It’s kind of funny to think about the vitriol that surrounded the cancellation of the Ibis Ride just a few short weeks ago. Irresponsibility on the part of students, haste on the part of the Dean of Students office and disgust on both sides, for different reasons.
Now the dust has settled a bit, and overtures have been made by Dean Ricardo Hall that indicate some type of Coconut Grove transportation will be made available beginning next academic year. But what will be changed? What will be made different to make sure something like this doesn’t happen again?
The answer to this student-created problem naturally comes from a student. Irene Daboin, a sophomore and resident assistant in Stanford Residential College, e-mailed The Miami Hurricane and Dean Hall immediately after the cancellation. Her suggestion? Give the watchdogs on the shuttles some bite. The Ibis Ride is university property, just as a floor in a residential college. If a rule is broken on the shuttle, it should be penalized like it would be if you were stumbling around campus so drunk you don’t know where you are. Irene’s proposal is the creation of a Transportation Security Assistant with the authority to write students up, submit reports to the Dean of Students and call for police assistance if necessary.
Sometimes, the threat of enforcement is the only enforcement necessary. If students know that their actions will have real repercussions, they’ll clean up their act (literally and figuratively) before they step foot on the shuttle. To Dean Hall and the rest of the Dean of Students office: listen to this proposal. Most students want the Ibis Ride back, and they want it to be safe. This is one inexpensive way of making that happen.