Following the removal of three residents by the Office of Residential Life (ResLife), Quinby House has undergone several changes in leadership.
According to the policy outlined in the College House Constitution, the vice president will assume the presidency if that position becomes vacant. Former vice president Maura Allen '14 is the new president of Quinby House. The house elected Sam Shapiro '14 to the vice presidency.
In an interview with the Orient, Allen said that the Office of Residential Life approached her three weeks ago about taking over Quinby.
"They gave me the option and a few days to think about it," she said.
Quinby then held elections for the vice presidency November 6. Assistant Director of Residential Life Chris Rossi '10 formally announced the new leadership in an email to all Quinby affiliates.
These changes followed an alcohol -and drug-related incident over falll break. The Office of Safety and Security first uncovered the incident during a routine walk through of the house.
According to the report given to the Orient by Director of Safety and Security Randy Nichols, the officer found several students with hard alcohol, a bong that had been used to smoke marijuana, and the "remains of what appeared to be a drinking game."
Security subsequently conducted an investigation, determining that there had been an unregistered event in Quinby House that had "included a planned and organized drinking game that involved hard alcohol" in violation of Quinby's social probation and College policy. Security forwarded the findings to the Dean's Office.
Since the investigation, the Offices of Residential Life and Student Affairs have taken disciplinary measures against several of the students involved, three of which were removed from Quinby House. The Office of Residential Life confirmed that disciplinary action was taken, but declined to describe the decision-making process or comment on whether the event and the removal were connected. The students involved declined to comment.
As far as the Orient was able to discern, there have been no previous instances of students being removed from a College House, but not expelled from the College, for comparable violations of the social code.
Despite the upheaval, the new leaders of Quinby are optimistic for the house's future.
"All the stuff we've gone through as a house has led us to be a very cohesive and strong group," said Shapiro. "While we were on social probation, we had a lot of really good programming. We reached out to Appleton and the campus...coming out of that as a house we really have a lot of good energy."
-Compiled by Eliza Novick-Smith.