'Shame On You': Student Assembly Criticizes Administration's Response to Campus Tragedies and Approves Restorative Health Day Guidelines

The Student Assembly unanimously passed a resolution Thursday to implement guidelines for recovery days across campus in response to student deaths and Sexual Assault Crime Alerts.

Resolution 17 follows a series of tragedies on campus over the past week, including one report of drugging and assaulting a student at the Chi Phi House found dead in Fall Creek Gorge and a student admitted to hospital after falling in the same area.

SA members expressed disappointment at what they see as an inadequate administrative response to these events. echo dissatisfaction among students and calls for a ‘mental health day’.

The only message sent to the entire student body was an email from Vice President for Student and Campus Life Ryan Lombardi, urging the Cornell community to “lean on each other and provide support, empathy and care for each other,” with links to counseling. and victim advocacy resources and announced a campus-wide community support meeting last Tuesday.

“Shame on you, shame on you,” said Student Health Council President Davian Gekman ’27 in response to the administrative response.

VP of Finance Niles Hite ’26 explained that he hopes the passage of Resolution 17 after this week’s events will set a good precedent for administrative responses to future tragedies.

“No matter how hard we work, how much we go through in general, it can be a very stressful environment and if external factors are also contributing to that, a mental health day is the least people deserve,” Hite said.

In recognition of how these tragic events have negatively impacted the “mental, emotional and physical health of the student population,” Resolution 17 seeks to set a written precedent for future responses to tragic events. A community recovery day would be granted in the event of a student death or a Sexual Assault Crime Alert.

“Everyone needs time to slow down, process what happened and be able to reset… and have that time to process it,” said Christian Flournoy ’27, vice president of Diversity and Inclusion.

Kendall Eddington is a Sun contributor and can be reached at (email protected)