By Sarah Carrillo
News Assistant
The next time a sorority of fraternity is caught throwing a wild party it won’t have to answer to the Judicial Review Committee.
Instead, a new group composed of Interfraternity Council and Panhellenic members will be overseeing the disciplinary actions of the Greek community.
The Greek Judicial Board is still in its planning stages, but will start hearing cases soon. It is comprised of the Panhellenic Executive Board, the IFC president, the IFC vice president of risk management and representatives from the other fraternities not already represented. Each sorority is represented on the Panhellenic Executive Board, so at least one member of all fraternities and sororities will be present.
“In the past, problems have always been dealt with through JRC and they had a habit of giving harsh punishments, not that they weren’t unwarranted,” IFC president Byron Branch said. “It’s not that we’re going to be lighter, we’ll just (discipline) in other ways.”
While specific punishments will be chosen on a case-by-case basis, possible actions may include community service, monetary sanctions or social restrictions.
“It depends on the chapter because each one is different,” said Lauren Thomas, Panhellenic Vice president of ethics and morals. “We will give what we feel is the most suitable punishment to the crime.”
Construction of the board actually began last semester through talks with the IFC and Panhellenic leaders and Student Organizations Coordinator Nicole Phillips.
Phillips, who recently resigned her position and will begin her new role as Washington, D.C., Internship and On-Site Interview coordinator Oct. 14, said that the new board will work to be fair and promote a learning environment.
“I always tell the boards that there is a difference between discipline and punishment,” she said. “I think that if someone is disciplined, sometimes they may think they are being punished a little bit, but you try to do something to make sure they are going to learn from that mistake. When you punish someone, sometimes it creates resentment and they don’t learn from that mistake.”
Anyone with a complaint about a Greek chapter must issue a written statement to either the Greek adviser or the IFC or Panhellenic vice presidents of risk management, according to Branch.
The complaint will then be discussed in a meeting with the board members to see if it is a valid case.
The board will run its hearings similar to a courtroom trial. Students will be allowed to present their case and even call on witnesses and display evidence.
“(The complaint) needs to be based on hard evidence and not just hearsay,” Branch said.
The school will still deal with cases against individuals or severe deviations from the rules by a Greek organization and recruitment sanction decisions will still remain separate, as national Greek guidelines dictate how recruitment is run for all sororities. Also, if a sorority or fraternity is under investigation, the judicial member from that chapter would not sit on the board for that hearing, Phillips said.
Members of the Greek community say they think the change will have a positive outcome for sorority and fraternity members.
“I think it’ll be better (than going to the JRC),” Alpha Phi member Amanda Johnson said. “Students understand (what sororities and fraternities do) better than the administration.”
One of the main goals of the board is to create a standard of rules for the Greek community to live by.
“(The judicial board) creates an accountability factor,” Phillips said, explaining that student judicial boards must always be sure to maintain the rules they are enforcing. “You set the rules; you need to be accountable to them.”
In order to make the board as fair as possible, chapter presidents will not be allowed to be members, Branch said.
“(Presidents) have a very different mindset, they think in terms of their chapter above all, as they should, but the (representatives on the board) need to be here to benefit the Greek community and make decisions and give discipline where needed,” he said.
Branch also said he feels the goal of the board should be to make decisions that will benefit the Greek community as a whole.
“We want to do stuff that will discipline but not hurt the Greek community,” Branch said. “Because the Greek community at Pepperdine is so small that when one chapter is hurt it is felt by the rest of the chapters.”
October 03, 2002