How YU’s Student Courts Compare to Other Universities
A student judiciary is a student government organization where students are given formal powers to act as a court. Student judiciaries can play very different roles on college campuses. Some primarily oversee student government and elections, while others have the authority to adjudicate allegations of student misconduct. At Yeshiva University, the distinction between these roles is particularly interesting.
At YU, the Beren Campus has a Constitutional Court that serves as a check on the Beren Campus Student Government (BCSG) and as the oversight body and point of appeal for all elections, as well as oversight for student activities and clubs. The Wilf Campus also has a Student Court, which (like its Beren counterpart) performs oversight over clubs, is a check on the Wilf Campus Student Government (WCSG) and Canvassing Committee and is the point of appeal for elections. However, unlike Beren, the Wilf Campus Constitution also grants the Wilf Student Court additional power. According to the Constitution the Wilf Court also has jurisdiction over: “all student activities sponsored by the Student Government; all Yeshiva University undergraduate male students as spectators at all Yeshiva University athletic events, both home and away; all Yeshiva University undergraduate male students violating rules and/or regulations established by the Student Government or the administration concerning extracurricular activities; and appeals in any case involving suspension or expulsion.”
While Dr. Schwab, the Director of the Office of Student Life (OSL), contends that most of these roles are “not within the jurisdiction of the court” and are, in practice, reserved to the YU Administration, it is nevertheless worth examining what the Wilf Constitution as written would entail.
To explore what a real implementation of the Wilf Constitution would look like, it is worth examining student judiciaries on other campuses.
Washington University in St. Louis (WashU) is a good example of a student judiciary focused on the student government. WashU’s student judiciary is known as the “Constitutional Council.” The Constitutional Council is composed of five justices appointed by the student government. The Council checks the actions of the student government, clubs and the electoral process to ensure that they all obey the WashU constitution. Student misconduct allegations are handled by the academic integrity panel of the student’s major’s department. After going through the academic integrity panel, if the case results in a suspension, the case is moved to the WashU Student Conduct Board, which is a joint student-faculty panel that will then issue the final judgment in the case.
The University of Maryland (UMD) provides a very different model. At UMD, the Student Government Association (SGA) has a “Governance Board” (Gov Board) which serves the same role as the Beren Court and WashU’s Constitutional Council. However, UMD also has a separate student judiciary called the “Undergraduate Student Judiciary” (USJ), which is run through the UMD Office of Student Conduct (OSC). The USJ is an example of the second type of student judiciary and is responsible for hearing all cases of alleged student misconduct. Unlike the previously discussed student judiciaries, judges on the USJ are not appointed by the student government but instead go through a rigorous application and training process. The USJ conducts closed trials in which it has the authority to subpoena witnesses and evidence, and then tries the facts of the case before deciding on any penalties, which are then enforced by the OSC.
The USJ has the authority to dismiss cases or issue any penalty ranging from a failing grade on a test to expulsion from UMD. The USJ is composed of five branches, including a Student Honor Council that deals with academic integrity, an Appellate Board and a group of “Community Advocates” who serve as lawyers for both sides of each case.
Shulamit Frenkel (1L UVA), a past member of the USJ, notes that UMD’s student judiciary “allows students to shape the campus culture and community expectations.” By allowing students to be heard by their peers who acutely understand what it is like to make a mistake, be stressed, struggle with mental health and be young, the UMD system allows campus expectations to “feel more peer oriented as opposed to something forced upon us by the administration”.
At YU, the Beren Court has tried cases of alleged legislative misconduct (Pollack v. SCWSC (2019)), and of questions regarding clubs (Canadian Club v. Anonymous (2024)). Meanwhile, the Wilf Court has dealt with cases of contested elections such as in Warren v. Canvassing Committee (2023), and constitutional questions as in Wilf Amendments Committee v. General Assembly (2022). While the Wilf Constitution gives the Court the power to try certain cases of student misconduct, it does not use that power in practice. On both campuses of YU, cases of student misconduct are dealt with in the following manner: After an accusation of misconduct, the student attends a mandatory interview with a “Hearing Officer,” which is the student’s chance to present his or her case. This interview entails a one-on-one meeting with no “attorney, parent, or other advocate present”. After the interview, the hearing officer meets with the YU Disciplinary Committee and decides what, if any, sanctions to impose. The student is then informed of the decision and has 10 days to appeal. The whole process is done through the administration, with no involvement from the student court.
WashU’s student court is primarily a constitutional check on the student government while misconduct goes through a separate channel. At UMD, students take the lead in adjudicating misconduct through a formally trained student judiciary. At YU, the administration handles misconduct in practice while the constitution gives the student court the powers to do so on paper. This seems to place YU somewhere between the models of WashU and UMD.
The differences between these models and the various extents of involvement they give students in the policy enforcement process raises a question for YU: should students have a role in adjudicating disputes involving their peers, or should those decisions remain exclusively with University administrators?
Students have different views on what role a student judiciary should play. Sasha Aaron (SCW ‘27), Chief Justice of the Beren Court, says that it is extremely beneficial for a campus to have a “structured way to address disagreements” and to keep small arguments from consuming a whole community, while noting that enforcement of University standards should remain the purview of the Administration. Some see having a jury of peers as a benefit; Sammy Grayson (UMD ‘30), for example, calls it “a good first line of defense”. However, others like Dovi Rossman (SSSB ‘30) argue that it would be “[un]fair to force students to work against their fellow students,” a sentiment Amir Gross (SSSB ‘29) shared, saying, “student affairs should be handled by the administration.” Penina Soboroff (WashU ‘30) argues that at the end of the day, the most important thing is accountability.
Ultimately, when it comes to how to handle student misconduct allegations, each school must answer for itself what role students should have in creating and maintaining university standards, whether that means the UMD model of student ownership, the WashU model of faculty leadership with an option for student involvement or the current YU model of administration-only authority.
Photo Caption: Judge’s gavel
Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons
