New staff member hired to oversee nonacademic student misconduct at KU

Kansas University has hired a new person to oversee nonacademic student misconduct.

Nick Kehrwald will join KU’s Office of the Vice Provost for Student Success on Jan. 31. He comes from the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, where he was in a similar role, responsible for conducting and overseeing judicial hearings and provided training and educational outreach to students, faculty and staff.

Attempts to reach Kehrwald, who will earn $55,000 annually in his KU position, were unsuccessful.

Nonacademic misconduct situations can be for a number of different issues, including alcohol or drug violations, hazing or crimes committed on campus such as assaults or thefts, said Jane Tuttle, assistant vice provost for student success.

Other nonacademic misconduct violations include “offenses against the orderly process of the university,” which can include things such as lying to the university or carrying a firearm on campus.

They are all outlined in KU’s Code of Student Rights and Responsibilities.

Currently, Tuttle serves as the conduct officer for these types of cases, in addition to several other duties. The job had outgrown the small amount of time she was supposed devote to it, she said, and the office wanted to do a better job of outreach to other organizations involved in disciplinary matters on campus.

Tuttle said the office of the vice provost typically will see about 100 to 125 such cases each year.

Those don’t include cases heard by separate judicial boards — including the governing bodies for residence halls, fraternities and sororities. In his new role, Kehrwald would advise those boards, but not replace them or take over their duties, Tuttle said.

The nonacademic misconduct cases Tuttle sees are typically those that wouldn’t result in a student being suspended or expelled from KU. Those are handled by a different judicial board outside of Student Success.

Students served by the new conduct officer could receive a range of other potential penalties for their behavior, including warnings, fines, restitution payments, disciplinary probation and requirements to complete campus or community service.

Typically, the goal is to help the student correct the behavior, she said, and not to mete out unnecessary punishments.

Most students won’t notice much of a change, she said. Most universities KU’s size have at least one full-time person dedicated to student conduct, she said.

“It’s a whole subspecialty in student affairs,” she said.