Following a campus study that suggested the Residential Security Officer program at UCSD is unsatisfactory, a five-person work group has released suggestions for administrators to improve the image of the RSO program in the eyes of students, including expanding ways to curb student drinking in order to present RSOs who bust students as less of a damper on residential life.
Revelle College residential security officer Freddy Pesqueira, an 18-year veteran, makes his rounds. A new campus report has expressed support for the RSO program and has also made suggestions to transfer more RSO duties to resident advisers to improve the officers’ image.
According to the 2005 Undergraduate Student Experience and Satisfaction report, which detailed undergraduate life and was compiled by campus officials, students and alumni, many students found the constant patrolling and monitoring by officers to be off-putting, with one student even calling it “a Nazi-like sense of duty.”
The group, on behalf of Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs Joseph W. Watson, analyzed the mission statement of the RSO program as well as the varying misconceptions of what falls under their job description.
The newly released report suggests that, in recent years, RSOs have been forced to complete not only their own duties of ensuring the safety of people and property on campus, but also various responsibilities of residential advisers and campus administration in monitoring the behavior of students.
These misconceptions, the report suggests, contribute to the negative image students may have of the RSOs.
“This appears to the work group to be the case where the RSOs and the residence life programs were identified as being too restrictive when in fact, they are only serving to enforce others’ policies,” the report stated.
While the report supported and approved of the RSO program as a whole, A.S. President Harry Khanna said he was disappointment in the findings.
“It’s like they said ‘the RSO program is great, but the students aren’t educated enough to understand it,’” Khanna said. “Of course they’re going to say [the program works]. Look who’s writing it — if they thought the RSO program needed fixing, they’d have fixed it by now.”
Khanna referenced the lack of student input on the work group, which consists of five upper-level staff members, as a major flaw in the report’s accuracy.
“It seemed like [the report] was just a lot of back-patting,” Khanna said.
He also suggested that the group should have taken a closer look at whether or not the RSO program is even necessary.
“They didn’t ask, ‘Do we need the RSO program? Why don’t the other UC schools have them?’” Khanna said.
A focal issue of the RSO report was UCSD’s alcohol policy, and part of the study was dedicated to curbing underage drinking on campus and eliminating the “culture of alcohol” from causing undue trouble for undergraduates and campus officials.
According to California state law and UC policy, underage drinking on campus cannot be ignored when discovered and must be dealt with by officials. However, the study acknowledges that enforcing these policies would not necessarily increase popularity for whoever is implementing them.
“The use and abuse of alcohol will always require an enforcement aspect and that enforcement component will ultimately be considered by some students to be unnecessary and negative,” the report states.
The report outlined a plan to reduce alcohol consumption focused on four primary goals — education, communication, consistency and commitment.
Among the suggestions listed to curb underage drinking, the work group recommended that the administration implement exams throughout the week, including on Fridays, to encourage students to attend class.
According to Khanna, this new proposal would certainly prove unpopular to students, regardless of their alcohol consumption.
The study also suggests that administrators rethink the length of breaks such as orientation periods, finals weeks and other extended periods of break due to an increase in alcohol-related incidents during those times.
The group suggested investigating several new methods to wage a “social marketing” campaign on the RSOs’ behalf. In order to improve the body’s image, the report proposed that resident advisers handle more noise complaints and lock-outs on their own.
Similarly, the report suggested that communication between the RSO program, resident advisers and the administration could be improved to help increase the variety of responses to similar issues.
“I agree with the shifting the responsibilities,” Khanna said. “That’s the right recommendation. I’m glad they said it, but it isn’t deep enough.”
According to Khanna, increased participation by resident advisers and decreased RSO patrolling could potentially be a way to lessen student animosity toward the enforcing figures.
“I think they would have a lot more respect for the process if it was done by their peers, not an intimidating police figure,” he said.
Along with a change in duty, the group also suggested that both the name and the uniforms of the officials be examined to ensure that they reflect the “multi-faceted” nature of the job as well as their role in the community.
However, the group recommended no changes to the official job descriptions and duties of the RSOs according to UCSD Police Rules and Regulations.
“The work group offers a broad series of valuable recommendations that will be addressed over an extended period,” Watson stated in an e-mail to the council of college deans.
He also suggested the immediate adoption of the group’s recommendations of more specified duties for all parties and increased communication between the RSOs and the residential life staff.
The report recognizes that the issue is one that requires “extensive review,” and that any long-term success cannot be expected immediately.
