Alfred University to Dissolve Greek System

[dzrose93]

Originally posted by Ginger
If the DZs did have to pull out, what happens to the actives then? do they automatically become alumni? and then would they be allowed to function as a local, or would that violate dual membership?

The DZ sisters will most likely be granted immediate alumnae status by National Headquarters. They'll probably be encouraged to start an alumnae chapter in the area (or join a pre-existing alumnae chapter). I doubt seriously if National HQ would let the girls go local.

I hate that the girls worked so hard to colonize their chapter at Alfred only to have it stolen from them a few years later. It's sad that the actions of a few are preventing so many people from enjoying the benefits of being a collegiate Greek at Alfred U. I hope that, in time, the school will realize the poor decision it made and welcome Greeks back on campus. Doubtful, I'm sure.

[33girl]

Originally posted by dzrose93


The DZ sisters will most likely be granted immediate alumnae status by National Headquarters. They'll probably be encouraged to start an alumnae chapter in the area (or join a pre-existing alumnae chapter). I doubt seriously if National HQ would let the girls go local.

But what if they all decide to have a non-greek lettered "social group"? I mean, it's not like these girls are flipping DZ the bird - this is something being forced on them. It would suck if they had to disband just because they were the only national. Plus, what would happen after those gals graduated? The alum chapter would die, unless they keep initiating collegians through alum initiation. I think they should at least be given the chance to keep the group going in a local form.

[DeltAlum]

FYI, From Fraternal News

Thoughts As Alfred University Bans Its Greek System

By Hank Nuwer

"The call came in the middle of the night. Eileen Stevens's son was
dead. She was alert and numb at once, her flesh no longer part of
her. She wanted to hang up. She wanted the caller to stay on the line
forever. She wanted to know what had happened and how. But most of
all, she wanted the call to be a dream, a very bad dream.

The pain in the caller's voice, the small break in his professional
manner, revealed the truth, told her the worst had happened. She was
ready to bargain with God. The devil. The caller himself. Take my
life, my soul-take me. I've lived. But make it untrue. Take me, not
Chuck. But Chuck was dead."

So begins my 1990 book Broken Pledges: The Deadly Rite of Hazing, the
story of the death of Chuck Stenzel. Chuck was an Alfred University
student who died pledging Klan Alpine, a local AU fraternity. In a
bizarre hazing ritual called "Tapping Night," Chuck was locked in a
car trunk with other pledges, handed alcohol, and then later made to
play deceptive alcohol games with fraternity members, calculated to
make the pledges dead drunk by midnight.

Chuck, a strapping athlete with longish wheat-colored hair, was put
to sleep in the house, just before midnight on a tick mattress, and
died from an alcohol overdose on February 24, 1978. The theme of the
party, a Klan Alpine member (older and wiser and sweaty-soaked as he
talked) told me was, "Don't Stop Till You Drop." In writing Broken
Pledges, I interviewed Klan Alpine's undergraduates, their advisers,
and alums, including the last people to see Chuck alive. To a person,
they were decent men who spoke with their names on full record, in
hopes of preventing another fraternity death. The parents spoke to me
candidly, as did present and former AU administrators and faculty.

I concluded then that Alfred University, a small private school in
New York's Southern Tier, couldn't have handled the 1978 fraternity
death any worse than it did. An AU administrator and a local district
attorney conducted a so-called investigation without interviewing
many witnesses, and some crucial post-death statements by school
administrators, by their own admission, did not hold up as fact under
scrutiny. There were no arrests of fraternity members or alums who
attended the Tapping Night party where Chuck died. The only result of
this 'investigation' was a temporary suspension of fraternity
activities. The case might have embarrassed the school even more,
had not the entire Chuck Stenzel file prepared by that district
attorney's staff disappeared from the Allegany County (N.Y)
courthouse archives. (The then D.A. defended his investigation and
his decision not to press charges in the Stenzel death.)

*************************

While writing Broken Pledges, then President Richard Rose told me
point-blank that he'd taken bad advice from attorneys and had avoided
Stenzel's mother in the days and years following Chuck's death. If he
could go back in time, he said in a face-to-face interview, he would
have followed his heart and talked to them as a plain father to a
plain mother. Rose's decision to go on the record and criticize his
decisions took courage, but he did so unflinchingly when I
interviewed him.

In addition, in the past decade, Alfred University has reversed its
actions 180 degrees and has become as proactive in stopping hazing as
any school in the country.

Chuck's mother, Eileen Stevens (she took a new last name when she
remarried), began an anti-hazing organization called the Committee to
Halt Useless College Killings. Among other accomplishments, Stevens
agitated for a strong New York State anti-hazing law. She got it
passed after years of lobbying, and then embraced the fraternal
system by speaking at hundreds of colleges and universities. Her
message was simple: "Return to the ideals of your founders. They
would be turning in their graves to see young men and women dying
from hazing."

All this ancient history has been dredged up again. On May 20, 2002,
Alfred University announced - as has Williams, Colby and Bowdoin in
recent years - that it was discontinuing its fraternity system.

Continuing incidents involving alcohol and pledging were too much for
AU's trustees to forbear. Zeta Beta Tau member Ben Klein was found
dead in a frozen creek behind the chapter house, after having been
beaten by his fraternity brothers for revealing chapter rituals to
ZBT members at Syracuse University (the criminal investigation
continues). Additional hazing incidents, similar to those that had
killed Stenzel in 1978, involved the Klan Alpine fraternity. Ongoing
alcohol/pledging incidents - including post-party auto fatalities or
injuries to fraternity and sorority members - continued over the
years and resulted in suspensions to half of AU's sororities.

On May 20, 2002 then - Alfred University trustees announced their
decision to shut down all local and national fraternal organizations,
which had existed on campus for nearly 90 years. They did so with
full knowledge that some alums would withhold financial contributions
and that undergraduates would protest.

Certainly the fraternities and sororities should have seen the action
coming, and could have worked harder to clean up their collective
acts. In 1999, Alfred University embraced its once bitterest critic,
Eileen Stevens, and awarded her an honorary doctorate. "That event
has haunted both Mrs. Stevens and Alfred University for more than 20
years," said then President Edward Coll. "I believe, and the Board of
Trustees agreed, that it was time for a reconciliation."

In association with the National Collegiate Athletic Conference
(NCAA), researchers from Alfred University conducted studies on
athletic hazing and conducted another study on high school hazing.
The school's administration welcomed criticism on their studies, and
welcomed my input on the NCAA study when researchers were preparing
questions. Mrs. Stevens was also an adviser to AU researchers Dr.
Norm Pollard and Dr. Nadine Hoover.
The death of Zeta Beta Tau member Ben Klein this past February
horrified trustees and the AU researchers on hazing.

Public relations seemed the smallest of concerns. A young man was
dead, and the chapter members who had beaten him - incredibly - sat
back and drank beer and watched as rescue workers combed the bushes
in search for the missing Klein. (The AU chapter members' puzzling
and unsettling actions occurred in spite of demands for reform issued
from the Zeta Beta Tau headquarters that has lost other young men to
hazing and/or alcohol since the 1970s).

And though the death of Chuck Stenzel occurred in February 1978, that
loss still devastated Mrs. Stevens, AU administrators, and some
fraternity/sorority members, including Klan Alpine alums.

For what it is worth, having a fraternity background, I'd hoped the
AU administration might bounce the worst offending chapters and keep
the other fraternities and sororities. I'd recommended in print that
the school keep its system, and instead, launch a national commission
to study deaths and near-deaths involving fraternity and sorority
members and party guests on campus. I'd heard from Alfred
undergraduates and alumni by e-mail, who pointed out, in sometimes
emotional and sometimes reasoned arguments, that their
fraternity/sorority experience at AU had enhanced their lives.

Thus, I don't fully agree with Alfred University's current decision
to ban all fraternal organizations on campus. Yet, I wholly
understand the reasoning of the AU board of trustees. The board,
significantly, had some members with a fraternity/sorority
background, and tellingly, it had a key trustee with a corporate
background in the insurance industry. He presumably had risk
management facts about AU and national fraternities and sororities at
his fingertips. Perhaps the decision might reduce liability in the
Klein death-that's too early to tell.

In turn, the AU trustees could look us all in the eye and ask a tough
question: Would we want to call a mother in the middle of the night
to tell her that her child has died in a fraternity or sorority
initiation - or drowned in a creek after chapter members had beaten
him?
I know my answer. What would you say?

The losses of these family members weigh like stones on the soul. And
while I have no idea how the ZBT undergrads feel at Alfred
University, I have talked (for publication and informally) over time
with the past two ZBT national executive directors and one member of
the national council, and they have been forceful in their assurances
that they want - that they insist - on reform and safe chapters. I've
also talked firsthand to Klan alum, who were not only devastated by
Chuck Stenzel's death but frustrated because undergraduates continued
to drink and haze.

