Last Tuesday, DRs in Anderson-Centennial caught students trying to sneak a keg of beer into the residence halls. Later, as Housing and Dining staff and Public Safety were attempting to document students who were attending a party in Centennial (for which the first keg was intended), a fire alarm was pulled on another floor.
The stupidity and immaturity of disrupting nearly 1,900 people with the fire alarm is only matched by the stupidity and immaturity of overreacting as someone involved with the incident did. One of the RAs who was involved with the bust first received a threatening note on a whiteboard and then a death threat stuck to the door with a knife.
The Metropolitan Police Department is now investigating the threats. The person responsible faces severe criminal charges, including up to a year-and-a-half in prison, along with whatever consequences, including expulsion, are imposed by a student conduct council.
RAs are an important part of dorm life. They don't enforce university rules for fun; they enforce the rules to keep their residents safe. They keep residents from harming themselves with alcohol and work to keep students safe from outside dangers, like the random man who exposed himself to girls who were in the shower three years ago. They are not just the "fun police."
It takes a special kind of person to be willing to make the sacrifices necessary to be an RA. The immature reactions of a few will undoubtedly make people considering a job as an RA give some serious reconsiderations to that choice. It's impossible to say what the consequences of life in the dorms will be now that potential RAs have to consider death threats as a part of the job description.
Students are caught with alcohol in the dorms and subsequently punished throughout the semester. The RAs weren't targeting a specific party or specific group, they were merely doing their job.
Plus, after one of the intended party kegs was apprehended, is it really a big surprise that the rest of the party was busted as well?
