Alpha Chapter Woes

[furmanbeta]

Hey everyone,

I only recently started to hear a little about what was going on with Alpha. There's currently a running blog on their issues. Any further information would be helpful. In the meantime, take a read, it's pretty interesting stuff.

Pete

http://www.wooglinswoods.blogspot.com/

[Coramoor]

Sounds to me like the AO is showing their hand prematurely.

Has anyone doubted that within a few years we are going to be a Honorary/Commmunity service fraternity?

It's been going in this direction bit by bit for quite a while.

[a.e.B.O.T.]

This blog is mind boggling to read. Although I have always stayed on the fence when it comes to my feelings about the AO, I only hope that this blog is lacking information. I doubt that the Alpha Chapter is even close to our worse off, and I dont think the Alpha chapter should hold it self to special standards (high standards nevertheless). I think that we are all brothers, and we all need to hold ourselves equal, no matter what chapter, and likewise, the AO should do the same. I am on the fence whether the AO should have forced a reorganization, and their authority to suspend members; according to the blog, a lot of the reasons was that those people were told they were not allowing the chapter self-governess, well, that if that is truly what the AO holds dear, then they have no business reorganizing. This is the first that I've heard of this situation, and I hope that such events do not hurt the chapters reputation on campus, because such events could scare potential members, and hurt the morale of the active brothers. I do think that reorganizations are often necessary within our fraternity, and we need to hold are selves to the standards we commited ourselves, which does mean sometimes trimming the fat. Beta is a privledge, not a right! I also think these blogs are childish in rhetoric. I realize their anger, which could cause such release, but the blog is sublined 'Your Number One Source for Alpha Chapter Gossip' which is inappropriate to spread. So, this is a tough situation, and I think that based on this blog, the AO and the men writing this blog are both in the blog

[ECUJacob]

So, this entire blog is filled with holes and blanks that I would like to have filled. It's only showing one person's side of the story.

Bryan Stainfield started the blog on Wed., February 14th. So, almost two weeks later, after several heated posts, he still has not provided a background for whatever drama is going on up there.

I'm curious as to what happened that would drive the AO to have a review of the chapter.

[ZZ-kai-]

Sounds like a lot of holes in that story to me, lots of bitching and not much meat to it. I highly doubt that the AO just went in there just to go in there. They're not going to make waves just for shits and giggles. That being said, it seems that 4 guys have a blog, and one pissed off mom, and thats about it. That is about 3% of their chapter. Until more info. is posted, or this becomes a public discussion among actives/alumns/chapters, I'm not putting too much into it. Seems like some guys whining to me??!!

[EE-BO]

Originally Posted by ECUJacob

So, this entire blog is filled with holes and blanks that I would like to have filled. It's only showing one person's side of the story.

Bryan Stainfield started the blog on Wed., February 14th. So, almost two weeks later, after several heated posts, he still has not provided a background for whatever drama is going on up there.

I'm curious as to what happened that would drive the AO to have a review of the chapter.

Stories are already starting to circulate. I have my own limited opinions which I have no intention of airing on the web, but be that as it may I am sorry to see this blog.

It is a no-win situation.

For starters, unless the full story can be told- it is useless as a tool to get the rest of us to look at what happened and make our opinions heard if such a thing is merited.

Second, you can't tell the whole story on the internet because this is a private fraternity matter! As long as whatever happens in a chapter problem does not involve any criminal charges or public threat, then it is a matter for the chapter first, and the Beta brotherhood second- and nobody else at all.

I have much to say about this, but I cannot even bring myself to hint at my inclinations. This just doesn't belong on the internet.

But I will say- this young man is our brother and clearly upset and worthy of our consideration and care regardless of which side is right or wrong on any given issue. I hope he will bring this blog down and handle the matter among brothers- even emailing guys like us from other chapters just to be there to listen if that helps.

[BigRedBeta]

I e-mailed Bryan late last week and he said there was going to be a full disclosure post soon, starting from the very beginning which stretches back to last year. Apparently it's a pretty long story.

Given the small run-ins we've had with EC's in the past couple years about parties and the like, having the AO over your shoulder is probably a real tough thing. While I can certainly understand the GF's position on the grounds of risk, insurance costs, and general image to the public, I think there is a pretty big lack of understanding on their side as to just what the implications of their position are on the chapters. Regardless of what they want chapters to be, the chapters still have to provide what rushees are looking for. And at many places that includes girls, parties, and alcohol, in addition to great brotherhood, academic success and men of principle. If this ends up being about social policies I wouldn't be surprised, but it will still upset me (considering how good Alpha has been over the past several years...of course, if they undergo some sort of reorg, then my chapter can take back our lead in total Knox awards...)

[EE-BO]

The long story actually goes back several years and gets to the core of many things this fraternity is dealing with in the interests of finding our right place as an organization.

