PBE suspension terms changed by MIT

So... what does the suspension mean if they are recognized as a frat? Rushing kids and living in the house is pretty much giving them everything back.

This is a huge slap in the face to JuddComm, who definitely didn't handle it correctly, but undermining them and overturning their judgement when someone whines is stupid.

Undermining an incorrectly handled process sounds to me like a good idea. You wouldn't accept a speeding ticket from a cop using a broken radar gun. Why should JudComm expect MIT and Phi Beta Epsilon to accept a judgement that came from a severly flawed process? Also, I don't see how objecting to that flawed process could be classified as whining.

A 4 year suspension of a fraternity is effectively the same as a 10 year expulsion. Incorporating softer terms for a suspension should be standard policy.

Clearly, no member of Phi Beta Epsilon or MIT wants to harm or put at risk any student. We are in this together to pursue the best learning atmosphere for our studentmembers. We were all students foremost.

Seems that MIT realized it was upholding a flawed decision by a biased JudComm and now they are trying to keep the "suspension" in name while giving PBE all of their rights back as a fraternity. Hockfield may have been a good neuroscientist, but clearly is a poor administrator. Dramatic change in the political climate at MIT is in order.

I'm curious how judcomm is seen as "biased".

And what about the process itself is flawed?

People are killed from fraternity hazing so it's pretty logical to have a very strict policy against it. I don't necessarily agree with the decision that the JudComm made in the first place, or that it was changed after the fact by MIT, but I think saying that there was a bias and that the process is flawed is going too far. They took the problem as it's written in the book - hazing, as outlined by MA state law, results in expulsion. They even made it softer than it was written by making it a suspension.

It's important for both the school and the IFC to have extremely strict rules on hazing in order to continue allowing the fraternity system to exist at all.

Calling the process "biased" or "flawed" is an overstatement and is unfair, and those who say such things only come across as bitter and illogical.

Would writing a scenario in which a pledge had beer poured over his head constitute hazing? In fact, the possible scenario was never implemented nor approved. The JudComm chairman was denied acceptance into PBE's pledge class years earlier.

How is that situation not flawed?

Judcomm itself may not be biased, but any system that has no mechanism or expectation to recuse biased members is clearly flawed. If nothing else, this case should serve as a wake up call to the entire community that reforms are needed. Who watches the watchmen?

6

MIT-IFC Follows the hazing defined by the FIPG in addition to MA Hazing Laws.

The FIPG definition can be found on page under the "Risk Management Program" at fipg.org

There were 150 variables that needed to be considered and solved by MIT and PBE. This resolution is an elegant solution to a nondeterministic polynomial time class problem. If you do the math you will understand why this is a reasonable conclusion.

Here is a slight correction to some of the comments above.

7 no, the judcomm chair never rushed pbe nor had any interaction with them until fall 2010...so...you are wrong.

most....what do you think is flawed?

8 There is a mechanism and expectation for board members to recuse themselves and is taught to each board member at the JudComm Board member training that is required of all board members....so you are wrong...

before posting you should probably know a little bit about what you are talking about....

I don't think it serves anyone at MIT, the IFC, or at PBE to rehash these issues here. Many of them were discussed in detail last Fall in The Tech already. Both MIT and PBE decided to resolve a very serious conflict. That is a good thing, not something to criticize.

I question why anyone would want to be a member of IFC after this debacle, given that IFC has life and death power over its members via its ability to suspend and expel member organizations from MIT without regard to well-defined institute policy or its own bylaws.

Number 6 clearly has the right idea. It's time for IFC to die a sad and lonely death.

11

I believe 7 meant a member of that JudComm who served the ruling, not the chairman himself. One of the members rushed PBE years earlier, and was not offered a bid. And if he absorbed and adhered to his training appropriately, he should have known better and recused himself from the case.

Hazing can be dangerous. Abuse of power is a worry in any environment. "Zero tolerance" policy, however, is rigid, allowing for no proportion to offense, and what can potentially be an abuse of power, in itself!

This situation was an administrative quagmire, where most people saw the punishment as disporportionate to the offense (recognizing that reasonable people may disagree on this point).

Just like a well-engineered system, or "TQM" approach to managing problems, MIT and PBE were able to review issues and move forward with appropriate feedback and cautious, monitored optimism.

Hopefully future reviews of this decision will see this result as having served both institutions well. Perhaps we will see improvements in initiation which reduce worry to those outside the fraternity, yet still allowing for Brotherhood bonding. At the same time, perhaps a review of "zero tolerance" policies could make such quandaries less likely to occur again at MIT.

Congratulations to both parties. As for IFC/ JudComm, this situation can be an opportunity to do some self-reflection, too, as an entity, to improve and move forward.

As the seriousness of penalties increase, the requirement for a well-defined policy as well as a well-defined process are implemented. When you have a process in which what is effectively a death penalty can be imposed, allowing the decision to be made by five undergraduates who are members of other living groups that compete with the accused for members is clearly a flawed process. Add in a stolen document, no claim that anything happened and a judge who should have recused himself, and it goes from flawed to ridiculous.

The PBE case has made it obvious that there need to be changes in the way the system works. The settlement provides some hope that that will happen.