Editorial: Pitt should set clearer penalties

Although members of Pitt’s Greek community were caught breaking rules at — ironically — a… Although members of Pitt’s Greek community were caught breaking rules at — ironically — a leadership retreat, The Pitt News also finds the University at fault in its handling of the situation. To put it simply, the punishment does not seem to fit the crime.

Putting all fraternities and sororities on social probation is an extreme and unfair consequence for the admittedly inexcusable actions of individual members.

For the University to include in the social probation groups that were unrepresented at the off-campus retreat — including Alpha Epsilon Pi, Iota Nu Delta and Triangle fraternities — seems especially unnecessary. The University’s Student Code of Conduct states that a fraternity or sorority may bear joint responsibility for violations made by individual members, but not that all chapters may bear responsibility for the action of their counterparts within either the Interfraternity Council, the Panhellenic Association or National Pan-Hellenic Council.

According to Ron Justice, the director of Student Organizations Services at West Virginia University, WVU doesn’t customarily place groups on blanket sanctions and instead creates formulated action plans for individual groups. Justice, who has been employed by WVU for 26 years, has never witnessed a blanket social probation on the campus.

“We address the individual organization based on the violations to our student code,” Justice said.

Pitt is not the only school to see campus-wide restrictions on Greek life. Fraternities and sororities at Indiana University, Minnesota University and Texas A&M University have all seen similar social bans; at some schools, the Greek councils placed restrictions on themselves. But in those particular circumstances, the universities or Greek councils were reacting to serious incidents such as hazing, sexual assaults or the death of a student.

While we don’t have a problem with the Student Code of Conduct for allowing a fraternity or sorority to bear joint responsibility for individual-member violations, we think this type of action is only appropriate in reaction to serious incidents.

To punish all of the fraternities and sororities for reprehensible but not life-endangering actions of some individuals only serves to alienate the entire Greek community — 10 percent of our campus — in an effort to set an example.

In the end, the probation does little to punish the individuals at fault since such a widespread probation is hard to actively monitor and enforce. According to Vice Provost and Dean of Students Kathy Humphrey, the University only checks in on those under social probation if it receives information about a potential violation. How effective can this reactive approach really be?

For the future, we’d like the University to figure out what it wants punishments to be, clearly define them and then enforce them.