It was a messy affair when the University of North Carolina at Wilmington closed its chapter of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, in 2012. The group was kicked off campus for providing alcohol to minors, sponsoring a social affair after its activities were supposed to be suspended, and then lying to university officials about having done so.
So far, the fraternity’s return to the campus isn’t going much better.
Now that Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s two-year suspension has expired, university officials are trying to ensure that there is adequate oversight and accountability for its future members. But the officials feel their efforts are being undercut by a group of the fraternity’s alumni, including a state legislator and an influential local businessman with strong ties to the governor, who have used their influence to protect the fraternity from a university administration they felt was unfair to the group. Further complicating the issue are the group’s ties to a local, private men’s club that played a central role in the city’s violent racial past.
Meanwhile, the national organization of the fraternity has contributed to the university’s sense of frustration by deferring authority over the local chapter to an alumni commission, along with a faculty adviser who has sued the university in the past.
Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s offenses at Wilmington pale in comparison to the bad behavior that other chapters of the fraternity have been charged with — the fraternity has been dubbed the nation’s deadliest. But the case vividly demonstrates one of the main reasons that colleges have a hard time reining in their frats: Along with national associations, institutions struggle to define who is responsible when things go wrong.
William A. Sederburg, who will step down as interim chancellor of the Wilmington campus next month, when a new leader takes office, says the fraternity seems to want high standards for its members, but he worries about how to make sure members comply without getting the university mired in local politics.
“It just seems counterproductive to get into whether they were mistreated or not,” Mr. Sederburg says. “My issue is, How do you try and build better relationships with them in the future?”
Sigma Alpha Alcohol
The problems that got the Wilmington chapter into trouble took place in the fall of 2012, during several off-campus parties, according to a review of the fraternity’s alleged infractions and the university’s responses.
In one incident in September of that year, an underage student was brought to the hospital for possible alcohol poisoning after attending a fraternity party. Nine days later, the police were called to a house party being hosted by SAE. (A neighbor had complained about the noise and disturbance.) An 18-year-old student tried to climb into the police car, thinking it was a cab, according to a summary of the events.
At that point, both the national association and the university issued an order for the fraternity to “cease and desist” from hosting any events. But in October other students reported that SAE had joined with a campus sorority in hosting a mixer. Sorority members then revealed that the fraternity had asked them to cover up the SAE chapter’s involvement.
In November, after a hearing before the student-conduct board, the university suspended the fraternity through May 2015. The national SAE organization followed with a similar order in February 2013.
Phi Beta Backlash
Then the drama began, fueled by the anger of chapter members and their powerful political connections.
In a deposition filed as part of an outside review of the university’s procedures, Chip Phillips, then the associate dean of students, said that fraternity members and a prominent alumnus, Parks Griffin, had tried to intimidate him. Mr. Griffin was a founding member of the Wilmington chapter of SAE and was chairman of Gov. Pat McCrory’s inaugural committee in 2013.
In local news reports at the time, Mr. Griffin denied Mr. Phillips’s accusation. In a voicemail message last week responding to The Chronicle’s request for an interview, Mr. Griffin said that he now has little involvement with the local fraternity except for helping to arrange a venue for an annual alumni gathering.
Later in 2013, the governor appointed two SAE alumni to the university’s Board of Trustees.
Another SAE alumnus, State Rep. John R. Bell IV, a Republican, got involved the following year, introducing a bill to allow individuals and student organizations to bring legal representation to student disciplinary hearings. The measure passed with wide support in both chambers of the General Assembly.
Representative Bell said he would have sponsored the legislation regardless of his past SAE affiliation. “I’ve always been interested in student rights and due process,” he said in an interview.
Also last year, amid the criticism of the student-conduct system, the chancellor at Wilmington, Gary L. Miller, left his position after just two years in the job. Mr. Miller had been dogged by other controversies, including a lawsuit by a faculty member, Michael S. Adams, who sued the university after being denied tenure. Mr. Adams, who argued that he had been discriminated against because of his outspoken conservative views, won after lengthy proceedings.
Now he has been appointed as the faculty adviser to the reinstated chapter of SAE.
Nu Relationship?
All of those events set the stage for a very difficult relationship between the fraternity and the university, the chancellor says.
In particular the choice of Mr. Adams as faculty adviser seemed meant to spark a confrontation — the professor of criminal justice maintains a blog that has been considered controversial for its conservative viewpoint and provocative headlines. One column, titled “The KKK Took My Building Away,” criticized the effort at UNC’s flagship campus, in Chapel Hill, to change the name of a building that had previously honored a 19th-century alumnus who also led the state chapter of the Klan.
Mr. Sederburg, who has been interim chancellor since Mr. Miller’s departure last July, says making Mr. Adams the chapter’s adviser was “a very poor decision.”
“This is a person who is committed to a hostile position against the university,” he says.
Mr. Adams did not respond to requests for comment.
There have been other missteps along the way, Mr. Sederburg says. Early this year, Representative Bell suggested a meeting with the chancellor at the Cape Fear Men’s Club, the site of the fraternity’s first initiation ceremony in 1981 and a regular meeting spot for the group over the years.
But the Cape Fear club is also a private membership group that served as one of the meeting places for leaders of a violent 19th-century insurrection by white Democrats against Republican city leaders and prominent black citizens.
Mr. Sederburg declined the invitation. When asked about that proposed meeting, Representative Bell says he “honestly doesn’t know anything about it.”
Instead, the lawmaker insists the real problem is that administrators have treated SAE more harshly than they treat other fraternal organizations. “When the university removed the chapter, I was shocked by the process,” Mr. Bell says. “When all the evidence was presented” to the national SAE, he adds, “it was very evident that there had been some discriminatory actions.”
In response to the criticism from Mr. Bell and others, the university commissioned an independent review of its procedures by a former general counsel of the state’s university system. That report found no wrongdoing by the university and noted that neither fraternity members nor the alumni who protested the actions disputed the actual charges against the chapter.
In addition to the mire of local politics, university officials are frustrated by the stance of the national SAE organization, which they see as deferring responsibility for the local chapter.
Michael A. Walker, associate vice chancellor and dean of students at UNC-Wilmington, says the national association has changed its original stance barring former members from rejoining the fraternity.
And the group has designated a local alumni commission as having primary responsibility for overseeing the chapter. University officials, however, want the national group to take oversight and be the primary contact for issues of health and safety.
“It might not be unusual to have an alumni group in an advisory role,” Mr. Walker says, “but not in an authoritative role.”
Brandon Weghorst, a spokesman for the national SAE, says he doesn’t know enough about the situation in Wilmington to confirm that previous members will be allowed to rejoin. And typically, the local alumni group is seen as an extra layer of oversight for a chapter that is coming off suspension, he says.
Mark P. Koepsel, executive director of the Association of Fraternity/Sorority Advisors, says the university will still have a direct line to the national organization to the regional director. “Those local alumni are much better positioned to provide consistent leadership, mentorship, and guidance to the undergraduate members,” he says.
Mr. Sederburg’s term ends on July 1, and he will be clear of the controversy that he considers one of his setbacks as interim chancellor. But he also sees the situation as a lesson for the incoming chancellor and other institutions that are trying to rein in fraternities.
“If you want to have high standards and hold people accountable, it has to go back to the nationals,” he says. “You don’t want to get embroiled in local politics.”
Eric Kelderman writes about money and accountability in higher education, including such areas as state policy, accreditation, and legal affairs. You can find him on Twitter @etkeld, or email him at eric.kelderman@chronicle.com.
