SENSIBLE STRATEGY

Student groups on the campus have much to learn from Students for
Sensible Drug Policy. The group went the traditional, preferred route
of achieving their goals. They set up meetings with Resident Life
officials and tried to convince them that penalties brought against
students who smoke pot in dorms are out of step with how society
treats usage of the drug. But no dice.

In response, the group's leader, junior Anastacia Cosner, stepped up
and joined the University Senate. Even though she'd be vastly
outnumbered by faculty senators, she realized that joining the
university's most powerful policy-making body is the most direct way
to effect change.

Now it's apparent, as The Diamondback's Nathan Cohen reported
yesterday, that SSDP has also employed a brilliant, unflinching
method of lobbying resident assistants to use discretion when
reporting marijuana use. To be clear, we don't support an on-campus
housing scene where bong hits are more common than books. But SSDP is
appealing to what this is all about: the appalling disregard of
justice Resident Life officials have displayed so far.

Because Resident Life's policies on pot use are baseless, unbalanced
and indefensible, SSDP will likely find great success in appealing to
RAs. We hope that, as Resident Life will likely attempt to assail
SSDP's efforts, RAs will do their duty to consider the plight of
their fellow students and think critically about Resident Life's
obsession with micro-managing its staff.

The Student Government Association, too, seems to be coming around to
the populist approach of giving students more power. Their goal of
registering 1,000 students to vote in next month's city election has
been met with a surprisingly warm reception, especially considering
students have had a long history of apathy at the polls.

But it's troubling that the SGA has been so singularly focused on
engaging student voters without considering how difficult it would be
to shake things up in the districts where so many students live
without any challengers in the race.

There's something that can be done, however, and it can be pulled
straight from the pages of the SSDP playbook: Frame the debate,
appeal to people's sense of fairness and if the traditional approach
doesn't work, don't be afraid to try something else.

Assuming students overwhelmingly edge out city voters this year and
that most of the students who vote are this year's freshmen and
sophomores, they'll all still be around to vote two years from now.
That gives ambitious students two full years to campaign. That's two
years to build upon the SGA's important work building a voter base
this year, show up at council meetings to learn the issues and
observe elected officials bow to anti-student constituents and take
wishy-washy positions on everything from public safety to student housing.

No one, including the SGA, has ever really effectively done what SSDP
has done, which is to go through the regular channels until there's
nowhere left to go, then get pissed off and take it to the people who
matter: the grassroots. It takes diligence, craftiness and -
especially in city politics - a big learning curve. The SGA has laid
the groundwork. They just need somebody to show how little the
council has actually done for students and then demand change with a
mass of student voters standing behind them.