Professors in the University of California System will vote this spring on whether to allow romantic student-teacher relationships.

If the UC System votes to ban student- professor relationships, it will join the University of Michigan, University of Iowa and Yale University in taking this action as a precautionary measure in averting lawsuits.

The student-professor relationship policy is under scrutiny after UC-Berkeley student claimed she was molested by a professor following a night of drinking. The professor claimed the incident was consentual.

The proposed policy would make it a breach of the code of conduct for a faculty member to engage in a “romantic or sexual relationship” with a student for whom he or she should expect to have academic responsibility.

Typically, college students and professors are over the age of 18 and are considered adults in a legal sense. If a student and a professor choose to be involved in a romantic relationship, the university they attend or work for should not be allowed to interfere or prohibit the relationship as long as the learning environment isn’t affected.

The policy of the UW System states that students and teachers are allowed to be involved in a romantic relationship. The relationship, however, must be declared to the university, and the professor can have no more involvement in the student’s academic affairs. This policy is practical in that it separates dating and academics so preferential treatment cannot be granted.

It is impractical to ban romantic relationships between two consenting adults. If student-professor relationships were banned, in all likelihood professors and students who would be involved with each other would end up “sneaking around.”

As long as the student’s academic achievements and the professor’s performance are not being affected by the relationship, there is no reason why any university or college should ban student-professor relationships.