Coalition for a Responsible Community
History of the Coalition
In his “Building a Responsible Community” town-hall speech delivered on March 4, 2003, President Robert G. Bottoms addressed DePauw University students, faculty, and staff and candidly discussed the issues of alcohol abuse and related high-risk behaviors at DePauw. Specifically, he expressed concern about the level of alcohol consumption and the negative results reported by students. He said the University community must make it a priority to develop a long-term effort to change the ethos of the campus. While indicating that everyone will be involved in developing a responsible community, President Bottoms said students must inevitably take leadership roles.
To begin to deal with the issues involved, President Bottoms established a Coalition for a Responsible Community, whose members included students, faculty, staff members, and alumni. He created three task forces that completed their work during the 2003-2004 academic year.
One task force, consisting primarily of students working with faculty and staff members, was charged with developing a covenant, or a statement of core values for which the DePauw community should stand. While visiting every fraternity and sorority house and residence hall on campus, the Covenant Task Force asked all DePauw students to help define the core values that then were incorporated into the DePauw Community Covenant.
The second task force was assigned to develop a set of expectations defining the relationship between the University and the fraternity and sorority community. This group developed the Greek Standards Initiative (GSI), which is a statement that expresses expectations the University has for Greek organizations as well as expectations Greek organizations should hold for the University. Each year, a staff and faculty member work with each chapter to set goals toward fulfilling the objectives of the GSI and meet several times throughout the year to provide support to the chapters.
The third task force investigated ways to support student leadership among all student groups on campus. One tangible result of this task force was the creation of the annual Student Leadership Summit, in which 150 campus leaders come together to discuss issues and solutions related to campus.
During the 2004-2005 and 2005-2006 academic years, the Coalition continued to meet to discuss issues faced by our campus, including continued alcohol abuse, hazing, and high-risk behaviors related to alcohol and the Greek system associated with Winter Term. The Athletic Department and Student Athletic Advisory Board also created the Student Athletic Code of Conduct, which focuses on the responsibilities student athletes carry to themselves, to their teams, and to the DePauw community.
In Spring 2006, Coalition members discussed what campus issues they would like to see the group address in future years. These discussions led to the creation of five additional task forces: the Alcohol and Other Drugs Task Force, Community Relations Task Force, Hazing Task Force, Social Programming Task Force, and Winter Term Task Force.
These task forces began their work early in Fall 2006. The groups meet twice each month and are co-chaired by a student and staff or faculty member. Each month, the co-chairs report progress to the Coalition steering group and post their minutes on the Coalition website so that all members of the community may be informed about their work.
