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PITTSBURG —
Dave Adams, Pittsburg State assistant director of campus activities, has a hard time calling the first Saturday that students will be back in town by its former name.
The history of what was once called Shark Night has several more recent chapters, and the newest chapter will be a day full of events for students on campus at Pittsburg State.
The event known as Shark Night started off as a Greek event, as sorority women were not allowed to talk to men during Rush Week. Traditionally, they were allowed to break their silence at midnight on Saturday at the end of rush week, which often fell on the Saturday before school starts.
Over the years, Shark Night became one of the biggest party nights in Pittsburg. Streets would often be closed because of the sheer number of revelers. It all culminated in 2008, when one man was charged in a stabbing and there were other fights and arrests.
Although the event wasn’t a Pittsburg State event, and steps had been taken to try to stem the problems, drastic changes were made to kill off Shark Night. Sororities moved up the rush week schedule so the first night of co-ed communication is before Saturday. One of the biggest changes was to have fraternities and sororities schedule trips away from the Pittsburg area to avoid fueling the Shark Night fire.
These changes have been successful, causing Pittsburg Police Chief Mendy Hulvey to say in 2010 that “Shark Night as we’ve known it in the past is gone.”
But this year, rather than ship Greek students hours away for the weekend, they will be staying on campus.
“We are holding our fraternity leadership summit on campus this year. A lot of the reasoning is the week before leadership summit is really intense, primarily for the women,” Adams said. “There are all of these fresh, brand new students to the university, and everyone’s putting their best foot forward. And then in the past few years, we’ve had to immediately turn around and say on Saturday that you have to get up at 5 a.m., get on a bus, drive to Johnson County and stay awake the whole time because it’s really important.”
This year, Adams said the greek leadership recommended staying on campus rather than have two-hour bus rides each direction. During the day, there will be numerous workshops and meetings, including national speaker David Stollman and an alcohol management workshop with the university’s Prevention and Wellness staff. Then, the night will feature a concert with bands and other activities on the Oval.
Dave Adams, Pittsburg State assistant director of campus activities, has a hard time calling the first Saturday that students will be back in town by its former name.
The history of what was once called Shark Night has several more recent chapters, and the newest chapter will be a day full of events for students on campus at Pittsburg State.
The event known as Shark Night started off as a Greek event, as sorority women were not allowed to talk to men during Rush Week. Traditionally, they were allowed to break their silence at midnight on Saturday at the end of rush week, which often fell on the Saturday before school starts.
Over the years, Shark Night became one of the biggest party nights in Pittsburg. Streets would often be closed because of the sheer number of revelers. It all culminated in 2008, when one man was charged in a stabbing and there were other fights and arrests.
Although the event wasn’t a Pittsburg State event, and steps had been taken to try to stem the problems, drastic changes were made to kill off Shark Night. Sororities moved up the rush week schedule so the first night of co-ed communication is before Saturday. One of the biggest changes was to have fraternities and sororities schedule trips away from the Pittsburg area to avoid fueling the Shark Night fire.
These changes have been successful, causing Pittsburg Police Chief Mendy Hulvey to say in 2010 that “Shark Night as we’ve known it in the past is gone.”
But this year, rather than ship Greek students hours away for the weekend, they will be staying on campus.
“We are holding our fraternity leadership summit on campus this year. A lot of the reasoning is the week before leadership summit is really intense, primarily for the women,” Adams said. “There are all of these fresh, brand new students to the university, and everyone’s putting their best foot forward. And then in the past few years, we’ve had to immediately turn around and say on Saturday that you have to get up at 5 a.m., get on a bus, drive to Johnson County and stay awake the whole time because it’s really important.”
This year, Adams said the greek leadership recommended staying on campus rather than have two-hour bus rides each direction. During the day, there will be numerous workshops and meetings, including national speaker David Stollman and an alcohol management workshop with the university’s Prevention and Wellness staff. Then, the night will feature a concert with bands and other activities on the Oval.
“I wouldn’t categorize it as an open party. We’ll have a pretty strong police presence. Pitt State staff will be there, too,” Adams said. “Everything we’ll have going on on-campus will be entirely fun and safe to engage in. I think that while it’s only been three or four years since the last Shark Night, a certain amount of students have graduated. So most won’t remember that night and what it was.”
Adams said that neither PSU officials nor greek leadership are worried about any recurrence of the Shark Night of old.
“One of the things we told them is that if they’re making the decision to come back here, that means the students are taking on a lot more responsibility,” he said. “We try to promote that student organizations are student-run. We put it in their hands, and they are responsible for themselves. If something negative happens, they know that night is one of the worst nights that something could happen.”
Andrew Nash can be reached at andrew.nash@morningsun.net or by calling 231-2600 ext. 140.