If you have any influence with Bryan, please encourage him to take that blog down and not go any further with it. Or PM me his email if you would and let me please talk to him.

There is a valid discussion to be had on this, but the internet is not the place for it. He loses the ears of many who have an open mind, including me, by making a public scene of this matter. And I don't want that. I do not want this young man to walk away bitter and angry.

[BigRedBeta]

I have no such influence.

While I understand your thoughts on sharing the situation over the internet, I personally have to say that I would know nothing of the situation if not for them posting this blog. By doing this, they've reached a much broader audience of brothers which is no doubt their goal. Of course the flip side of this is that non-members, the media and any person who might wish to disparage Greeks in general, or Beta in particular have access. Given the recent Delta Zeta DePauw incident, there certainly are some PR risks with this blog...

However, since I still only have very vague bits and pieces from the blog, I can't make an assumption into exactly how appropriate or inappropriate a blog and public disclosure are. It seems, EE that you have more information that has lead you to much different conclusion about this. Perhaps you can share this through a PM, so I can better understand your views?

[EE-BO]

PM about to be sent.

For the public record though, I do not have any special insights and conclusions on this. I am a great believer that a chapter's active members, alumni and GF liasons are the ones to handle chapter matters.

I do not want to embed myself in this, just as I would not want other chapters embedding themselves in the doings of my chapter. I just wanted to put my comments out there in the hopes that the people who started this blog might change their minds.

While it is true that many would not have been aware of this situation, from the inside there is not a lot of information out there either- nor have I pressed for it- for the reasons I state above. So, the blog does not really do anything to provide info to those who are entitled to it (Alpha actives and alumni) in reaching a determination.

As an advisor, I try to encourage my chapter to approach their fraternity experience like a business. In many ways, being in a fraternity prepares you for professional interactions.

In this particular case, the primary driver of the blog seems to be a desire to get more information about the reasons for the member review. Agreeing with its findings or not is surely a matter of contention too, but what I have read indicates the most urgent desire is to get more info from GF.

And, looking at it from a real life perspective, the presence of the blog is only going to make it less likely that will happen. How the member review went down is something I know nothing about, nor it is my business- but I think it is safe to say that if those asking for the information are showing a willingness to broadcast chapter matters on the internet, then GF has no incentive to try and have a discussion with those individuals because they have no way of knowing if those individuals will make additional discussions public if they do not like what they hear.

I do not ever try to butt in on other chapters- I really don't. But then again, I have never seen anything like this blog before in response to a chapter's internal matters.

And I am just not sure it could do any good at all. If anything, it creates more harm.

As an active member I often had an inherent mistrust of GF and Housing Corps and all that- but with age and experience I know that these entities do care. And a chapter with a strong caring alumni base will have the best ally possible in dealing with internal strife.

Alpha chapter has such an alumni base- full of men who care deeply about the chapter and have devoted their time to other chapters around the country, including mine.

So while there may be particular aspects of this one process that need to be discussed for the better of future management, I cannot imagine how this blog is going to help in any way.

Right now it can still be possibly excused to some extent as frustrated young men who need someone to work with them on understanding what happened- or accepting it.

But if the disclosure gets much more detailed or starts naming names, then it will go beyond that and I do not think these young men will find a sympathetic ear because at that point it will look like something quite different, and it would then validate the presumption that these men were in the wrong all along.

JMHO.

[furmanbeta]

While I can understand where you guys have been coming from, I think that there is something that should further be understood and looked at here. I definitely concur in the opinion that I do not want other chapters butting into my home chapter's business, nor do I necessarily feel the need to get involved in theirs. However, looking at things from a business perspective, each chapter is not its own business, each chapter is a member of the larger corporation. As such, members of the corporation should have the right to gain at least some knowledge into the inner workings.

Basically any time that you take a look at the GF website, you'll see that there are chapters reporting on various successes that they have had. But isn't it strange that there is virtually never a failure posted? Is it because every chapter is functioning so well that there are no massive failures worth reporting? Of course not, this is merely selective reporting of the news to create a particular image. There is barely a mention of when a chapter is closed, much less severely reprimanded. The entire process needs to become somewhat more transparent.

That having been said, I am no great fan of the AO staff in large part. While I am sure that the hearts and minds of these men are in the right place, they are working on a seriously misguided sense of action. It is not the job of the General Fraternity to step in constantly. We're closing chapters as quickly as we're opening them, that suggests to me that there is a problem. Now comes the question of what the problem actually is. The first possibility is that there are far too many irresponsible individuals, who are not living up to the Code, and basically disgraces to the name of the fraternity. The second possibility is that those individuals who sit on their high hill in Oxford have little understanding of what it takes to be successful on the undergraduate level, have forgotten what life was like when they themselves were undergrads, and are high and mighty enough to believe in their own superiority. As for me, I think it's the latter.

