Bucknell University students and public safety staff under investigation after LGBTQ incident
Lewisburg PA May 17 2021
A liberal arts college in Pennsylvania is investigating a “horrific incident” of alleged harassment of LGBTQ students.
On Friday, Bucknell University President John Bravman and two school officials wrote a letter addressed to students and staff of the prestigious school acknowledging and condemning the incident.
A group of nearly two dozen students male students “banged against our windows and doors, swinging a metal bar at our flag pole that displays our pride flag, and urinating on our front porch,” Tyler Luong, the residential advisor for Fran’s House, wrote in an email to Bravman.
Luongo sent the email on Friday morning. He also shared it with The Daily Item.
The scary incident took place Thursday evening at Tower House, “the Fran’s House affinity residence and center of student life for our LGBTQ student community,” according to the school.
The LGBTQ home is named after Fran McDaniel, the late director of the school’s LGBTQ office. It provides gender-neutral housing and a safe place for LGBTQ students on campus, according to Penn Live.
“We are both outraged and sorrowful that the residents endured this violation of the space that is so critically important to them as a community,” Bravman’s letter, which was posted on Brucknell’s website, read. “These actions will not be tolerated.”
“While others were drinking and having fun under the sunset, the residents of Fran’s House were locking our windows and securing our doors from nearly 20 former Tau Kappa Epsilon (TKE) members from breaking into our home,” Luongo wrote to the president.
The students “banged against our windows and doors, swinging a metal bar at our flag pole that displays our pride flag, and urinating on our front porch,” he said.
They also yelled, “Let us in,” “This isn’t your home,” and “This is our home.”
The house at 825 Fraternity Road formerly housed the TKE fraternity until they were removed two years ago.
A 2019 investigation into hazing found that some TKE members engaged in activities “creating a reasonable likelihood of bodily injury,” including the use of dog shock collars on students, slapping, as well as “throwing darts at members.”
As a result, the fraternity is no longer a recognized student organization, and it’s also banned from campus operations.
“It is clear from multiple accounts that the students violated the physical space and, far more importantly, the residents’ sense of place and security,” the president wrote, adding that the school has retained an outside firm “to conduct an immediate investigation of these actions and submit a full report to Bucknell administration as soon as possible.”
In his letter, Bravman also acknowledged a possible failure in the handling of the issue by public safety personnel.
“When Public Safety arrived, they laughed at the situation,” Luong wrote, adding that “the officers bonded with our offenders, reminiscing their college days and calling them handsome young men.”
“The two officers didn’t even speak to me,” he wrote. “Neither of the two officers came up to us Fran’s House residents to ask if we were okay.”
Bravman said that the school has also “engaged an outside firm to immediately investigate Public Safety’s response and will implement corrective and disciplinary measures as appropriate.”
In a statement shared on Instagram, the school’s office of LGBTQ resources said that, after the ordeal, “the Fran’s House community has and continues to show courage and support for one another.”
