Student gets campus ban for hosting house party

FIRST OF KIND ISSUED UNDER NEW RULES BY LOUGHBOROUGH

LOUGHBOROUGH University has issued its first campus ban to a student who hosted a house party.

The misconduct notice, issued because the party was in breach of the Covid-19 restrictions, means the student will have to stay away from the campus for 14 days.

University chief operating officer Richard Taylor told BBC East Midlands Today: “We issued our first notice to a student who decided to hold a house party last weekend in breach of the clear rules. That’s one strike.

“Hopefully, they’ll have learnt their lesson and hopefully it will say to other students that this is a great university to study, do sport, do all the things that make student life excellent – but at the end of the day they have to follow the rules.”

A Loughborough University spokesman told the Mercury new disciplinary measures have been put in place.

He said: “We are looking forward to welcoming our young people back, for whom the past six months have been a very difficult experience, with their lives on hold.

“Many measures have been put in place to ensure our students and staff can return to campus safely.

“We are asking every member of the university community to do all they can to keep the campus Covid-19-secure, and a key part of this is following the rules set out by the government. I am confident our students will follow the rules, but for a small minority that choose to disregard them, disciplinary measures have been introduced to deal swiftly with any breaches.

“Any students resident in a house where a large social gathering takes place that breaches government rules will be deemed to present a Covid-19 risk.

“They will immediately be denied access to all areas of the university campus for 14 days. This includes academic facilities, halls of residence, sport and social activities and Loughborough Students’ Union.”

The spokesman said anyone found breaching the rules again would be required to leave the university for the remainder of the academic year.

According to university magazine Label, vice-chancellor Robert Allison said in an e-mail to all students the university had a legal responsibility to protect others from spreading the virus.

He described the rules as “really tough interventions” but he said it was important students followed the rules to keep the campus open.