Fraternity Law, Practice, and Reality: The Fight Between FIPG and Student Decision Making

NOTE: This post is meant to ask serious questions regarding the role of litigation, liability insurance, and practice that provokes thought and conversations. It does not constitute the official position of my Fraternity, any of my future employers, or a rejection of my respect for the laws of the United States. I am curious and constantly trying to challenge my own effectiveness. These are musings I've had over the course of my two years as a consultant.

That I had to make such a disclaimer says alot about the topic of risk management education these days doesn't it?

Let's be honest with each other, many students drink in college. Not "everyone" drinks, as many chapters are fond of saying, but enough that the idea of abstinence before the age of 21 seems laughable. The problem, for Fraternity and Sorority consultants is that when we go into a chapter we are first and foremost agents of our respective organizations. Many organizations operate under the Fraternity Insurance Purchasing Group founded early in the 1990s to fight a spate of high risk incidents that drove premiums up across the board for all organizations. Though it does not directly sell insurance (as its name implies) FIPG creates a set of "risk management guidelines and educational resources to help member fraternities and sororities be more effective in their risk management policies and education efforts." These policies were adopted by 45+ Fraternities and Sororities and quickly set the standard for policies of other organizations and institutions around the country. It laid out base line definitions for "Bring Your Own Beer" events and qualifications for third party vendors. Universities and Professionals hailed these universal standards and the phrase "FIPG Compliant" become a trademark phrase around the country. This in turn led to decreasing insurance premiums for many organizations and thus everyone wins, right?

I'm not so sure.

Alcohol

As I mentioned earlier, drinking on college campuses remains high. There is a strong indication that banning alcohol consumption for those under the age of 21 does not in fact reduce college drinking and, on certain campuses where there are strict drinking enforcement regimes, may actually increase high risk drinking. This has given rise to organizations such as GAMMA (Greeks Advocating for Mature Management of Alcohol), CHOICES, and BACCHUS. All of those programs are peer education seminars where students themselves are the primary focal point NOT for abstinence but instead encourage responsible life choices. These programs show significantly more effectiveness than the average consultant visit. A survey conducted by Ohio University found that students retained 30% more information about FIPG when having a conversation with another trained undergraduate than when they heard a similar presentation from a Graduate Assitant or Fraternity / Sorority consultant. The issue is so thorny that many college presidents have gotten together and signed a public letter asking states to lower the drinking age back to 18 while promoting open and honest conversations about responsible drinking.

The liability aspect of alcohol conversations are even worse. An untrained consultant operates under a "wink, wink, nudge nudge" mentality that turns a blind eye to drinking. This denies a chapter the ability to have an open and honest conversation with a potential resource. Moreover, chapters run into the issue that the more formalized a chapter is in its risk management practices, the more likely they are to get into trouble if there is an accident. The biggest example is that of the designated driver program. As late as several years ago, even the insurance companies (including the Fraternity Insurance Purchasing Group) advocated their use. One of the greatest source of fatalities as a result of alcohol are those resulting from driving under the influence (Almost 2000 deaths of students aged 18 - 24 according to the Government in 2008-9). States pore huge resources into combating these fatali.

But then it became clear that the courts considered the organizations that sponsored the designated driver programs groups that "promoted intoxicated behavior and were responsible for the health and safety of all individuals who participated in these programs." Without proper training, student organizations were relying on younger drivers who were more prone to distraction and more likely to get into accidents. Some schools responded to this by taking the extra liability on their own shoulders and offering "safe ride" ride programs. Some institutions rejected the additional liability and continued to try and enforce abstinence at all costs. FIPG made a switch and issued a memorandum instructing Fraternities and Sororities to dissuade their chapters from utilizing these programs as well.

Suddenly, those shared standards that made FIPG so effective became liability red-herrings for many groups. The idea of a common "FIPG compliant" chapter moved away from shared standards on good risk management procedures to "legal compliant" and it became easier to use the law and liability as a hammer rather rather than promote safe practices of today's students. Schools that once utilized FIPG as a benchmark for best practices start going their own way leaving alumni, headquarter staff, and University Professionals dancing circles around each other unsure of what to say and when, in an ever expanding effort to avoid "liability."

