FIRST COLLEGE FINED FOR CAMPUS SECURITY REPORTING VIOLATIONS
Mount St. Clare College plans to appeal $25,000 fine

By Robin Brennan
Clinton Herald Staff Writer
June 22, 2000

CLINTON, IA-The United States Department of Education (DOE) has slapped Mount St. Clare (MSC) College with a $25,000 fine - the first fine ever imposed on a school in the country for violating the Campus Security Act.

MSC is appealing the ruling.

"The fine is not fair or appropriate or consistent with other actions, Director of College Relations Effie Hall said. "Another college was cited for incomplete reporting and given a reprimand."

In a letter to MSC's President James Ross, a DOE letter stated, "the institution's failure to comply with the Campus Security Act amounts to substantial misrepresentation."

The Campus Security Act of 1990 requires colleges and universities to report all crimes and make the information available to students and employees.

"The false picture MSC presents is even more detrimental in light of the fact that the school portrays itself as a "safe" place to attend school," Acting Director of the Administrative Actions and Appeals Division Mary Gust wrote.

Gust levied a $15,000 fine for the institution's failure to adequately disclose crime statistics; $5,000 for the institutions failure to provide its campus security reports to prospective students and employees, and $5,000 for the institutions omission or incomplete statement of the required campus security policies.

"We are appealing because we feel we did not do anything wrong," Hall said. "The regulations are ambiguous."

Hall said it's basically a matter of form and interpretation. She said the school has been complying with the Campus Security Act.

"We thought we did not have to report a crime unless there was a conviction," Hall said. "We had crime statistic reporting policies, but we didn't have everything listed in one brochure."

The director of college relations said when regulations are passed by the DOE, the school usually isn't trained or given guidelines on how to comply with the regulations and it's all left up to a matter of interpretation.

"We provide training to any school that requests it," DOE spokesperson Jane Glickman said.

MSC challenged how the DOE classified 10 of the 15 violations in its report issued in March, but Hall says the school has not heard anything about those challenges.

Those 15 incidents the DOE said the college omitted from security reports from 1993-1999 include seven aggravated assaults, three forcible sex offenses, four burglaries and one arrest for liquor law violations.

The burden of proof of why MSC should pay a fine is on the shoulders of the DOE. It has until July 29 to file its brief. MSC has until Sept. 12 to respond.

BACK TO HIGHER-EDUCATION LEGAL INFORMATION

BACK TO TOP