Anxoius over college - possible disciplinary?

LegacyUser

I did something really stupid today, I was in my college library working on my thesis and when the bell sounded for closing I packed up the stuff on my desk without thinking. Amongst the stuff I put in my bag was a dissertation I had been looking at. When I tried to leave the alarm went off and I realised what I'd done. I handed it back at the desk and apologised but they took my student number and now I'm really worried about it going further. It was a stupid mistake, but it says in my college regulations that attempting to remove material is a serious offence. I've been freaking out about this all evening. Am I likely to get in trouble and what can I do?

Sinall

Relax. It was an innocent mistake. The fact that it happened when the bell went helps to demonstrate that you got distracted and it was an accident.

College regulations have all sorts in them to cover every eventuality. This must be a very common mistake for people to make - if libraries spent all their time chasing people for this they wouldn't do much else!

Try not to think about it this evening - it's important that you relax in order to be refreshed to work on your thesis tomorrow. If you're really worried you can talk to the library staff again tomorrow and explain again but I honestly believe it'll be fine.

Exclamation Marc

If you've no previous, they'll likely just see it as a mistake you made and just warn you about doing it again or to be more careful. I'm sure many people before have made the same mistake without thinking.

The fact that you were doing thesis work and the bell went shows that you were just deep at work and made an oversight.

You'll be fine.

Ursus Horribilis

Hey, you're making a mountain out of a molehill here. When I was a student I accidentally did something like that. The alarm went off and next thing there was a security guard confiscating my student ID card. I was frogmarched into an office out back and told off by a hatchet-faced old bat who acted as if I was the only person who had ever done this. I was a kid of 20 at the time and she scared the bejesus out of me. When I told my friends what had happened, they just laughed. It happens more often than you think. It turned out that one of my friends had done it loads of times and when she was yet again brought into the old bat, she said "Not you again!" and rolled her eyes. All of us graduated from university with good degrees so it certainly didn't hamper us in any way.

I doubt anything more will come of this. It's not even going to go on record I'm sure. It seems to be part of a library's policy to kick up a fuss every time people make genuine mistakes like this. Here's another thought. If you were planning to steal material from the library you'd not go walking through alarmed gates with it, would you?

meme74

I honestly wouldnt worry about this. Theyu took your student number as thats the procedure but I highly doubt much more will come of this. When we were in college we used to put library books into eachothers bags as a prank just to see the other person be mortified when the alarm went off and they had no idea why! Anyway, nothing much ever came of and we all graduated no bother. The library staff will realise it was a mistake. Think logically about it, its really not a big deal.

The_Valeyard

Do not worry, this happens the whole time.

When I was immature at 19/20 in college, this was a prank the lads would play on each other. When someone went to the toilet, someone else would hide a book on menstruation, etc, in their bag just to cause the alarm to go off and get a laugh. Nothing ever happened over it.