Students living in Oak and Elm residence halls have reported sightings during the past few weeks of people climbing to the roof of the Oak-Elm dining center and looking in residents’ windows.

Karen Ehler, freshman in pre-business, lives on the third floor of Elm Hall and said her floor’s community adviser cautioned residents against leaving their curtains open or inviting strangers into the dormitory.

“We heard from our CA that there have been reports of people on top of the dining center looking in girls’ rooms,” Ehler said. “I’ve been a lot more cautious since the meeting.”

ISU Police Capt. Gene Deisinger said patrols in the Oak-Elm area were intensified after they learned indirectly of an incident six weeks ago involving female residents seeing men looking into windows from the roof.

Deisinger said similar situations have occurred before at Iowa State.

“At times in the past, we have had incidents – a small number of incidents – where individuals have been observed looking through windows,” he said.

ISU Police responded to a call at 8:40 p.m. Wednesday reporting that several people had climbed onto the roof of the Oak-Elm dining center, he said.

“We did respond to a call that there were people on the roof,” Deisinger said. “Officers arrived and made contact with two females and ordered them down.”

He said no arrests were made and no charges were filed in connection with the incident. The names of those on the roof were not released, he said, because no substantive actions were taken.

Wednesday’s incident appeared to be unrelated to earlier reports of people looking into dormitory windows, he said.

Department of Residence officials said they had not heard about any incidents involving people on the Oak-Elm roof.

“I am not aware of it,” said Virginia Arthur, associate director of the Department of Residence. “No incident reports have been filed to my knowledge.”

Arthur said she didn’t know how anyone would gain access to the Oak-Elm roof, but she said students are not allowed there.

“Students are not supposed to be on the roof,” she said, “and if someone does go up there, we handle it appropriately according to the institutional code.”

She said anyone caught looking through windows would face stern repercussions.

“It’s inappropriate behavior and we would certainly take it very seriously,” she said.

She said every disciplinary situation is handled on an individual basis, so consequences for anyone caught looking into other students’ windows would depend on the incident.

She said regulations do not permit students on roofs, but the rules are sometimes broken.

“It seems like every year, sooner or later, there’s a situation where someone gets on a roof,” she said.