Here's one final thing to consider, and I can't believe it hasn't been brought up yet. Alpha won some awards at Convention last year, with the most important being the Knox and Sisson Awards. These are the absolute highest honors that a chapter can receive throughout the course of a year. They are the supposed mark of chapter excellence. Are we to believe that in a period of about 6 months (4-5 of which were actual academic months) that this chapter has devolved to a point where the entirety of the membership needs to be reviewed? Something is rotten in Oxford.

[EE-BO]

As long as details are being posted on the internet by the actives in question, I guess there is no harm in addressing them- and perhaps it will do some good.

It is my opinion that our General Fraternity's Risk Management Policy is a very fair one that allows chapters plenty of opportunity to self-govern while maintaining some important boundaries. Compared with the approach of several other fraternities to RM, I think we have struck an ideal balance.

Beyond that, chapters and alumni Housing Corporations may go a step further if they wish- for example a dry house. And that is their right.

The alumni who guarantee chapter house leases and/or purchase and maintain chapter houses are putting forth extraordinary amounts of money and/or putting significant personal assets at financial risks. $100s of thousands of dollars is not uncommon.

One stupid incident can bring all that crashing down. And when a chapter loses a charter and a house already paid for is sold, then it takes time and money to again get a new house years later (especially now with property values around campuses on the rise as many colleges expand.)

The "other house" was clearly a Beta house in all but legal name. A catastrophic event in that property would clearly have a major impact on the entire chapter, and thus also the real Beta House.

And by the admission of the young man who did the facebook post, the entire thing was set up to circumvent the policies in place for the chapter.

That is not initative and self-governance, that is a flagrant disregard for the guidance and wishes of those alumni and advisors who are making the financial and personal investments imperative for a chapter's success. If you don't like the rules, pledge somewhere else! It's real simple.

If enough alumni not currently involved don't like the dry house approach, then let them step up and pay the bills and do it their way. Again- real simple.

It doesn't matter if the keg was full or empty.

It doesn't matter if the people playing drinking games on the front porch were underage.

What matters is that Beta was being publicly displayed for all the world to see as a place to get drunk.

How hard is it to have social events indoors (or offsite in a dry house)? How hard is it to BYO and not have community alcohol?

Even more interesting, the person writing that facebook post said that this incident was the only charge- but then also openly states that this kind of thing goes on all the time.

Who is going to defend that? What alumni and brothers from other chapters are going to even try to defend this guy's position?

This is what I expected by the way- that as facts were revealed, it would become clear that the member review was not exactly unjustified.

Furmanbeta, your comments are well-taken and on the mark. There is clearly something not working- but when even the accused and removed members are admitting to incredibly inappropriate behavior and acting like it is no big deal, then it is hard to question these member reviews and suspensions.

More and more I wonder if this is perhaps a college culture issue? Greek Life in a dry house and under MPI standards just won't play at some schools. And I am not sure how we address that in the long term.

[Bob Dole]

We should all allow a couple of months to pass so enough information is released to where we can make valid assumptions. The members who were forced to alumni status by the general fraternity are accomplishing their goal of rallying support and sympathy. I of course regret when any ill happens to any member of our great fraternity, but for the moment I am withholding any emotions towards this instance. So far we have only heard one side of the story.

As an undergrad in the south, I have a love / hate relationship with nationals. Every southern fraternity feels the same way as my chapter (unless recently colonized; therefore they are biased). I could not imagine having big brother literally next door to me.

Playing drinking games with a keg next to the General Fraternity is like having a meth lab set up next to a police station. Not smart. If the house was occupied by Beta's, but not an official house, I don't see a problem. Does the GF say that members who are MOP are not allowed to consume alcohol as long as they are an undergraduate member?

No alcohol; what image are we trying to send out? I have a few peers who don't drink, but not many. Drinking alcohol goes hand in hand with social events. I understand the problem with underage drinking; it's against the law and should not happen. If to the public we send an image of Beta where its members do not consume alcohol, we would be lying.

Anyway; Lets give it some time. The Alpha chapter, unfortunately, is the testing ground for nationals. In the grand scheme of a bigger and better Beta, somebody is going to get fucked.


I hope everybody is having a good weekend

[EE-BO]

MPI (MOP as you call it- same thing) does not require a dry house or a commitment by the member to not drink. The dry house bit is the option of the chapter or the alumni who are paying for/managing the property.

I am not saying no alcohol- in fact I don't even like the idea of a dry house. College is not a time for babysitting. I did not like advisors trying to babysit me when I was an undergrad, and I have no intentions of doing it now.

What I am saying, and I think your post implies agreement, is that so foolish and open a display suggests that there is a general level of complete disregard for certain common sense boundaries which still allow young men to self-govern, but with some general guidance from above that can, and will, prevent a lot of potential risk management incidents.