Actually, I share their frustration. As I write, Klan Alpine is on
suspension for injuring a guest and for conducting pledging
activities that constituted hazing (and which were reminiscent of
those that killed Chuck Stenzel). Also on suspension for alcohol
infractions and pledging violations were Sigma Chi Nu and Theta Theta
Chi sororities. Other fraternity chapters in recent years at AU have
been in trouble, and yet these, and some other chapters, have been
involved admirably with charities and that makes the shutdown all the
more serious and worthy of close study by other schools.

When I write about hazing, I tend to look for behaviors I consider
risky or unhealthy, as opposed to making conclusions by "judging"
people on their rightness or wrongness. AU's administrators clearly
indicated that the ZBT chapter involved in Ben Klein's death
certainly engaged in risky, unhealthy activities. Does this make it
any easier for the healthy, risk-free fraternity and sorority members
and alums to accept the loss of their chapters? Not one bit, I know,
and I empathize with those folks - though not with any chapter that
engaged in risk-taking activities while trumpeting their chapter as
"responsible."

The lessons of the Alfred study are clear for other private schools
and for members at those institutions.. The committee did not act in
haste. It met often and welcomed input. It could not entirely be free
of emotion since one young man had died in a hazing and another died
under mysterious circumstances with the blows of the brotherhood
imprinted on his body.
Private and public schools of higher education are cracking down, no
question, since the early 1990s. I see firsthand the tighter rules at
Indiana University, and I hear second-hand the tightening of alcohol,
drug and hazing restrictions at schools such as Duke University,
Trinity (Connecticut), San Diego State, and so on. The number of
deaths has become appalling, and working in student affairs has
become highly stressful for those administrators who have had to sit
the night in an emergency room chair with a family, wondering if a
kid who had been healthy as a horse just hours earlier will live or
die. Likewise, I've spoken and corresponded with many fraternity and
sorority executives over the years, and I have no doubt that they are
horrified by alcohol- and hazing-related deaths. Too many executives,
for financial, personal or board/alum pressure reasons, keep too many
chapters active that are walking time bombs.

The bottom line is that the number of deaths on college campuses
related to alcohol is astounding. The bottom line is that the
National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse says that underage
drinkers are twice as likely to have gotten drunk in the preceding
month compared with adult drinkers (27.7 percent vs. 13.5 percent).
The group also estimates that 5 million high school students binge
drink monthly. These statistics tell colleges such as Alfred that the
problem isn't going away, but will be at the doorstep with each new
class. Finally, the bottom line is that Alfred University decided
that continuing the fraternity and sorority system was a risky,
unhealthy thing to do.

And that decision sends a clear, unwavering - and yes - sobering
message to the rest of America's private colleges, and perhaps to its
state universities, as well. Like it or not, they and I hear that
message now.

Bio: Hank Nuwer writes frequently about Greek safety and reform
issues. His latest book is "To the Young Writer." He was a member of
a fraternity that was forced to go local by order of the State
University of New York chancellor many years ago and he maintains
contact with other members of his chapter.

Disclosure: I've also in the past conducted an unpaid seminar with
the then-suspended ZBT chapter at Indiana University at the request
of a Dean Michael Gordon of IU, who oversaw the chapter's no-nonsense
rehabilitation).

Alfred Trustees Ban Fraternity and Sorority Life On Campus

Story about it in my hometowns newspaper.

I agree that its sad to see the system go, but if they have been having all the problems they have had for awhile (And I have been hearing about it sinec I was in HS)...
1) Practically 0 interest in greek life, numbers on the decline
2) Continual behavioral problems from not just a few but many
3) Terrible grades and lower than the campus average (Of course not all the orgs but a vast majority)
4) A greater proclivity to drink *which thats not a greek thats a college thing so skip that*

Then maybe it isnt bad if the campus takes a break from it for awhile. Most of the trustees on the board ARE Greek alums and are saddened (supposedly) by this. It's sad but sometimes the good ones have to take the downfall with the bad in order to make things better. However, if the greeks at Alfred have other suggestions I the board should have listen. After all the school administrators are kind of just as guilty as the Greek students for not putting a foot down when the system first started to get out of control.

[dzrose93]

Originally posted by 33girl


But what if they all decide to have a non-greek lettered "social group"? I mean, it's not like these girls are flipping DZ the bird - this is something being forced on them. It would suck if they had to disband just because they were the only national. Plus, what would happen after those gals graduated? The alum chapter would die, unless they keep initiating collegians through alum initiation. I think they should at least be given the chance to keep the group going in a local form.

I tried to post about this a few minutes ago, but I think it was lost in cyberland... I'll try to remember what I wrote...

