contest, only 245 seniors voted, compared to 384 first-years, 435 sophomores and 459 juniors.

The SGA, the Faculty Council, the Community Council and the Honor Code Review Committee all supported the recommendations, and were eager to get them passed.

Among the commons, voting patterns were largely consistent; Brainerd, Cook and Ross commons all had about 300 voters each. However, Wonnacott Commons, with 348 votes, had a full 100 more votes than Atwater.

Hiba Fakhoury '09, the current SGA president, expressed enthusiasm about the results. "It has been the most exciting project I have been involved in," she wrote in an e-mail. "It's very nice to finally see it happen!"

Jamal Davis '11, a member of the Honor Code Review Committee, described how the group had worked to develop and improve the Honor Code, a process that culminated in these proposals.

"We felt like the old Honor Code wasn't working as well as it could," he said. The new amendments, he described, better serve both faculty and students.

In the presidential run-off election, the underdog from the first round, Mike Panzer '10, beat out his opponent Vrutika Mody '10, but by a paltry 40 votes. The run-off election had 300 fewer voters than the record-setting election two weeks ago. The first presidential ballot had what Panzer described as an "impressive" turnout.

The large turnout on April 23 did immediately produce a clear victor for the SGA presidency, though it was not who many might have expected, given the results from the first round in which Panzer had only 278 votes compared to Mody's 356.

"Wow, that was a close close close election," Panzer wrote in an e-mail. "I just managed to sneak by."

It was indeed a narrow margin of victory. The run-off evidently benefited Panzer's campaign - some students speculated that he may have profited from the elimination of the three other candidates - Andrew DeLoach '10, Nick Alexander '10 and Nick Sohl '10 - by picking up their votes.

Janet Gehrmann '09, head of the SGA Elections Committee, believes, however, that Panzer won the election because "students at Middlebury College believe he will best represent them, their interests and their concerns in the 2009-2010 academic year," not because, he received all of the eliminated candidates votes.

"I think Mike ran a really strong campaign," said Francie Alexandre '12, who voted in both the first and second rounds of the presidential election. "I saw him out there driving around in cars and shouting and holding up posters