During its meeting last night, the Honor Committee discussed a proposition to eliminate randomly selected student juries from the trial process. Students accused of honor offenses would only be able to choose between all-Committee panels or mixed student panels that include students from both within and outside the Committee.
The main impetus behind the removal of randomly selected student jury panels would be to engage students serving on juries, allowing them to increase their understanding of the honor system.
"Students are disengaged because they are not quite sure what they should be doing," Committee Chair Charles Harris said. "They are not quite sure of what they are being expected to do."
Mixed panels encourage students to be more active in asking questions in the beginning of the trial, as the questions posed by Committee members prompt them to do so, Harris said.
"Unfortunately our system does not provide, and I think it should provide, for very much discussion until deliberations of what the bylaws mean and how they ought to be applied," said Alexander Cohen, a Graduate Arts & Sciences representative and former Cavalier Daily columnist.
At the same time, the presence of Honor Committee members on a jury trial would be vital in helping the jury interpret the meaning of terms such as "intent" and "beyond reasonable doubt," College representative Rubana Masood said.
Nevertheless, the proposition attracted criticism from some Committee members. As College representative Sarah Munford said, trials do not necessarily depend solely on understanding the definitions of the bylaws.
Moreover, Medical School representative Weldon Diana said students might interpret such a change as taking away one of their rights.
But Commerce School representative Whitney Johnson said the removal of such juries would facilitate the process and, in turn, serve the best interests of the student population. The measure may be "seen as taking away a right, but the real motive is pursuing the truth," he said.
Whether doing away with random student jury panels would actually create fairer trial results is also a question, though.
"I am not convinced that it would," College representative Alex Solomon said. "There is no tangible evidence that proves that it will."
Instead of removing randomly selected student panels, Solomon said, the Committee can improve the trial process by having meaningful conversations about honor with the students in question rather than simply reading from a script.
"We would require a lot of education efforts, so that students understand why we are doing this," Solomon said about the new proposition.
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