In light of Monday night’s pause on all social events for the 13 fraternities on the Interfraternity Council, one caucus within the Student Government Association wants to be sure students attending house parties stay safe.
Kaleb Chowning, the off-campus caucus chair, announced to the senate floor Wednesday the caucus’ plans to pair with the student safety committee within SGA to address what it estimates will be more students attending house parties.
RELATED: Ball State, 13 fraternities agree to 'pause' all social events
“Obviously, I mean, people are still going to go out and have parties or whatever, just not at fraternity houses,” Chowning said. “So that could lead to situations where there’s … a lot of people in one area.”
The caucus hopes to pair with University Police in hopes to raise student awareness on how to party safely until the pause is reviewed Jan. 31, Chowning said.
“What we’re going to do is talk to UPD and see if there’s any way we can help them prepare for that extra activity that’s going to happen outside of fraternities,” Chowning said.
SGA president pro tempore Zoe Taylor specified these awareness efforts will aim to “re-inform” students about partying safely, including a reminder of Indiana’s lifeline law and how to “tone down” a party that has gotten out of control.
The plan now is not to propose legislation, Chowning said.
“I think it would be more of like, an event or social media or those types of things. Not necessarily like a rule or something like that that’s written up.”
Taylor said it seems as if the rest of SGA senate is on board, but the caucus’ actions must happen soon — namely, within the next two weeks.
“This is when the big kind of reaction period is,” Taylor said. “Usually after two weeks — after a big change like this — students kind of deafen their ears a little bit after two weeks. So we’re hoping that we can get in just enough time to get students information that they need.”
Despite the caucus’ proposed efforts, Chowning said he doesn’t expect any “dire circumstances.”
“I don’t think I necessarily expect an issue but it’s just the realization that there could be possibly, because people are still going to want to be social and do things outside of that environment that was previously contained to a certain house or a number of houses,” Chowning said.
Contact Sara Barker with comments at slbarker3@bsu.edu or on Twitter at @sarabarker326.
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