Keg limit set for colleges

By Thresher Editorial Board     3/13/13 7:00pm

For the second year in a row, colleges will be limited to a certain number of kegs during Willy Week. 

College masters and presidents decided on March 11 to raise the Willy Week and Beer Bike keg limit from six per college to eight, according to campus-wide Beer Bike Coordinator Andrew Jacobson. 

Jacobson, a Brown College sophomore, said Student Judicial Programs enforces the keg limit by keeping tabs on each college's Willy Week events submitted for approval. 

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"The masters and college presidents decide what is a reasonable amount of kegs for each college for the whole Willy Week," Jacobson said. "Once the keg limit is set, they send the number to SJP, and SJP monitors the numbers by accepting or denying SJP event forms." 

Associate Dean of Undergraduates Don Ostdiek said although SJP heads the approval process, enforcement is up to the colleges. 

"The colleges help enforce it," Ostdiek said. "We do the approval process, but the colleges need to enforce it if they're violating [the policy]. We're not going to be there counting kegs or anything like that." 

Ostdiek said the reasoning behind the limit was to avoid colleges competing for the most kegs. 

"The colleges agreed that there should be limits, because otherwise you create a type of arms race where colleges try to have more than the college next to them," Ostdiek said. 

Martel College Beer Bike Coordinator Helene Dick said the college Beer Bike coordinators have not been well-informed about the limit. 

"College Beer Bike Coordinators were essentially cut out of the conversation about the keg limit," Dick said. "While our college presidents and masters sought to represent us at the table, that's not a replacement for putting Beer Bike coordinators directly in touch with SJP and the administration. Despite the fact that we were voicing our need for news on a keg limit from the very first campus wide meeting in the fall, the issue was never addressed until less than two weeks before Beer Bike." 

Dick said this complicates the process for getting kegs donated to the colleges. 

"The issue is it's difficult for us to coordinate donations and sponsors when we aren't given a clear estimation of what we can register in the first place, "Dick said. "[Dean of Undergraduates John Hutchinson] only spoke to Beer Bike teams after the keg limit was set. The same problem happened last year: There wasn't sufficient communication between SJP and the masters to put the issue on their agenda in time for the college Beer Bike coordinators to do their jobs well." 

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