Fraternity Suspends Wesleyan Chapter [UPDATED]

After a sophomore student fell from a window at the Beta Theta Pi house in Middletown, Wesleyan president Michael S. Roth decreed that no students were allowed to live in the High Street home and declared it off-limits to all Wesleyan students for the academic year, at least.

Acknowledging that the Wesleyan chapter is undergoing a transformation and that members must accept personal responsibility, Beta Theta Pi fraternity officials suspended the Wesleyan chapter, effective immediately, according to an emailed statement from Martin Cobb, Director of Communication at the Beta Theta Pi Foundation and Administrative Office.

The chapter was previously on probation. The fraternity website was not updated to reflect the suspension, as of publication time.

“Beta Theta Pi has enjoyed 125 years at Wesleyan, but the chapter has been in the midst of an extensive period of self-renewal and reorganization following several years of challenging behavior,” the statement from Beta Theta Pi notes. “Moving forward and building positively on that reality, Beta Theta Pi must continue to accept responsibility for its members’ actions that have not lived up to the expectations of the University, community and larger general fraternity. To that end, effective immediately, the fraternity is downgrading the chapter’s status from ‘probation’ to ‘suspension’.”

The suspension provides an opportunity for collaboration and examination of the culture of the Wesleyan chapter, according to the Beta Theta Pi statement.

In a Sept. 10 campus-wide email from Roth, he said the university was open to discussing the future of the fraternity on campus. He said the Beta Theta Pi students would be provided with alternate university housing as the High Street house was no longer available to them.

“Down the road we are open to seeing from the fraternity a considered plan for the house and social activities there that satisfies our expectations for residential life at our university,” he said in the email.

Roth was not available as of publication time.

Fraternity officials said Beta Theta Pi is committed to helping shape the fraternity’s contributions to the university.

“The University will receive Beta’s full commitment and cooperation during this process and will have an active partner in helping develop Beta’s future contribution to the student body and Wesleyan experience,” they stated in the release.

Support for the Injured Student

The statement from the fraternity noted that Beta Theta Pi undergraduates and alumni are focused on the recovery of the student who fell from the window.

“As difficult as it may be at the beginning of the academic year for all of our undergraduate members to be moved by Wesleyan University out of the chapter house into alternative university housing, Beta Theta Pi undergraduates and alumni remain focused first and foremost on the recovery of the young woman who attempted to climb onto the roof of our chapter house this past weekend,” said Administrative Secretary Jud Horras. “She is a close friend to many undergraduate Betas and they are spending time in the hospital supporting her and her family. Initial accounts indicate this appears to have been a simple accident.”

(Photo Credit: Beta Theta House in Middletown, Patch archives)