My main point of the lost post was: Once a Delta Zeta, always a Delta Zeta. Just because the Alfred University DZ chapter is being forced to close due to matters beyond its control doesn't mean that the sisters cease to be Delta Zetas. For this reason, it would be wrong for them to form a local group that is a separate entity from DZ. However, that being said, the girls can join a local group -- a Delta Zeta alumnae chapter. And, if they want to create their own DZ alum chapter instead of joining a pre-established one, then they have the option to do that as well.

Just because the Greek system is being shut down at Alfred University doesn't mean that a DZ alumnae chapter will "die" after the current sisters graduate. After graduation, those girls will STILL be Delta Zeta alumnae -- they can still participate in DZ-related activities and they can welcome other DZs in the area to join them. There are Delta Zeta alumnae everywhere, and there are many very strong, vital DZ alumnae chapters that are doing great right now, even though there isn't a collegiate DZ chapter anywhere nearby. So, just because Alfred U. no longer will have a DZ chapter doesn't necessarily mean that a DZ alumnae chapter in the area won't thrive.

I hope this clarifies my point a little bit. Please let me know if you have questions!

Greek Love,
dzrose93

[FuzzieAlum]

I'm pretty sure that just accepting federal funding doesn't mean the school can't tell students what to do. Almost every college and university accepts some funding for research, yet almost every private college restricts where students can live. For example, my school got a lot of research grants ... yet those under 21 who didn't live with mom and dad were required to live on campus (including greek housing).

Maybe state universities can't make restrictions like that, but I have a feeling that if it were illegal for private institutions to do so, it would have been legally challenged a long time ago.

[madmax]

Originally posted by dzrose93


The DZ sisters will most likely be granted immediate alumnae status by National Headquarters. They'll probably be encouraged to start an alumnae chapter in the area (or join a pre-existing alumnae chapter). I doubt seriously if National HQ would let the girls go local.

If the girls want to go local then go local. It's not like DZ nationals can pull their charter for a second time. The new chapter can be called Delta whatever. I dont see how DZ nationals can complain about dual membership because some chapters start out as local.

[madmax]

Originally posted by FuzzieAlum
I'm pretty sure that just accepting federal funding doesn't mean the school can't tell students what to do. Almost every college and university accepts some funding for research, yet almost every private college restricts where students can live. For example, my school got a lot of research grants ... yet those under 21 who didn't live with mom and dad were required to live on campus (including greek housing).

Maybe state universities can't make restrictions like that, but I have a feeling that if it were illegal for private institutions to do so, it would have been legally challenged a long time ago.

I disagree. If a school receives federal funding I dont think they can take away a student's Constitutional Rights. Many schools think they can and some even get away with it. The reason they get away with it is because most college students dont want to go through the trouble and expense of hiring a lawyer.



Did anyone notice that Beta Theta Pi was recently reinstated at Auburn. (Auburn thread).. Auburn didnt reinstate them willingly, it took a 100 million dollar lawsuit, but they are back in.

[shadokat]

I'm sure our university gets some form of federal funding 33girl, yet ban fraternities all the time. As a matter of fact, a few years (maybe 2), they put a rule into affect that if your fraternity or sorority is busted having a party with alcohol, and people are arrested for underage drinking and such, the University can suspend you from campus, and you will never be reinstated as a student organization. Yes, the fraternities who were banned do continue to operate, but when a student at the university died at one of the banned fraternity's parties, that student's parents couldn't sue the university...and ended up suing the parents of each brother of the fraternity. It was ugly and messy and expensive, and the fraternity lost its house...the only fraternity that owned their residence.

[FuzzieAlum]

If you're under 21, you don't really have constitutional rights. That's why, for example, the courts have ruled again and again that high schools can limit students' freedom of speech.

[DeltAlum]

Nobody can take away your Constitutional rights. But there's no Constitutional question here that I can see. The Constitution doesn't guarantee you the right to belong to a fraternity or sorority. And it doesn't guarantee that you can live in any given place. (If you're being told you can't live somewhere due to race, that's another matter -- one of Civil Rights.)

And FuzzieAlum is right. If you're under 21 your rights are at least not the same as they are later in life. Not that you have no rights, but they are dramatically modified.

Finally, remember that the university has rights, too -- no matter how agregious they may seem to us. Private colleges are, in the long run, simply businesses -- and unless they break the law, they can do pretty much whatever they want to within the context of that business. And, what they're doing here is simply cutting their liability.

[dzrose93]

Originally posted by madmax


If the girls want to go local then go local. It's not like DZ nationals can pull their charter for a second time. The new chapter can be called Delta whatever. I dont see how DZ nationals can complain about dual membership because some chapters start out as local.

