Category: Hazing News

Excerpt below and link to story here: 

Schools reopen, renew push against hazing

By Robert Carroll, Globe Correspondent | September 7, 2006

For many area high school athletes, autumn means end-zone celebrations, beautifully crafted soccer goals, and long putts coolly drained. But for some players, it could signify something darker — like being forced to drink alcohol, shave their heads, and even endure beatings.

Hazing season, as some refer to it, is upon us.

“The start of school sports is always a time to start monitoring,” said Paul Wetzel, spokesman for the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association. … Hank Nuwer, author of the book “High School Hazing: When Rites Become Wrongs,” points to a 1999 study by the National Collegiate Athletic Association that found that 80 percent of student athletes had, at some point, faced a hazing incident as reason to believe the situation might never be totally cleared. “Hazing is out there,” said Nuwer.

Nuwer said he believes mentoring programs like those in place at Duxbury and Plymouth North are a great start.

“When older kids respect younger kids, there isn’t that need for control,” he said. “That’s the key.”

Links are below:

New Bedford:
http://www.southcoasttoday.com/daily/09-06/09-03-06/07local.htm

Boston Globe: today:

Hank; Just confirming that you will be on the Kids FIRST Radio Show this Saturday,
September 9, from 9 – 10 am.
President
Juventus/The Center For Kids FIRST
in Sports, Health, and Education

Link to story is here

Excerpt: UWSP Looks Out for Hazing After Dance Team Incident

Hazing will not be tolerated at UW-Stevens Point. That’s the message University officials are sending out as the school year starts without any performances by the dance team.

The team is giving up their status as an official school organization, while the University checks out allegations that some new members were hazed after some suggestive photos showed up on the internet.

The UW-Stevens Point dance team isn’t admitting these photos show hazing. Still, members gave up their rights before other student groups could be affected in the University’s investigation.

Thursday, September 7, 2006

Frat adviser alleges extortion

Link to Press-Citizen here

Excerpt: An adviser for a fraternity that’s suing the University of Iowa and one of its vice presidents testified that UI would not recognize the chapter until it pleaded guilty to hazing charges.

“After we negotiated an agreement, we were being extorted into pleading guilty or we would not be recognized,” Phi Delta Theta local adviser Steve Snyder testified Wednesday in Johnson County District Court. “It was a constant pattern. We would negotiate a settlement and at the last minute we would be told we would have to sign this.”

Phi Delta Theta sued the university and UI vice president for student services Phillip E. Jones alleging a tape recording used in a hazing and alcohol violation investigation was illegally obtained and should not have been used.

A pledge who claims he was burned with cigarettes has left the University of Alabama and its Sigma Phi Epsilon brothers. The national, known for the integrity of its long-existing Balanced Man programs, took immediate action. Story link is here