The Office of Judicial Affairs reported a 35 percent jump in the amount of charges handed out against Penn State students last year.

According to the office's 2001-2002 annual report, released on Thursday, 1,497 charges of violations were filed against students last year.

This is an increase from the 1,104 charges handed out in 2000-2001.

Penn State officials attributed the increase in the number of charges to the revised off-campus misconduct policy.

"I believe that the increase is due principally to the new referral policy, whereby citations and criminal actions in the surrounding community are referred to Judicial Affairs for further evaluation," Penn State President Graham Spanier said in an e-mail.

Joseph Puzycki, director of Judicial Affairs, said the office has been working closely with the State College Police Department since fall 2001 to curb misconduct off-campus. Any violations cited by State College police that involve a student are automatically forwarded to Judicial Affairs.

Of the 1,775 referrals sent by police officials, about 1,200 involved Penn State students, Puzycki said. Judicial Affairs met with about 500 students, serving sanctions in about 250 cases, he said.

Depending on the severity of the violation, punishments can range from a verbal warning to expulsion.

"We decided that a lot of the behaviors were nuisance behaviors that weren't your major assaults or drug violations, but rather loud music violations and such," Puzycki said.

He said students who did not receive sanctions were placed in a "minor violation category," and Judicial Affairs officials would pay close attention to any future misbehavior.

University spokesman Bill Mahon said the threat of involving the university in matters may plant a seed of doubt in a would-be offender's mind.

"Overall, it [the university's presence] is having an impact," he said.

Sean Gavin (freshman-engineering) said university officials have a very difficult task in curtailing misconduct.

"When you get this many people together, there's not much you can do," he said.

"You just have got to make people aware of the problems."

Sara Grabowski (senior-hotel, restaurant and institutional management) said the report's numbers aren't cause for concern.

"There's nothing wrong with that ... as long as we still have students doing well in school and making progress in school," she said.

For the fifth year in a row, drug and alcohol violations accounted for the most citations brought before Judicial Affairs. About 700 drug and alcohol charges were filed last year, compared to 428 in 2000-2001.

Penn State recently was named "America's Best Party Town" by Bacardi, a brand of rum. Also, the Princeton Review ranked Penn State as the fourth best "party school" in the nation.

Puzycki said the rise in drug and alcohol violations, combined with the recent negativity surrounding Penn State's standing as a "party school," would not place any added pressure on the university.

"We're not different from any university across the country," he said, noting that the majority of Penn State students drink responsibly. "We do a good job trying to educate students on drugs and alcohol and we respond pretty diligently [to violations]."

Judicial Affairs also reported the number of cases involving academic dishonesty more than doubled from 51 in 2000-01 to 107 in 2001-02. Puzycki said the increase resulted from more stringent academic policies enforced by the university.

Puzycki said that despite the rise in misconduct, the university remains optimistic.

"There are common values that Penn State believes in. I'm starting to see that more, and that's a positive trend," he said.