Hazing

Hazing has been talked about almost ad-nauseum in a number of blogs, articles, and programs around the country. Needless to say the idea of hazing, in principle, activities designed to create subservience, dependence, or mental and physical harm are universally considered a detriment to the mission of Fraternity and Sorority life. I am absolutely against these practices and seek at all opportunities to discuss positive alternative programming whenever and wherever I can.

I won't comment at length here. I will merely to point out that the idea of "mental or physical harm" is such a broad definition and almost every institution has a different conception of the the idea of harm that only becomes somewhat more clear when there are claims brought against groups. Again, like the liabililty of drinking, hazing (despite our best claims) prevention does not seem to be prevention in many cases as it is selective reaction. The burden is on the consultant, the organization, and the University to take situations on a case by case basis in fighitng this scourage. The best example I can give of this double standard is the difference between a football team and a Fraternity intermural team. A Football team runs 2 a day drills at the request of its coach to develop team cohesion and develop physical endurance is a disney sports movie while a Fraternity that does the equivilant is harshley criticized. That said, I stand with most experts here in that while I am not condoning this "sports and / or military training analogy" there are some substantive issues in how we address the analogies while still maintaining the notion that we treat each student and organization relatively equitably.

Moreover, as a consultant, I'm troubled by the distinction of "minor hazing" or "little h" versuses "big H" hazing. I know that different campuses have VERY different tolerances for behavior and different responses. Sometimes looking soley to the Inter/National organizations or the alumni or sometimes working entirely in-house without any cooperation from anyone to punish hazing. For any consultant or professional who works at certain schools (specifically in the SEC among many others), these tolerances are a source of significant frustation and confusion.

The Theory

Insonsistency is a large problem for students. No one likes to be held (or think they're being held) to a double standard. There are a number of reasons why this is the case. Think about your own life experiences, in the work place, in your own classes, or in social scenarios (like the following). A man has sex with a large number of women and he's hailed as the epitome of manliness. He's sexy, he's a "player" etc, etc. A woman who has sex with a large number of men is a "slut" or is insecure about herself and lashing out as a response. How is that in any way fair?

The other example of our natural frustrations with inconsistent application of rules are speeding tickets. Just because lots of people go five miles per hour or more over the limit doesn't mean it feels any better to be the unlucky SOB who gets caught, does it?

The University Learning Outcomes Assessment demonstrates that Fraternities and Sororities tend to foster enhanced levels of student development between Freshmen and Junior years of college while plateuing during senior year compared to undergraduate peers that are "unaffiliated" or minimally affiliated with other social groups on college campuses. When you read these developements against William Perry's model of academic maturity, there are some (in my mind) significant implications.

During the first stage of academic maturity, a student operates in "dualist" thought patterns. There are right and wrong answers and they need someone to teach them those "right and wrong" responses. This is why hazing is so damaging and why many individuals do not consider hazing to actually be hazing. When a "pledge master" says that you must have 18 dollars and 52 cents on you at all times, there is no doubt that every pledge in the chapter had to do the same and that the symbols are important. As far as the pledge is concerned, it is the "right" way of doing things.

The same understanding goes for alcohol consumption. When you tell a pledge that he cannot (or must) drink, the natural mindset is to consider the rules to be "right" or "wrong" regardless of what the law says and what the campus practices are.

Most students, mainly freshmen and sophomores, tend to then morph into the second stage of Perry's model. They percieve problems in terms of problems that have solutions that they know or solutions that they don't know. When students realize that there are solutions that they don't know, they tend to go for broke as it were. Most schools play on this desire and encourage experiential learning as a major component of their first and second year curriculum. They hope that through hands on application and taking ownership over their own experiences, freshmen and sophomores will gain a bigger impact from their lessons than if they were in lecture classes alone.

Fraternity and Sorority students tend to fall into the same pattern. As they're exposed to more chapters (either at national events or through Greek Leadership Conferences), they tend to find that the comfortable world of pledging is no long as simple as they thought. Since few people follow "the rules" exactly as it is drilled into them from their Pledge Masters, their consultants, and the University officials, it is natural to want to experiment with a wide range of issues from alcohol, to drugs, even different world views and chapter operations. If left unconstrained, there is a great potential for damage both physically and emotionally vis a vis a student or a chapter's social actions as a result of running afoul of "The Rules."

