This year at Waynesburg University, a new guest policy has been set in place by the public safety department.

The major change to Waynesburg’s guest policy is the requirement of guests under 18 years of age to have a signed document from their legal guardians.

According to Mike Humiston, director of Public Safety and head baseball coach at Waynesburg, the new policy was set in place to ensure parents are informed of their child’s visit and to prevent liability issues.

“I think it was something, quite honestly, that should have been done a long time ago,” Humiston said. “We have been fortunate in the past to have all of these people on our campus who are under the age of 18 and never had a problem, but you don’t have to look far to see other institutions that are having visitation issues and problems that may arise from those so we want to kind of set the standard and this is one of the ways we do that,” said Humiston.

The idea of the new policy goes beyond informing parents, as the documentation helps security to better protect visitors.

“We as a security department have to be aware of and notified that we have other students that may be here, or other students that may be on campus, in the event that something may happen,” Humiston said.

According to Humiston, the new policy will also make it easier to find guests and notify them in the case of an emergency.

“We know where they are and who they are with, and we can make notification and get in touch with those students,” Humiston said.

While Humiston is unaware of who the idea for a change in policy came from, he speculates it originated in student services.

As head baseball coach, Humiston said that prospect visitation is important during the recruiting process as head baseball coach.

“Speaking from a coaching standpoint, being the baseball coach here at Waynesburg, that’s a big part of our recruiting process to have a student athlete who is trying to make up his or her mind where they want to spend the next four years of their life. It’s probably the single most important decision that they make at 18 years of age,” said Humiston.

Humiston believes the policy has been helpful and will help the university to take a proactive stance on student and guest security.

“I think it has been beneficial, it’s all about knowing,” Humiston said. “For us, from a security standpoint, we want to be proactive versus reactive. So I think this is a good proactive move by the university to enforce this policy and we hope for the best and hope that we don’t have any problems. We haven’t had any problems to my knowledge so it seems to be working,” Humiston said.

Overall, Humiston believes the policy is beneficial to security, students and visitors.

“I think it’s a great idea to make sure that the communications with not only our students but visiting students is clear and we want everyone to make sure that they have a good visit,” Humiston said.