Are you fazed by haze?

Hazing, an ongoing issue country-wide, is not uncommon on college campuses. According to hazingprevention.org, nine out of ten students who have gotten hazed in college don't consider themselves to have been hazed at all. The definition of hazing is "any action taken or situation created intentionally that causes embarrassment/harassment and risks emotional and/or physical harm to members of an organization or team against one's will."

In an attempt to make students aware of how serious hazing is around college campuses, Bridgewater State College will be hosting the National Hazing Prevention Week from November 2nd to November 6th.

The Office of Student Involvement and Leadership (OSIL), as well as the Department of Athletics and Recreation, will be sponsoring National Hazing Prevention Week. BSC sororities and fraternities will be helping out all week as well to spread information about putting a stop to this type of humiliation.

Even though this nation-wide week has been going on for a few years now, it just started up at BSC two years ago. There will be different events occurring around campus to help students understand hazing further.

SGA, for instance, is sponsoring a speaker to come and talk to the Bridgewater State College campus. The speaker, Erle Morring, will talk about his own confrontation with hazing in his fraternity. He will speak about his goal of making the fraternities and sororities at his college change their negative traditions of hazing. Students who are interested in hearing this personal story can go to Horace Mann Auditorium on Monday, November 2 at 8 pm.

On Tuesday, November 3, the Panhellenic Association, the governing board of sororities, and the Interfraternity Council, will be hosting a showing of a documentary called "Haze" at noon. This will be held in the Small Ballroom for anyone who is interested. The documentary will focus on a student, Gordie Bailey, who died at the University of Colorado in 2004 from the cause of hazing.

The Associate Director of OSIL, Maribeth Johnson and the Director of Athletics, John Harper, will be holding a "brown bag lunch" for faculty and staff in the Campus Center (room 202) on Wednesday, November 4 for those interested in talking about hazing issues.

Throughout the whole week, the Panhellenic Association will be on the main level on the RCC all day with a bulletin board of statistics as well as a memorial for those who died from hazing. If students have questions about hazing, they will be able to go to this station to find out more information.

In addition to all of these events, Gamma Phi Beta will be hosting a ribbon campaign to bring awareness to the BSC community in an effort to end hazing once and for all.

Though there are a lot of facts that can be learned during this informational week, Maribeth Johnson, who is a strong supporter of National Hazing Prevention Week, was able to offer some firsthand statistics. She revealed that one out of four students who come to college have already been hazed in high school. Building off of that number, 1.5 million high school students are hazed each year and 47 percent of students who go to college already experienced hazing in high school. Of the students in college, 55 percent involved in clubs and organizations experience hazing. Furthermore, the idea that hazing takes place mostly in Greek Life and athletics is stereotypical. In fact, hazing has been seen in a variety of campus clubs.

Student perspectives on this subject may come from personal experience or their own opinion on the subject matter.

"There are better ways to foster membership into groups than making people eat strange things or run to the tops of mountains with alcohol poisoning," said Emily Kirslis, a first year student at BSC.

With National Hazing Prevention Week right around the corner, Maribeth Johnson is excited to bring an understanding to students.

"This is something I'm really passionate about stopping," she said.

Currently there are 44 states with laws against hazing, each varying from one another. With more awareness on campuses all over the country, the goal is to hopefully have all 50 states with laws against hazing. If interested in learning more about National Hazing Prevention Week or hazing in general, you can visit www.hazingprevention.org.