Hazing could affect college plans

Students disciplined in the violent melee involving Glenbrook North High School students might be facing more than just an ugly end to their high school days. Their college careers might also be on the line.

About half of all U.S. colleges require incoming students to tell them about any serious trouble they've gotten into since they filled out their applications, including the University of Illinois, where, according to the high school's Web site, 174 Glenbrook North current seniors have enrolled.

"There's a committee that evaluates each case," Robin Kaler, a spokesperson at the University's Urbana-Champaign campus, said Monday. "They look at each report individually to determine whether the student might pose a clear and present danger to other students here. If the answer is 'yes,' they recommend to the director of admissions that our offer be rescinded."

It's very likely, admissions experts said, the suspended Glenbrook North seniors will face additional questions, and possibly disciplinary sanctions, from the colleges and universities they'd planned to attend.

"Their admission could be revoked," said J.P. Allen, president of My Footpath, a Chicago firm that offers counseling and coaching services for high school students applying to highly competitive colleges. "At the very least, colleges are going to look twice. They all reserve the right to change their minds based on a student's performance senior year."

High school seniors who have been admitted to the University of Illinois and who have written back agreeing to enroll there are already subject to the school's disciplinary code, Kaler said. Under this code, she said, "students who have been caught hazing on our campus have, at times, been separated from the university." It's also possible, Kaler said, that students involved in violent incidents like the one May 4 at Chipilly Woods forest preserve near Northbrook "might have to agree to special conditions" before being allowed to attend the University of Illinois.

"They might have to take a violence-prevention course," she said, "or might not be allowed to live in a dormitory."

At Northwestern University, admissions officers send a form to high school guidance counselors each spring, asking them to report any "significant changes" in an accepted student's performance or behavior. The reports are evaluated by the admissions office on a case-by-case basis and could trigger responses ranging from no action to a retraction of admission. Northwestern, where 81 Glenbrook North seniors have enrolled, according to the high school's Web site, does not give a specific definition of what must be reported, said spokesman Charles Loebbaka, so it's not clear that the Glenbrook High School administrators would have to report a student's involvement in the violence in the forest preserve.

Harvard--where two Glenbrook North seniors have enrolled--requires applicants and their high schools to report all "changes of status," including suspensions or expulsions. Each case is reviewed by the university's admissions committee, Marlyn McGrath Lewis, Harvard College's admissions director, said Monday, adding, "We are not reluctant to withdraw the offer of admission." Harvard does just that in a handful of cases "every year," Lewis said. "Physical violence, or serious harassment, this would be a great concern to us."

You wouldn't believe the whining by these girls that we're hearing on the local radio call-in talk shows. None of them get the picture as to the concept of hazing being a problem - they still contend they did nothing wrong. Maybe a small handful of them are sorry..... but it seems that it's the classic 'they're not sorry they did it; they're only sorry they got caught'.

I can guarantee you, these girls are no longer sorotity material. Hazing, the word implies alot of bad stuff, and these girls did some horrible things, but for alot of people, it can be basically harmless fun. I'm not talking about water torture here, or beating the hell out of somone type of stuff or gang initiation (why aren't hazing laws ever used on them). Fraternities, and Sororities and sports organizations have been doing it for years, every now and then, you get a screw up. Baseball teams (MLB) encourage it. Its shame this happened, regardless, when you screw up, be man (or in this case, woman) enough to admit it.

They could study at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, which is still an all-men's school. The future pastors in the senior class haze the incoming men. I read about it on the Internet. It is a big secret in the Wisconsin Synod Lutheran group.

These girls are a little rough for the Wisconsin boys. The boys might cry about being punched that much. They boys do get beer poured on them, and that sort of thing.

Well, obviously, the principal didn't get the concept of hazing as being a problem since it went on for years in his school district and apparently he did nothing to stop it. Now the crap has hit the fan and he decides he should do something about it. It's called CYO (Covering Your Ass).

I'd like to know why the principal didn't know about the district's code or the state's law on hazing and convey that to his students. The school board attorney had to tell him what action to take.

Kids wore jerseys to school that Friday and put up sign-up sheets throughout the school. No one in authority seriously questionned them as to what they were doing. If he did know what was going on, he could have informed the students what the penalties were.

This had been going on for years, which means that the school knew that senior girls hazed junior girls. They should have informed the students long ago what the penalties for hazing are under their own district code and the state law. This guy should resign.

I bet one of these students will sue the school over his incompetence. If the principal doesn't know what the penalties are, why should the kids?

Not that this excuses these amazons' excesses.

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