By Eric Finkelstein, Director of Residential Programs and Housing Operations

This letter is in response to your article, “Hofstra’s Pot Culture” in the October 7th issue of The Chronicle. There were several inaccurate statements made as to the approach and expectations of Resident Assistants confronting marijuana use in the residence halls.

The anonymous RA’s quote stating, “most RAs don’t feel the need to take disciplinary action on students caught smoking or possessing marijuana” misrepresents the training and expectations of our staff. RAs serve an important role for us in identifying, documenting, and referring students who may be in violation of the drug policy to the Office of Community Standards. We do not expect the RAs to handle any illegal substances, but rather contact Public Safety.

The second quote, “We don’t do our jobs anymore… there have been cases where people have been written up 17 times and not had a thing done to them because they’re too afraid to kick people off campus because they’ll lose more money,” is totally untrue. Our community standards process, which is overseen by the Dean of Students Office, is educationally based, mindful that the college experience should involve some safety net for growth and development. While I cannot comment on the frequency of any given student’s violations, concerns over losing students to off-campus housing do not drive educational and student conduct decisions and enforcement by Residential Programs, nor how we train our staff to respond to each and every suspected case of drug use they encounter.

I would like to establish an expectation that moving forward, as the Director of the area, I am at least given the courtesy of an offer to be interviewed before an article is published. Truly then will your coverage be fair and balanced and consistent with your mission of keeping the Hofstra Community informed since 1935.”