Author: courtney-hall

Spring elections are coming up for UVA students and one hot topic on the ballot promises to be “single sanction.” Hoos Against Single Sanction has a nonbinding resolution on the ballot that asks if students want to establish a multi-tier punishment for honor-system violations. If a majority vote in favor, UVA’s Honor Committee  (www.virginia.edu/honor) could scrap what has been, in effect, a 165-year old system.

Single sanction refers to the only punishment for an “intentional act of lying, cheating or stealing”: permanent dismissal from the University. On February 13, a group of 20 students gathered in Newcomb Hall to hear the Single Sanction Ad Hoc Committee discuss the current system. The four students forming the committee stressed the strength of the honor system, but also suggested alternatives. Josh Hess, a UVA law student, said the system treats students like adults, while sophomore Rachel Carr, member of Hoos Against Single Sanction, explained that once many students are in the system, they have no reason to tell the truth. Jay Trickett and Laura Holland, UVA law students, focused on a single sanction alternative. They suggested informed retraction, where a student would be able to admit they cheated and withdraw from the University for one year, with a chance to reapply.

Get caught breaking your obligation and students get permanently expelled—but students are rethinking that policy on their spring elections.

Students aren’t the only ones with reservations about the current system. According to a 2006 survey, only 16 percent of faculty and teaching assistants report cheating they directly observe to the Honor Committee; nearly 31 percent of faculty and TAs said that “single sanction was too strong a punishment for the infraction.”

Elections take place February 21 through February 28.

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Some State lawmakers are dead set on restricting women’s access to contraceptions and abortions, introducing legislation year after year to do just that. To explain the 2007 versions of bills introduced by the usual suspects in Richmond, the local group Left of Center (www.loccville.org) called in their “favorite defender of the uterus,” Becky Reid, grassroots organizer of Planned Parenthood, to their January 9 meeting in Starr Hill’s Art Gallery.

Fresh off his marriage amendment triumph, Republican Delegate Bob Marshall is sponsoring legislation that would criminalize abortion the moment Roe v.Wade is overturned.

Speaking to a youthful crowd of around 50, Reid discussed the role of conservative legislators in morphing sexual education to promote moralist ideals. She emphasized that politicians “are trying to project bias into medical guidelines, when we need sound science and facts.”

Reid spoke specifically of Republican Delegate Bob Marshall (www.delegatebob.com) of Manassas, who co-sponsored the constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and civil unions. Should the U.S. Supreme Court ever overturn Roe v. Wade, Marshall’s House Bill 2124 would immediately criminalize abortion as it was pre-Roe—one to 10 years of jail time for performing an abortion. Marshall also co-sponsors Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) legislation, which would require greater building space for abortion facilities, effectively shutting down smaller clinics.

The new year also sees the introduction of a bill stating that for admission into schools, girls must have a vaccine for the human papillomavirus (HPV), a virus initiated by any sexual contact and found to be a cause of cervical cancer—parents could chose to opt-out. Reid said that the State legislature has found ways to oppose the Birth Control Protection Act, which defines birth control as contraception and prevents it from being regulated by Virginia’s abortion laws that require a mandatory 24-hour delay, state-scripted counseling and parental consent for minors.

Next up for Planned Parenthood (www.ppblueridge.org) is the Pro-Choice Lobby Day on January 25 in Richmond.