As Ball State University ends its first week as a smoke-free campus, students who smoke remain ticket-free.
Kay Bales, vice president of student affairs, said no students had received citations for smoking in non-designated areas as of Thursday afternoon.
The smooth transition to a smoke-free campus was the result of students' sensitivity to the issue, she said.
"People on this campus are, just as we thought they would be, respectful of the policy and respectful of the actions we took," she said.
Bales said staff members observed students using the designated smoking areas Sunday, hours before the campus smoking ban went into effect.
Staff supervisors, including college deans and department chairs, have the authority to ticket students who do not follow the smoke-free policy, she said. They received training through the human resources department on how to handle the issuing of citations, she said, but the staff members had no reason to apply their new skills.
Sophomore Pedro Bassoe said despite an overall adherence to the policy, the smoking ban seemed inefficient because it gathered too many people together in an inconvenient area.
"Now people are just congregated in certain areas, with 10 people smoking at once," he said. "I do understand why they want people away from the buildings, but all the locations are so close to the edge of campus, they might as well be off-campus."
If designated areas where students can light up a cigarette remain part of the policy, Bassoe said, the areas should be moved farther inward to encourage more students to use them.
"Maybe if we could have found a better way of reenforcing and getting people away from the fronts of buildings, [it] would have helped, since it seemed like that was the big issue," he said. "It would also be nice if people could smoke in more sensible locations."
Bales said she knew some students would object to the ban, but the students' opinions on the matter would not affect their adherence to the policy.
She said she predicted the student body would continue to follow the new guidelines after the policy had been in place for a longer period of time.
"As I look back at my years of implementing policies, I've noticed that once people get used to it, on occasion you'll find someone who doesn't follow it," she said, "but that's still very much the exception."
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