In other words, you can see the keg and the drinking games in plain view. So what is it that you are not seeing that might be going on that indicates a wholly reckless attitude? Maybe nothing serious at all- but that is a pretty big chance to take given the stakes.

I see your point about waiting for the facts- my contention is that the facts and opinions do not belong on the internet. This is a matter for internal consideration by the chapter, alumni, and perhaps Convention if members of other chapters choose to get involved.

My comments are merely meant to address and analyze what is being disclosed publicly- and give a perspective on how that is going to be received by many, though surely not all.

This facebook post tells a lot. Just look at how it is worded. Note the following comment posted by a suspended member (excerpt from what aeBOT posted above),

"I'd sure love to know the rationale...but of course, they didn't enumerate the reasons, just gave us a ridiculously broad outline, which supposedly covers everyone. When I persisted in asking for the reason for my removal, I recieved another voicemail saying that I was removed for a number of reasons, but the "bulk" of it was my attitude and "problems with authority" as well as the incident occuring last semester at my house.

The incident was that there were reportedly some of our sophomores there playing drinking games on our porch and we had a keg out there too--which was actually empty, it was dated about 2 years old. The AO photographed it, though the photos were never released."

1. I see no understanding or willingness to accept that the "incident" was a very bad and inappropriate move. The fact it happened off the dry property is not really important. That other house was intended to be and is openly "advertised" as a "Beta House" (the Annex is the term I have heard most often). And the obvious goal of setting it up was to have all the benefits of being in a fraternity, but none of the responsibility that comes with it. Otherwise, why not live in the provided chapter house, or get a group of GDI friends together and do what you want?

The litmus test is simple. If there were to be a publicized risk management incident at that Annex house, how likely is it the press and the community would refer specifically to Beta Theta Pi? How likely is it that Beta Theta Pi GF and the chapter's advisors would face liability? I say the answer to both is "very likely", so regardless of the technicalities- that Annex is, in effect, a Beta House (my opinion anyway, certainly subject to debate.)

2. Why does this member seem to think it matters that GF has not "released" the photo or that the keg was empty? Are we a brotherhood or a sea of strangers who will settle disputes in court on legal technicalities?

Bob, when I was an undergrad I had a love/hate relationship with GF too. Goes with the territory, and it is healthy in a way. Now as an adult and advisor, I see it as a relationship that needs to be somewhat adversarial at times.

The goal, in my mind, is to let the actives in a chapter grow and develop in ways that GDIs never could. A chapter house is a mini-environment all to itself. A place where guys learn financial responsibility. A place where guys learn to manage their own lives and protect their home. A place where guys can learn to have a 2 hour fight in chapter over a critical internal issue and then put it all behind them and go have a beer and watch the game later.

Almost all advisors, alumni and GF people I have met don't want to interfere in that process. We benefitted from learning it on our own, and it would be selfish of us to try and take that away from the next generation.

But we do have to set some strict boundaries and enforce them. It is not easy and it is not fun. But it rarely needs to happen, and it only needs to happen to prevent or alleviate the kind of situation that no college student, no matter how smart or dedicated, has the life experience to understand and manage. And of course, how an advisor or GF goes about doing it makes all the difference in how it is received and dealt with.

The blog and the facebook posts claim the situation was handled poorly- which does happen sometimes. We are all human. However, the more that is said- the clearer it becomes to me that this was not the case. The more they say, the more they will unintentionally reveal- as the facebook post illustrates clearly.

And I see nothing brotherly about trying to drag other chapters (and any non-Beta who reads these public disclosures) into this mess with one-sided and emotional arguments that are not even logical at face value.

Time will tell...

[ECUJacob]

And I see nothing brotherly about trying to drag other chapters (and any non-Beta who reads these public disclosures) into this mess with one-sided and emotional arguments that are not even logical at face value.

I completely agree.

The more I see posted about this situation, the more that I feel like the membership review wasn't unmerited. If they were hosting a party that included underage drinking and the public display of drinking games, then you deserve whatever consequence(s) happen. I'm all for self-governance, but if/when you live so close to the AO, you should know better.

Alpha won some awards at Convention last year, with the most important being the Knox and Sisson Awards. These are the absolute highest honors that a chapter can receive throughout the course of a year. They are the supposed mark of chapter excellence. Are we to believe that in a period of about 6 months (4-5 of which were actual academic months) that this chapter has devolved to a point where the entirety of the membership needs to be reviewed? Something is rotten in Oxford.

I have do disagree slightly with that. You can make anything look great on paper, awards applications for example. But that doesn't mean your chapter won't have issues with brothers not representing our organization like they should. The problem with our current awards system is that they assume a chapter is doing well if they meet the awards requirements. There's more to being a good brother than earning a 2.8+ and performing community service.