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Hazing News

One or more sips from death

2010 has passed without a single fraternity or sorority or athletics fatality from alcohol on a U.S. campus (there have been deaths internationally, mostly from beatings or alleged suicides). This has been the first time since 1970 there has not been a death. The one international fraternity that has fought alcohol and hazing issues so hard had its legs cut out from them by the University of Arkansas chapter which had a pledge blow close to a .70 after a big and little brother party that mimicked the death of Chuck Saucier at Auburn University so many years ago, prompting antihazing action by Chad’s mother Rita, Phi Delta Theta International and Auburn University. Arkansas already had one death–a recruit killed during rush. I am relieved that the Arkansas case did not result in a death. But the brothers there certainly have embarrassed themselves and Greek life at Arkansas. Let us hope something positive comes out of this close call. Link

Here is the strong stand again hazing Phi Delta Theta has taken. This incident had to disappoint, to put it mildly.

A & E for discussion questions

By Hank Nuwer

Journalist Hank Nuwer tracks hazing deaths in fraternities and schools. Nuwer is the Alaska author of Hazing: Destroying Young Lives; Broken Pledges: The Deadly Rite of Hazing, High School Hazing, Wrongs of Passage and The Hazing Reader. In April of 2024 and April 2025 , the Alaska Press Club awarded him first place in the Best Columnist division and Best Humorist, second place.

He has written articles or columns on hazing for the Sunday Times of India, Toronto Globe & Mail, Harper's Magazine, Orlando Sentinel, The Chronicle of Higher Education and the New York Times Sunday Magazine. His current book is Hazing: Destroying Young Lives from Indiana University Press. He is married to Malgorzata Wroblewska Nuwer of Warsaw, Poland and Fairbanks, Alaska. Nuwer is a former columnist for the Greenville (Ohio)Early Bird and former managing editor of the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner in Alaska.
Nuwer was named the Ohio Society of Professional Journalists columnist of the year in 2021 for his “After Darke” column in the Early Bird. He also won third place for the column in 2022 from the Indiana chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. He and his wife Gosia, recently of Union City, Ind., have owned 20 acres in Alaska for many years. “The move is a sort-of coming home for us,” said Nuwer. As a journalist, he’s written about the Alaskan Iditarod sled-dog race and other Alaska topics. Read his musings in his blog at Real Alaska Daily--http://realalaskadaily.com and in his weekly column "Far from Randolph" in the Winchester Star-Gazette of Randolph County, Indiana.

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