BREAKING: SAE To Eliminate Pledging Process
Friday is usually the go-to day of the week to release negatively perceived news, so I’m guessing Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s Supreme Council expects some serious pushback from the atomic bomb they dropped today–and for good reason. Not everyone is going to support this move.
Effective this Sunday, Sigma Alpha Epsilon will completely shut down its pledging process, citing the vision of the fraternity’s original Ritual and Constitution. According to the SAE Supreme Council, the fraternity aims to terminate unequal class structure between new members (pledges) and active members.
From SAE.net:
Sigma Alpha Epsilon, under the leadership and direction of the Supreme Council, has made a historic decision that will realign the Fraternity to produce the original member’s experience that our Founding Fathers envisioned. This change will adopt a method, practice and policy that treat all members equally and fairly and strive for a continuous development of our members throughout their lives. Effective March 9, 2014, new-member (pledge) programming will be eliminated completely from our operations, and the classification of new member (pledge) will no longer exist. All chapters and colonies will be required to implement this important change.
A new program, called the True Gentleman Experience, will be enacted immediately. This program will replace the current pledging process, and its goals are to “enhance the educational and leadership experience” and promote a more “positive, meaningful membership” for all new and active members.
That’s the front page, politically correct version.
The barroom version is this: hazing–and the public perception and perpetual threat of litigation that comes with it–has become a monstrous thorn in the national office’s side. This is SAE’s way of further distancing the fraternity from hazing incidents, at least from a legal standpoint.
Under the new program, recruits who accept their bids from SAE will immediately be activated.
Under the program, chapters and colonies may continue to recruit prospective members as they do currently. When they extend a bid, the college man who accepts the invitation will become a collegiate member. He will be required to accept our Scope of Association Agreement and complete the Carson Starkey Membership Certification Program. Furthermore, every member will be expected to meet our membership requirements and expectations and, should he fail to do so, our Fraternity Laws provide the means to suspend or remove his membership.
A “Member Educator” will replace the time-honored role of Pledge Educator–which is just the title to tell Mom and Dad in lieu of “Hazer Extraordinaire.” The Member Educator’s role will include overseeing the newly-implemented educational initiatives for his fellow brothers.
Times, they are a-changin’.
To learn more about the demise of SAE’s pledge program, read the full story on SAE.net.
[via SAE.net]
Sigma Alpha Epsilon 1856-2014. Sigma Alpha Communism. 2014-Present.
11 years ago at 11:38 amThe secret’s out. I just don’t understand why this is happening in the middle of a pledge process. So many pledges are absolutely not ready to initiate yet. This isn’t even going to fix the hazing issue. New members are still gonna get hazed no matter what. I’m still gonna call them pledges.
11 years ago at 11:39 amThis is fucking stupid
11 years ago at 11:41 amThis is the most ridiculous news ever. I’m sure this is more about gaining new active members than being worried about hazing pledges. Lowering the pledge duration down to 96 hours isn’t going to reduce hazing, it will only encourage the challenge of more hazing in a shorter amount of time.
11 years ago at 11:41 amAnd not only is this not going to reduce hazing, this will also defeat the purpose of earning your right to become active. No one who becomes initiated within 96 hours won’t understand the value of a fraternity and just join for the social aspect, thus bringing down the importance of fraternities even further in the eye of the modern age.
11 years ago at 11:43 amLike SigEp’s Balanced Man, any of their smart chapters will wind a way to make it look like they are following it on paper but still sticking to age-old traditions. This is just posturing my SAE’s nationals.
11 years ago at 11:41 amWord on the street is that ΣΑΕ was going to lose their insurance due to all the bad media coverage. This is nationals way of taking the pressure off them and putting it on the individual chapters and more so on the individual members. Basically if a brother is caught hazing another “member” (pledge) then that particular brother can be sued for that incident by that pledge.
11 years ago at 11:42 amSo it’s a club now is what you are telling me?
11 years ago at 11:43 amAlways knew SAEs were a bunch of goobs
11 years ago at 11:44 am“Come out to SAE Spring “Open Invitation” period. Become a True Gentleman just by showing up and being able to sign your name!”
11 years ago at 11:44 amTotal geed move!!
11 years ago at 11:47 am