When a DZ chapter is closed, the chapter girls are usually granted alumnae status, and National HQ does not recognize a chapter as being official once it's charter has been pulled. A chapter starting out as a local is completely different than a chapter going back to being a local. DZ National supports a local chapter when its members are working toward becoming an official DZ chapter. At Alfred University, the girls can't work toward that goal anymore.

So, why not just form an alumnae chapter at that point? You still hang out with your sisters, get to do DZ activities, and share the sisterhood of Delta Zeta -- you just don't have a collegiate charter anymore. Some folks in this thread are acting like starting an alumnae chapter is a bad thing, and it's not. I personally would much prefer being an official DZ alumna instead of going underground as a local chapter and not being able to enjoy the Delta Zeta experience that I worked so hard to earn.

[lenoxxx]

Just my 2 cents on this topic

The Kappa Sigma Zeta Chapter of Lambda Chi Alpha was just rechartered there in October of 2001.

This was the oldest fraternity at the college I beleive. In fact their HC- owns the current Kappa Sigma House and rents it to them at this time, last I heard.

So now I am quite sure LCA will revoke this group, as they have done in accordance with past policy on campuses like Colby, Waynesburg etc.

However-as a side note- from my limited experience with schools "dumping greeks" it seems that if they are strong organizations with houses and money- they wont go away anyway. Take a stroll in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and you'll see a group of large greek houses, with 80+ members, the college "doesnt recognize them".

I am not sure what Alfred is like, but I dont really see how a language house or non smoking apartment building replaces greek organizations.

My personal thought is that as schools take this route- you'll have fraternities operate out of the shadows- aka mid 1800's.

My college has about 6 "off campus" illegal groups- two just celebrated 10 years off campus- they still recruit/party/have houses etc. What is the point- they get less regulation and you still cant get rid of them.

Best of luck to my brothers at Alfred, and the rest of the Greeks.

Dont take it sitting down, and DONT let them take property you own.

Gratzi!

Jason Lenox

[KPU1190]

Hello all-

I am writing this post in response to all of the previous posts on this thread, not to voice an opinion, because most of you have already voiced the same opinions I have, but to ask for help. I am a Kappa Psi Upsilon brother here at Alfred University. We are a local fraternity, one of 5 GLO's that are local.

While Alfred University is predominantly a private university, we are funded in part by the federal government. This brings up many questions, many of which noone that I have spoken with know the answers to. I have read all of the previous posts, and while some touch on the subject, none fully explain what can happen. My understanding is that they can not prohibit us from wearing letters on campus, or prohibit us from congregating as an organization off campus. While I am not sure that they are going to try and do this, it seems as if it is implied in the Press Release that was made public Monday at 2:00 pm. While the press release says that they wanted to give the students the consideration of knowing before the general public (not the exact wording, I know), this is false. The press release was emailed to the entire AU student population at 4:23 pm, on Monday.

I also have a question regarding what the university can do to us greeks that do not listen to the university. I can give you an example. We own our house, which is off campus, and have owned it since 1927. Is it legally possible for the university to prohibit us from living in the house that we own a part of as it seems they are going to try and do?

Now here is my request, while it may not be a reasonable one, I am wondering if there are supporters out there that would like to voice their opinions to Alfred University. While this might not do anything, there is a possibility that it might do something. If you would like to voice your opinion to the President of Alfred University, Charles Edmondson, his e-mail address is edmondson@alfred.edu. If you do choose to voice your opinion, I would appreciate a CC to my account, because I am interested to know how many people are writing him. I apologize for the length of this post.

[33girl]

Let me clarify the federal funding thing...

Yes, the school can derecognize fraternities. They can make you live on campus. They can do all this even if they get federal funding.

BUT....they absolutely, positively cannot ban you from being in a fraternity OFF the campus, if you desire. If LXA wants to let the bros at Alfred retain their charter, and they meet/rush off campus, they are allowed to do that. This is what got people pissed at I think Colby....they were disciplining students for off-campus fraternal activities. By the same token you cannot discipline students for belonging to the KKK, Jaycees, NAMBLA or any other off-campus group. Even though the goals of the group may be in conflict with those of the college, once you walk off that campus it's your life and not a thing they can do about it.

At schools like the PA state schools where all the houses are off campus anyway, derecognition can prove particularly futile. Yes if something happens the individual fraternity members can be sued, but it's often a case of you can't get blood from a turnip. Most of these kids (and often their parents) don't have 2 nickels to rub together.

Hey Jason - can you PM me about the Greek scene at F & M? That whole deal confuses me.

p.s. No offense to the Jaycees out there.