SEAHO Report - Winter 2023 - 23

FEATURE ARTICLES
Revisiting Visitation:
An Introvert's Guide
to Leveraging Technology
By Meaghan Sullivan, University of Mississippi
When I arrived at the University of Mississippi in
Fall 2020 as the new Assistant Director of Conflict
Resolution and Student Conduct for Student
Housing, I had virtually no experience with visitation
policies. I had been a live-in coordinator previously,
but worked at an institution with mostly open
visitation and no front desks to enforce these
policies. As I observed trends through the 2020/2021
academic year, I quickly learned the visitation policy
was a pain point for our residents and our staff at
all levels. I embarked on a journey to find a new,
innovative way to address these concerns.
The following illustrates the shift in adjudication of
first-time visitation and visitation-related violations
at the University of Mississippi for the 2021/2022
academic year.
THE PROBLEM
* We have several hundred visitation infractions every
year:
o This is a significant drain on our resources
and leads to slower adjudication timelines
for more serious offenses
o Because the adjudication timeline is long,
students are likely to commit another
infraction while their initial visitation case is
still pending
* Students are choosing not to attend their conduct
meetings related to these violations:
o Students are not being educated about the
policies by their conduct officers
o Students know (from speaking with
other students) that they are receiving a
" warning " for a first offense if they don't
show up, so there's no incentive to attend
o Conduct officers are holding time for two
meetings on their calendar with a student
who does not intend to attend either
meeting, leading to morale problems
among conduct officers
* Students do not respect the policy- it's almost like
the policy doesn't exist:
o Student disrespect for the policy and the
lack of teeth in enforcement was leading to
frustration from student staff members on
the front lines reporting the behaviors as
they felt like their reports were not having
consequences
BRAINSTORMING
We needed a new approach that was deployable
with only a couple summer months to plan. This new
approach had to be something that addressed the
concerns related to the traditional outcomes. We
also wanted students to retain the right to have their
case adjudicated in the standard way (in a meeting
with their conduct officer) if they wanted that option.
However, we wanted to incentivize the alternative
route to cut down on the number of meetings our
conduct officers would need to hold regarding these
low-level offenses. The one " must-have " I received
from my supervisors was that the students had to do
something and learn something by engaging with
this new approach.
THE OPTIONS
Option 1: Visitation Seminars
Option 1 was modeled after another sanction
we commonly use in our office, Decision Making
Seminars. This option would offer the student the
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SEAHO Report - Winter 2023

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