What happened to T.K.E?

For two semesters now Fredonia has been missing some Greek letters from their list of student organizations. Tau Kappa Epsilon (T.K.E.) has been suspended by the administration due to an unfortunate accident that occurred last Fred Fest on their property: 248 Temple, a house located directly across from campus.

Police reports indicated last spring by Sgt. Phil Maslak of the Fredonia Police Dept. that 18-year-old Taylor Meckley of Hamburg suffered second and third degree burns over almost half her body. Her friend, 20-year-old Patrick Bettder, who is a member of T.K.E and a Fredonia student, suffered minor burns.

"These three kids were playing around and trying to light Devil Springs Vodka on fire," said Jud Heussler, president of T.K.E, "and when they did it … at some point the bottle ignited and coated the girl sitting on the couch." A member ot TKE was also injured in the incident.

Upon investigation the police charged Joshua Benton, a visitor from the Albany area, with igniting the 160 proof vodka. However, the university was also in the process of determining T.K.E's responsibility for the situation since they hosted the party.

 The fraternity believes less blame should have been place on their group  becuase no T.K.E members were responsible for lighting the fire or providing the alcohol.

The administration from Student Affairs waited until the beginning of the following fall semester to investigate the remaining guilty parties because the incident happened at the end of the 2010 spring semester.

According to David Herman, vice president of Student Affairs, in the fall of 2010 the division met with students that lived at the residence in September and, "we offered the group a resolution to accept a disciplinary suspension, however they chose to go to a hearing. The hearing board met in December, made a decision, then T.K.E appealed their decision and their appeal was denied." A representative from T.K.E's national headquarters attended the hearing to plead on the group's behalf that they found that the group did no wrongdoing, however they could not convince the consul. Additionally, the fraternity's disciplinary history is presumed to have some weight on their ruling.

"We warned them about an incident … from September of 2009 in which they were given a written warning, which is the lowest level of discipline we have … where we had a couple underage intoxicated students that had claimed to be at one of their parties," said Lisa Myers Coordinator of Judicial Affairs.

The organization received a disciplinary suspension for the following year, which will last until May 14 of this year.

According the Fredonia student handbook, this suspension "removes the student or organization for a specific period of time, usually no more than two years. The suspension might be immediate or begin after the end of the semester." This disciplinary action is a step before expulsion, which removes the student or organization permanently from the university.

Herman said, "This is the only Greek group that has been suspended recently, although we have had a number of them on probation and warnings."

Although, as the fraternity's representative, Heussler felt that Student Affairs decision was slightly extreme.

"I felt like the school jumped really quickly at their assumptions of things … that we had provided everything and there was a raging drunken party going on," Heussler said. "There were people drinking and yes some were underage but not everybody [was], the majority of people that were drinking were over-age and brought their own [alcohol], provided we didn't have kegs or cases upon cases of beer, people individually brought whatever they planned to drink that afternoon."

Heussler expressed that he was unsure how much of his hearing actually played into affect since he felt the university pretty much presumed how the group was to be punished.

The suspension restricts the fraternity from functioning normally on campus leaving them basically inactive. They are currently restricted from wearing their Greek letters, recruiting new members, including attending Activities Night and even conducting volunteer work as a group.

This administrative action has had detrimental affects to the growth of the group.

"We've shrunk, we haven't grown at all, haven't taken any new guys, [including] the entire freshman class or anyone else that may have been interested … we also lost kids that saw a financial burden of having to pay all fraternity dues without being active," Heussler said.

T.K.E currently has extra dues this year of $500 from their inactivity between the last two semesters. They had to pay it despite not being active on the Fredonia campus since they are still recognized nationally.

Herman explained that a major factor that went into this decision to reprimand this group was their concern for the university's image.

"I think anytime you're part of a group and you're displaying with pride that groups shirts or if you're wearing a team jersey or if you're representing Fredonia as a team member or a club member there is an extra responsibility associated with that because what you do not only affects you but it affects the organization and the reputation of the university … when things don't go well there is an extra burden there," Herman said.

Currently there are only 21 members of T.K.E constituting them as colony status by Grand Council, the first step to organizing a group of men for the fraternity. Before the incident last spring, T.K.E was very close to being recognized as a chapter at Fredonia.

Over the course of the seven years T.K.E has existed on campus since 2004 they have made considerable contributions to the community. "We volunteer with the boys and girls club, we raise money for St. Jude every year, which amounted to $12,000 last year," Heussler said.