FRAT ACTIVITY SUSPENDED
WVU temporarily bans social, recruiting activities of 16 fraternities
West Virginia University on Wednesday announced a moratorium on all social and recruiting activities of 16 of its fraternities.
The university also said it will start a review plan and strengthen fraternity oversight following concerns over continued behavioral issues.
“We are at a tipping point,” university president Gordon Gee said in a news release. “We have seen the headlines across the country. We have had a few of our own in recent weeks. I cannot in good conscience as your president stand by and do nothing.”
The news release did not refer to any specific incidents involving fraternities. A university spokesman could not be reached Wednesday evening for further comment.
Not affected by the moratorium are African-American fraternities and sororities and any other sorority that is a member of the university’s Panhellenic Association.
The fraternities immediately affected are social and social-professional fraternities that are members of the university’s Interfraternity Council. They are: Alpha Gamma Rho, Alpha Epsilon Pi, Alpha Sigma Phi, Kappa Alpha
Order, Lambda Chi Alpha, Phi Delta Theta, Phi Gamma Delta, Phi Kappa Psi, Phi Sigma Kappa, Pi Kappa Alpha, Pi Kappa Phi, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, Sigma Alpha Mu, Sigma Chi, Sigma Nu, Sigma Phi Epsilon and Theta Chi.
In November 2014, WVU student Nolan Burch died after consuming alcohol during a hazing ritual at a Kappa Sigma fraternity event. Two students were charged in the death, and the fraternity was disbanded.
In the announcement Wednesday, the university said basic chapter operations, philanthropic or service activities and brotherhood events will be allowed under the moratorium.
WVU said it will immediately raise the academic standards to join a fraternity or sorority from the current 2.5 grade point average to 2.75. That will increase to 3.0 by the 2020 fall semester, according to the university.
WVU’s Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life will conduct the review with the help of a group of students, alumni and partners from the Greek organizations’ national headquarters.
The university said its decision “comes in the context of a growing national debate over fraternity and sorority lifeon college campuses, with several institutions banning fraternity and sorority life altogether or tightly restricting their activities.”
The University of Pittsburgh suspended the Sigma Chi fraternity in January after a student was hospitalized following an incident involving alcohol.
Penn State University has suspended more than a dozen fraternities in the wake of the death last February of sophomore Tim Piazza during a hazing ritual in which he drank a large amount of alcohol and fell down a flight of stairs.