Since early November, the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and UW-Madison have been under the magnifying glass of legislators and other public officials for a student housing policy prohibiting resident assistants from holding Bible studies in their residence hall rooms.

At its core, the dilemma concerns whose rights should be defended first — student RAs' or universities'.

RAs claim their religious freedom has been challenged, while universities believe RAs' roles as student leaders is compromised when they use dormitories to hold Bible sessions.

But the policy of barring RAs from involving their residents in ideological activities is not one shared by most Big Ten universities.

The Big Ten response

Universities around the Big Ten denied any practice that would limit RAs' involvement in ideological activities offered to their students. Housing administrators from Ohio State University, University of Michigan, Michigan State and University of Iowa all agreed such a policy would never be applied at their respective universities.

"We basically don't regulate that," said UI Assistant Director of Residence Life Kate Fitzgerald. "An RA can do any kind of program they want. They can't force you to attend. They can't discriminate."

Other Big Ten housing administrators also agreed they would not implement a policy barring RAs from holding ideological activities.

MSU Director of Residence Life Paul Goldblatt said RAs (called "mentors" at MSU) are always considered students first.

"They're here to get their degrees. They're also residents," Goldblatt said. "We try to be very careful in what we say to mentors. Anything that violates policy is a concern to us."

Other administrators worried about how certain activities might be carried out with student residents.

"The issue for me would be the way in which we do our activities," said UM Co-Director of Residence Education Greg Merritt. "Activities we do with residents would be based on assessment of need. It would not be a policy."

OSU Director of Housing Administration Ron Kochendoerfer said OSU would only prevent RAs from holding Bible studies if there was a policy to support it.

"I think we would also [speak with] the student who may have brought the complaint," Kochendoerfer said. "The Bible study might not be the problem. … If we were to experience any kind of complaint, we would look at all sides of the situation."

Still, in an extreme situation, Kochendoerfer said a halt would be placed on the activity.

Big Ten officials also discussed the importance of clarifying the line between RAs and students, since the RA position often blurs that line.

"All [RAs] have a right to engage in behavior any student does," Goldblatt said. "The only way I might intervene is if a mentor was using his or her position to try and get students to come to Bible studies. … Now you're not doing it as Joe Student. You're doing it as Joe Mentor."

For Merritt, the Bible-study situation is little different from football athletes on Saturdays.

"They're all students, but [one is] clearly known as the quarterback and if they do things outside, do they get to strip the fact that they're a quarterback?" Merritt said.

Still, Merritt noted RAs are hired to be student leaders and must respect the rules of an RA.

"You can't sort of strip off your RA hat," Merritt said. "[In] some occasions, when an RA wants to party and be a student and other students will look at that RA and no matter how much they want to say they're not in their RA hat, you can't go drink a case of beer and say I'm not acting as an RA right now."

Legislators were more disgruntled after learning Big Ten universities did not have a similar policy.

"I think what that shows is just how out of touch the policy from UW-Madison and UW-Eau Claire is with even other academic institutions," said U.S. Rep. Mark Green, R-Wis. "The Bible [study] ban policy is not only unconstitutional, it's un-American. It's out of touch with the mainstream in our society and the mainstream of values in our state. It's wrong and it should be rescinded now."

The Bible-study situation: A history

Uproar over the UWEC decision to ban RAs from holding Bible studies began in early November soon after the Philadelphia-based Foundation for Individual Rights in Education made public the contentious RA policy.

The revelation that UWEC's policy was halting RAs from holding Bible studies angered legislators around the state, including Green, who began trading letters with UW System President Kevin Reilly.

Reilly sent a letter to Wisconsin Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager Nov. 15 asking for her opinion of the Bible-studies case. His letter was followed one day later by a similar request from 25 Republican legislators. However, Lautenschlager turned down giving legal advice since providing it could leave the AG unable to defend any lawsuit brought against the UW System or state, though she noted there may be "viable argument" for defense of the policy.

Throughout discussions surrounding UWEC's RA policy, the UW System confirmed UW-Madison also had a similar policy in place.

However, yesterday UWEC suspended its practice of not allowing RA Bible studies, momentarily hoping to uncover more information on the practice.

Legislators still say the UW System has acted poorly in response to the situation and hope issues will be resolved soon.

"The slowness in response in recognizing just how big this had become is unfortunate," said Rep. Rob Kreibich, R-Eau Claire.

In addition, Kreibich also believed Lautenschlager's denial of legal advice was a clear sign that UWEC was in the wrong.

"If she thought that it was constitutional, she would have said so," Kreibich said. "She did not endorse that oral policy. You can read between the lines. She didn't want to potentially have her words used against her in a future lawsuit."

Why ban RAs from holding Bible studies?

According to UW Director of Housing Paul Evans, the current written policy prohibiting RAs from pursuing ideological activities in the residence halls was written in 2003, though the policy most likely goes farther back than that.

Evans noted the role of a house fellow is a unique one.

"We are trying to balance the fact that the house fellow, to effectually do their job, needs to be viewpoint-neutral on this stuff," Evans said. "When you are first on campus here, your first couple weeks, you're looking to your house fellow. … It has an influence not because of the topic, but because of who that person is."

Evans said having Bible studies held by house fellows would hurt the relationship held between house fellows and their residents if the house fellow used residence-hall space for an organization.

"Let's say it's an organization that makes you feel uncomfortable," Evans said. "It just makes you uncomfortable, but how comfortable are you to seek out that house fellow now?"

However, Evans noted other controversial groups are usually brought in to speak with students, like Sex Out Loud. Evans said Sex Out Loud was a different scenario, since house fellows do not represent that organization.

"Dialogue on campus is what you want," Evans said. "What we're talking about is a house fellow using — even unconsciously — their position (for proselytizing)."