As the chair of the University of Wisconsin-Stout Tobacco-Free Policy Implementation Committee, I appreciated some of the comments contained in Dan Tollefson's column on Sept. 8, 2010. The column lauded the effort by UW-Stout students to provide a healthy environment by promoting a completely tobacco-free campus.
The column even suggested that UW-Madison might want to consider following UW-Stout down the path to a healthy, tobacco-free campus.
However, Mr. Tollefson is seriously off base in his contention that UW-Stout's enforcement policy, which relies on a comprehensive communications plan and social pressure, is a ""better fit in a fourth grade classroom than a state university.""
Mr. Tollefson reasoned: ""Allowing smokers on campus to be victimized by their peers simply diminishes the true authority of the administration's governance. In effect, the initiative's sole purpose is to remind smokers that they are the minority.""
It appears that Mr. Tollefson would like UW-Stout to roll out the ""tobacco police,"" with citations in hand, to fine or otherwise harass anyone who violates the policy. Somehow, he seems to suggest this is a more mature way of enforcing the tobacco-free initiative than allowing societal pressure to run its course.
I would argue the opposite. Our chancellor, Charles W. Sorensen, believes very strongly in the maturity level of our students, to say nothing of our faculty and staff, and their ability to follow a well-reasoned and administered tobacco-free policy. What Mr. Tollefson conveniently ignores is the fact that our students asked for this policy, in two campus-wise referendums, and the administration simply is carrying out the will of the students.
Furthermore, if Mr. Tollefson would have spoken to me before penning his column, I would have explained to him that the administration right now lacks the legal authority to write citations or take other legal action against our students. We could, in extreme cases, probably have violators come in for a ""discussion"" with our Dean of Students, but we very much doubt that will be necessary.
I am very happy to report that, one week into the new policy, violations seem to be far and few between. I have handed out one card to two smokers outside one of our buildings, and they extinguished their cigarettes and promised to practice their smoking habit off campus in the future.
I probably am not the only reader who was surprised to see a student, my alma mater, actually advocate publicly for a heavy handed administration approach to a new policy initiative, rather than rely on students to handle it themselves. We have a lot of faith in our students at UW-Stout, and so far, it seems, that faith is very well-founded.
Doug Mell is executive director of communications and external relations at UW-Stout and chair of the Tobacco-Free Policy Implementation Committee. Please send all feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com
