Student Handbook

Room Entry and Search of Rooms

Students are responsible for knowing the following:

ROOM ENTRY
 

The College will respect the privacy rights of students, and will not authorize law enforcement officials to enter rooms without a proper warrant. Room entry by College Officials is authorized under the following conditions, and the College will make a good faith effort to contact students prior to room entry.

  1. Regular or Unscheduled Maintenance, i.e. facilities needs to enter a student's room in the normal course of conducting maintenance.
  2. Health, Sanitation, and Vacancy Checks, i.e. normally scheduled room checks for purposes of ensuring sanitary or vacated residence halls.
  3. Safety, Welfare, and Nuisance Checks, i.e. safety concerns or public nuisance like missing students or unattended alarm clocks.

ROOM SEARCHES

  1. Policy Violations, i.e. alcohol/drugs, sexual assault, weapons, or battery.

a. Reasonable cause is first-hand, credible testimony information provided to College officials or Campus Safety that a student is violating a specific policy. All such room entries are to be authorized by the Dean of Students or designee and conducted by one official from Residential Education and Housing Services and one Campus Safety Officer.

b. The College will make every attempt to contact the occupant of the room. In cases where the student cannot be located, College officials and Campus Safety will conduct their investigation by documenting the search of areas reasonably related to the alleged policy violation with photographs of items in their original state and an Incident Report. Students who cannot be present during the search may appoint a witness.

  1. The terms of policy violations, searches, and subsequent sanctions imposed on students are to be determined by the Office of Student Conduct.
  2. In all cases of room entry or searches where the student is not available or cannot be contacted, College officials will leave notice that the room was entered and specify the reasons forthwith.

While residing in campus housing, Occidental students accept full responsibility for their actions under local, state, and federal laws, as well as policies and guidelines outlined in the College's Housing Contract and Student Handbook. Contraband such as weapons, alcohol (unless resident is of legal age), or drug paraphernalia discovered "in plain sight" during the normal course of room entry will be confiscated, and students may be subject to conduct proceedings.

  • Phone: (323) 259-2969