Ole Miss Kappa Sigma Charter Revoked (Appeal Possible)
 

According to a news report, Kappa Sigma has voted to revoke the charter of its chapter at Ole Miss. An appeal is possible.
Brief excerpts from the longer article are below. The whole article is at

http://www.djournal.com/pages/story....pub=1&div=News

The Kappa Sigma Supreme Executive Committee voted July 6 to revoked the chapter's charter because of a 2005 incident involving alcohol. Mitchell B. Wilson, the national executive director, said the chapter was sanctioned in 2004, and when the probation was violated, they had no choice but to pull the charter.


"The Ole Miss chapter of Kappa Sig was put on probation in 2004 because of an incident where an individual had alcohol at a rush event," explained Wilson. "The incident that lead to the charter's closing actually happened in the spring of 2005. We learned that during that time they had an event where alcohol was present, which clearly violated the probation."

. . . Sparky Reardon, Ole Miss dean of students, said because the chapter's suspension wasn't done by the university, he didn't have any comment and directed all questions to the national office.


. . . The chapter has 30 days to appeal the decision. If the decision is not overturned, the chapter could be off campus two or three years.

When do Chapters ever learn?

It may be fun at the time, but OOPs there goes the Charter. They have time to appeal, but when their HQ pulled it without any help from the school, I see little kindness from HQ!

Live and learn?

So, who is the real loser here?

Even if by some miracle a chapter were to win its appeal, they'd be labeled as trouble and therefore be under a microscope from then on. Since it seems many chapters don't learn from past mistakes it makes it only a matter of time until another reason to shut down the chapter takes place.

Bro. I think that is called stupidity on a chapters front door!:rolleyes:

We got an e-mail from Nationals about this very thing. All I can say is, be careful what you post on the internet.

Alcohol at a rush event! Oh my GOD! Somebody could get...drunk!

I'm sure that there is significant back-story to this which we aren't going to get here. I just can't see someone getting their charter pulled for alcohol at a rush event.

At the end of the day, it's still illegal, and once HQ knows about it, the insurance companies probably would expect some action. It's too bad that in this day, our decisions are often based upon liability or potential liability, but I guess we've put ourselves in that position.

The chapter was probably in trouble more than once in the past. Once you're on probation it just takes one violation to get you tossed.

Maybe its just me, but I would never pledge a fraternity that didn't have alcohol at a rush event.

The one and only rule for guys rush at my school was NO ALCOHOL. The last day of their rush were bid day parties (aka 5:01s because the ban ended at 5:00 that friday) I thought that was kind of a standard, is this not the case?

Well, we don't have alcohol during "formal rush" which is usually a 3 day period right before people get pinned. However, nobody really bids during formal rush. Real rush begins in June, and alcohol is at everything, be it beach parties, parties in various cities around the south, band parties once school starts, etc. The only events that are dry are potentially dangerous ones (daytime activities on the lake, skeet shooting, etc).

^Yeah, formal rush pretty much means nothing. All of our huge rush events are during the summer, whether it be trips to New Orleans, huge barbecues, all day band parties, etc. In fact, the FIJIs down here are having their Island party this weekend, huge rush event.

Depends on the School and HQ rulings though doesnt it?

I mean, I guess it could depend on the school. But I haven't ever visited one where the forbade giving out bids during the summer. Hell, I had some friends get their pins right after hs graduation ceremony was over.

The Sigma Chi's on our campus are the only ones with a house. They would hold parties during the orientation weekends for freshmen. A lot of the freshmen (guys and girls) would go to the parties instead of waking up in the morning and attending the informational things. They really got busted big time for it because it broke the school's rush rules. (The house is off campus so the only other thing they could do is bust them for alcohol.) As for the rest of the fraternities, the majority of them aren't around over the summer so there's not anyone there to rush guys.

This may just be the difference between a city school and a college town school though.

/Not ripping on the Sigma X's it's just obvious what house I'd be talking about if anyone wanted to look.

