Well,

I don't know if there is a law out there allowing colleges to walk into fraternity and sorority houses and just take away their bars and physical property, but this is not a situation that hasn't happened once before. I'm not looking to bring up some dark history of another, but on February 12, 1988, James Callahan, an 18-year-old Rutgers University student, died after consuming 24 ounces of hard liquor in less than an hour as part of a pledging ritual at the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity. This incident prompted a five-year shutdown of the fraternity as well as another interesting result. The university went to each fraternity house and ripped down all the bars in their basements with sledgehammers and whatever else as a symbolic way of saying to the community that this will not be tolerated. Of course years later the bars are back and almost no one recalls the death of the student and what happened. The university took action for attention, which is what I think is going on here. They want to show off how much they can control their students since they are a private college. Anyone else have a better explanation?

AXPAlum

as old as this thread is i gotta clear up AXPAlum that Rutgers is NOT a private college. Its a HUGE university containing many colleges and 3 MAJOR campuses across the entire state of NJ. it is the one official STATE UNIVERISITY OF NJ. which means yes its a public school. And this incident must be really old because as a greek, I never even heard of it

As old as I may be, phisigsigchic, I am an alumni of Rutgers, I know what kind of school it is. Please read the whole thread before responding. The subject matter of thread dealt with Dartmouth, which is a private college.

Also, I believe I listed the date of the Callahan incident, 1988, it is just a very big shame that no one in the greek system learns of this tragedy. Well, if you ever care to make his memory more than just a silly pledging prank, maybe it's time to remind everyone of the past so it doesn't relive itself in the future...


- AXPAlum