Student police patrols might be roaming campus next semester if the proposal gets needed approval.

Morenike Cheatom, Student Association Campus Security Advisory Board adviser, said the board will decide whether to recommend the idea at its next meeting.

The patrol is needed because “a lot of stuff goes on when the UPs (University Police) are busy,” said Board Member Sharat Shenoy.

Shenoy said he proposed the patrol after talking to security officials at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana. The proposed NIU patrol would be similiar to the eight-year-old student patrol at U of I, Shenoy said.

The plan is to divide NIU’s campus into about three zones with two students patrolling each zone. Five to six students would patrol the campus, he said.

The patrol would be monitored by a student supervisor in contact with UPs, he said.

If approved, the patrol would “have a one-year tryout,” Shenoy said. Initially, the patrol would operate only during late evening hours and weekends.

“Patrolling students would be walking in darker areas on campus and checking out parking lots,” Shenoy said.

Under his proposal, patrol members would be trained by the UPs, Shenoy said. Members would function as “eyes and ears” of the UPs but have no authority to make official arrests, he said.

The program would help “link together” students and UPs in their efforts to fight crime, he said.

Cheatom agreed that NIU does “need extra eyes” to insure security on campus. However, “students don’t feel comfortable with the idea” of having the patrols, she said.

“They don’t seem to like having a peer snitch on you,” she said.

However, members of the patrol “would not be police officers,” Shenoy said, adding they would be armed only with police radios and flashlights.

If the idea is recommended by the board, James Harder, NIU’s vice president of Business and Operations, will have the final say.