The new smoking ban will create eyesores and limit students' rights
Jump to full article: InsideVandy.com (Vanderbilt University), 2010-07-28
Author: Theodore Samets
Intro: Before someone had the bright idea to hire me as Opinion Editor of the Hustler, I served in Vanderbilt Student Government. I spent much of last year fighting what was at the time a "proposed" smoking ban. Along with Andrew Morse and John Gaffney, I authored a resolution opposing the ban that passed the House and Senate by wide margins, and the Torch wrote an editorial praising our work. I met with the Dean of Students to discuss this, and I thought we had made clear that opposition to the ban was widespread and that we had killed the ban.
Well, it looks like that did a lot of good.
In an email to students on Monday morning, Dean of Students Mark Bandas announced our "New Campus Smoking Policy." Vanderbilt will now be "smoke free," except for a few "designated smoking areas . . .
The administration's solution of designated smoking areas will be eyesores and ostracize students who would otherwise walk to class along with their friends while smoking a cigarette.
. . .
This smoking ban has been forced on students by the Faculty Senate. That's fine that they don't like smoking on campus - but they don't have to live here. Vanderbilt forces students to live in dorms, then at the same time says that if you're Sutherland and want to smoke a cigarette at 3AM, you've got to walk to the staff parking lot behind the Commons Center. Not only is that annoying, it's unsafe.
Vanderbilt calls itself a residential campus. Now they're imposing unfair restrictions on students while still mandating that we call the campus "home." . . .
it's time to stand up and be counted. Write Dean of Students Mark Bandas (mark.bandas@vanderbilt.edu) and make your voice heard.
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