Four Macalester students found guilty of streaking during the Midnight Breakfast during finals week last semester have been disciplined for their action. They appealed their sentence this week.

George Norris '03, Tim Lewandowski '04, Meg Stinchcomb '03, Chris Curran '03 and two unidentified females ran through the Campus Center naked midway through last fall's semiannual breakfast, despite a letter from Dean of Students Laurie Hamre threatening disciplinary action for such behavior.

"I just wanted to break the pent-up tension everybody was feeling with some levity and silliness, and taking my clothes off seemed to be a good way to do it at the time." Curran said.

"I felt that the tradition [of streaking during Midnight Breakfast] needed to be upheld as an example of doing something that lies outside of the accepted nor," added Norris.

According to Hamre nudity in public places is against the law in Minnesota, and although Macalester has no official policy on streaking there is a policy concerning sexual harassment.

In a disciplinary hearing, the student streakers were charged with offending several victims of past sexual assaults. The sentence places the students on disciplinary probation, and also demands that they work at next semester's Midnight Breakfast and write a three page paper on the pros and cons of streaking.

"After my conduct hearing, I feel like this comes down to two issues," Curran said. " If there are a few people who are bothered by streaking, should their wish to participate in a campus event without dealing with streakers outweigh everyone else's clearly demonstrated support for streaking? And, is there something inherently wrong with nakedness? Thankfully, the culture that is continually created by students at Macalester is not as rigid as the outside world. Living in this community, we have the opportunity to set our own standards of acceptable conduct, and I believe the consensus supports some streaking once in a while."

Those involved in the incident during the Midnight Breakfast believe that this punishment is overly harsh. Therefore they have appealed the sentence on the grounds that the punishment far exceeded the crime. This situation has also prompted the students to suggest a change in the structure of disciplinary action taken by the college.

"I think that there are ways for us to get away from a relationship of enforcer and enforced by including everyone in the process of setting community standards," Curran said.

He cites Grinnell College in Iowa as a prime example of this idea in action. At Grinnell students participate in a student self-governance. In this way, Residential Advisors at Grinnell are able to act as community builders without being obligated to uphold rules that they do not believe in.

Despite their disagreement with the imposed penalty, the student streakers do realize that they may have offended people.

"I didn't think I was offending any students when I streaked, but if I was, I apologize," Curran concluded. "I appreciate the work that the faculty and staff was doing to serve us some food during the late night, and if what I did made them uncomfortable, I'm very sorry."