The third major stage of Perry's model indicates that students become "relativists" or "proceduralists." In this stage, you begin to find significant chapter leadership for better or worse. Without clear rules, a student believes their situation to be "truly unique" and thus each response to any event must be viewed in context of their individual circumstance. Here we find chapters responding to critiques of their behavior and their procedures with the common refrain that "well, that doesn't work here because we're UNIQUE (or different)." However, in later stages of relativism, leaders may see the need to create proactive or alternative solutions. This is where most institutions begin modifying or "straying" from FIPG to accomidate the experiences of their individual chapters. We see this in the use of "off campus" or "annex" houses (apartments leased by seniors), bus parties, designated driver programs, and "alternative" or gimmick based new member education programs. Ironically, all of these may be influenced by consultants constantly challenging chapters to mix things up and engage in proactive leadership. Not to mention all of the ideas that students pick up from each other and other organizations!

Finally, while Perry does not make a normative claim on the value of the final stage of intellectual maturity, his framework is clearly where our Inter/National organizaitons are going. Perry talks about students making solid committments, facing challenges to those values based committments and learning that these committments are life long.

Doesn't that sound like "living your values" argument or "having a life long chapter obligation" rather than a three to four year committment?

Conclusion

The problems are multiple. First and foremost, consultants (often the face and the teachers of risk management) are not trained adequately to make simple declarative statements about the risk of running afoul of the liability line of FIPG. Second, even if you could make a cogent argument to follow the law to the T, you're not meeting students at their developmental level. Talking about brotherhood and love as a retention model while looking to the future of the chapter reflects a stage four development more often seen in seniors if it is seen at all in a chapter. Moreover it may well confuse the new members while frustrating the stage two and three leaders who see their model as "unique." Third, when talking about risk, you really are dealing in a relative argument that plays to the second and third stages of Perry's model of intellectual development. You frustrate those freshmen, sophomores, and juniors who are still looking for a line in the sand that they cannot cross and when you do put a line in the sand you run the risk of running afoul of the FIPG standards yourself let alone put your organization and the school at risk of a liability claim. Finally, you're a fighitng a culture where 90% of students make positive and constructive life decisions EVEN WHILE DRINKING and as thus, they don't see the risk that that poses to the bottom 10% who suffer from personal emotional issues that create the probability of further harm and conflict in the chapter.

Peer counseling is definitely a way to address these issues. Reducing The Rules, at least in the legal restrictions of drinking in college where personal experience trump any consultant, may be a significant step. Standardizing enforcement and making enforcement more transpearent is another great step.

Unfortunately, so long as students will be students (ie making mistakes) and the rules are so complex that any Fraternity and Sorority event presents some signficant liability while the victims of drinking are just as criminalized as their providers, then students will always remain unsure of where the line is until they cross it.

I do not condone under-age and irresponsible drinking. Nor do I condone hazing or acitvities that are designed to seperate and pit new classes of men and women against the older (or at least create the appearence thereof), but I do believe there is a significant problem with our liability models. I think that all chapters (and their alumni advisors) think of increasing measures to protect themselves and their brothers, they demonstrate further involvement in often times risky and often illegal (but accepted behavior) which should be integrated into our judicial process and the way we determine liability settlements in the courts. I also believe that de-criminalizing drinking (as the amethyst intiative suggests for adults over the age of 18) would also help us. Since then we could focus on educating against truly harmful behaviors.

There's certainly no perfect answer. I wish it would be as simple as promoting the ideals of brotherhood and sisterhood and that chapters that recruited properly grew at greater sizes than those that didn't. But there are a lot of conflicting models where bad practices win big and good practices flounder. These mis-gotten successes will only encourage others to make similar decisions with potentially radically different (and not positive) results.

As one Greek Advisor told me "Love is a Recruitment and Retention Strategy. We just need to find a lever to teach love."

How do you teach a concept such as love?

Some resources:

http://www.amethystinitiative.org/
http://www.bacchusgamma.org/mission.asp
http://www.stophazing.org/index.html
http://www.collegedrinkingprevention.gov/