Yeah, I mean there is always alot of guys around during the summer, but everyone still obeys all of the rules during formal rush, its just that bids aren't really given out because they already have been. Even the guys with bid still have to go through the formal part.

Gotcha, do you tend to rush more sophomores or are most of the freshmen local?
I have no idea if the Sigma Chis actually give bids early or not, but I'd be doubtful if the other 12 chapters do.

If a guy isn't around in the summer and comes to rush in the fall, is there still a possibility of him recieving a bid?

I imagine McCallan is like us, in that we rush mostly incoming freshmen in that summer. I mean, a lot of them are within an hour or so driving distance, so its not a big deal for them to drive over for a band party or something. If its farther, they'll usually just come to one of the beach parties or a party in Atlanta or Charlotte or something. We rarely rush sophomores unless they are like friends of current brothers, who for parental reasons or something couldn't rush their freshmen year. Usually we don't even rush those guys, its just a given that they'll be in the next pledge class. As for the HQ and University restrictions on parties... the school has all kinds of rules, but fraternities know which ones must be followed. For example, the biggest ones we follow are no alcohol during actual formal rush, and not bringing kids to parties during orientation (CWE weekend @ AU). Those are the ones which have really busted fraternities in the past. Most of the others we can get around. Also, I don't even know what the HQ rules on rush and pledgeship are. I was pledge trainer my junior year, but I guess we just don't really pay attention.

Hahah, thats funny, I really don't think I know what our HQ restrictions are either......and I have been on Rush teams too. I don't think ive evver reallythought about it....mostly just care about the university ones.

For Tennessee, it is a must for a fraternity to put in a good summer rush to make sure they can pull a good pledge class with guys coming from top schools in Memphis (MUS, Briarcrest, St. Benedict, Houston, CBHS), Nashville (Davidson, Ezell, MBA), Chattanooga (McCallie, Baylor) and even Jackson. The past two years or so, rush has been a 5/6 day event. Walkthroughs were on either Sunday or Monday, then there were two "informal" nights and then "invite-backs" for the other two "formal" nights and Friday would be bid-day/bid parties.

My fraternity throws a couple big parties during the summer in Knoxville and Nashville and some days on the lake in Knoxville and then at the very end of summer before the freshman go up we have a huge party in Memphis.

Its just meant to let the freshman coming in see us better than they would during rush, and for us to know who we want to rush balls on.

By the way, if you aren't having rush parties at a bar or two during rush week you won't stick out as much as the big fraternities that do. A band party is always a good idea since it brings tons of girls and music.

Yeah, even during formal rush when we can't have any alcohol, we usually take the guys out after formal rush ends (10pm each night I think). We'll have a party at someone's house or take a fraternity check to the bar.

Our rush days end at 9pm I believe, thank God. I usually just stick to the front porch burning cigs and talking to those coming up or heading out. Hitting on a guy four days in a row for a couple of hours is not my idea of a good time.

we would have been in so much trouble for giving bids out in the summer. Freshmen can't pledge untill the spring. It used to be that if you had enough credits you could still pledge first semester, but the rule changed when I got there and you had to wait no matter what.

that sucks

Not sure how it is at other schools, and this may have changed, but at UK (Kentucky) fraternities were not allowed to "officially" give out a bid over the summer. Or to be more accurate, the UK Administration would not "accept" the bid until the fall semester started. To be clear, a chapter might extend a bid, but it would not be binding until the the pledge was able to formally accept it in fall.

Regardless, by the time formal rush stated - which is right before/during the first week of classes - a good portion (core group) of the pledge class might be in place. Since there aren't quotas, totals or restrictions as to the number of men that can be extended a bid, the strong chapters continued to pick up more quality men during formal. Usually from out of state students and athletes. But also those men that did not know about the parties, had a conflict and could not attend, did not decide to rush until they summer orientation, or once they got on campus.