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The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/2003/11/25/pendergast-dismissed-as-cornell-football-coach/)

November 25, 2003

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Pendergast Dismissed as Cornell Football Coach

By wpengine | November 25, 2003

Tim Pendergast, the Roger J. Weiss ’61 Coach of Football, was fired this afternoon after the Cornell football team posted a 1-9 (0-7 Ivy League) record this season. In his three years as the Red’s head coach, Pendergast posted a 7-22 record, including 5-16 in conference play. The announcement was made by Athletic Director Andy Noel.

After winning its first game of the season against Bucknell, the Red lost the next nine straight, including all seven of its conference games. The team suffered numerous injuries to key players, such as junior linebacker Joel Sussman, senior wide receiver Chad Nice, and senior quarterback and co-captain Mick Razzano.

The Red concluded its season this past Saturday with a 59-7 loss to Ivy League champion Penn in Philadelphia.

The athletic department announced that a national search for Pendergast’s successor will begin immediately.

See tomorrow’s Sun for full coverage.

Archived article by Sun Staff

Stress On the BYOB Policy

By wpengine November 27, 2003

BYOB has been the word on many Cornellian’s lips since September, when the Multicultural Greek Letter Council joined the Interfraternity Council and the Panhellenic Association in voting to make Cornell a bring-your-own-beverage campus. The policy has weathered stress in the past two months, as members of the Cornell University Police Department, the administration and representatives of the Greek system have attempted to cope with the loss of the only caterer available and the unwillingness of the New York State Liquor Authority to issue permits to caterers with a poor track record. “The BYOB policy was instituted this fall so that chapters would have a way to hold relatively small parties without having to hire a caterer to serve alcohol,” said Timothy Marchell, director of alcohol policy initiatives at Gannett: Cornell University Health Services. “After the BYOB policy started, the only active caterer lost its liquor license due to violations. So that leaves chapters with few options.” At its introduction, the BYOB policy seemed to be an answer to the problem of the small party. While some fraternities were able to finance the high costs of catering parties, many were unable to — often leading to underground and illegal gatherings. “The students probably have one perspective as to why [BYOB] was originally needed,” said Susan Murphy ’73, vice president of student and academic services. “From where I sit, we were seeing a monopoly. The caterers were charging high fees so frats were saying ‘if you want us to have small parties there needs to be another way.’ We wanted to provide an incentive and structure in which fraternities could register their parties where they had been doing so underground and to establish consequences for violations.” “BYOB overall has been a step forward; however, it’s not without its challenges. We’re working on the glitches and that’s going to take a little more time and understanding [of] social policy,” said Michael Taylor ’05, IFC vice president of University and community relations. “It got a lot more stress put on it after the one [remaining] catering company got taken out. Now the only way anyone can have a party is through BYOB.” By passing the BYOB policy, Cornell joined many other schools around the country, including the University of Pennsylvania and Syracuse University, which also require partygoers to bring their own beverages. “I think we have a good chance of keeping the policy because its main focus is to get rid of hard liquor and kegs from parties, keeping beer, wine, wine coolers and other bottled malt beverages to make parties safer,” said Paul El-Meouchy ’04, president of the IFC. “Chapters were doing these kinds of parties last year underground and when they got caught they would get in trouble. We felt it would be more beneficial to legalize these parties in our system by ensuring a safety control on these events.” El-Meouchy added that the policy seems to have helped in that respect. “I can tell you that we have seen a significant decrease, by three fold, in the number of judicial cases, which is great. The chapters do know what is expected of them, the most important [components are] not having hundreds of hundreds of people at their parties, no kegs and no hard liquor,” El-Meouchy said. “The chapters that don’t register their events or break one of the above expectations get a pretty hefty sanction and it has been administered to a few.” As it stands though, BYOB is the only policy available to partygoers. “[Chapters] can hold a BYOB event, have their event in a licensed establishment, or find a licensed and insured caterer who can get a permit from the State Liquor Authority to do the event in a fraternity. However, those caterers are in very short supply, if they are available at all,” Marchell said. The lack of options has created a pressing need for members of the IFC, Panhel and MGLC and the CUPD to work together so that the policy will not be compromised, as it enables more safety at parties. CUPD Lt. Mike Musci has been meeting every two weeks with Leo Pedraza, assistant dean of fraternity and sorority affairs, to asses the situation. “Many fraternities are dependent on social events for recruitment events and our job at the office is to show them how they can be successful without these parties, show them that there are positive ways to bring in new members, and to disassociate this view of big parties and successful recruitment,” Pedraza said. The Alumni Interfraternity Council, which meets three times a year — most recently at Homecoming — has devoted a subcommittee to brainstorm ideas and suggestions for action next semester. “The concern of the Fraternity-Sorority Advisory Council, [a separate organization that is also dealing with BYOB] was that if you’re having a party with five hundred or more people it’s going to be impossible to handle,” Murphy said. “I hope we can find a way that we can continue some form of a third party catering system. At this point we’re looking into other caterers and figuring out how we can try to enable this to happen.” “The [Liquor Authority] wants Cornell to find a reputable caterer that will do its job,” El-Meouchy said. “I would like to see catering come back because they are what allow the chapters to throw a large scale event and to serve other stuff than beer and wine. We are still working on our plan of action in that regard and I think a solution will come soon.” Both Marchell and Musci confirmed that efforts are being made to identify outside security agencies, such as Chestnut Street Security — used by Colgate and Syracuse Universities — and figure out what role they might be able to play at BYOB events. Archived article by Logan Bromer
Cornell Plays Host to ROTC Competition

By wpengine November 27, 2003

Over 600 ROTC midshipmen and cadets from 26 schools, including the Naval Academy and West Point, arrived at Cornell on Nov. 14 to compete in the 26th Annual Cornell University Intercollegiate Drill Competition (CUIDC), held at Barton Hall. CUIDC is made up of drill contests, a military excellence competition and basketball games. “This competition is known and respected nationally amongst ROTC circles. Every year attendance rises and CUIDC grows in recognition,” said Cornell midshipman Brian Aquadro ’06, who staffed the event. The drill contests consisted of squad rifle manual, platoon rifle manual, color guard, trick drill and platoon inspection. United States Marine Corps Drill Instructors were brought up to Cornell to grade drill and conduct inspection. Penn State Air Force ROTC cadet Ryan Harris was “impressed by the intensity and dedication of the Marine Corps Drill Instructors. The nature of the Marine Corps is much different than the Air Force.” The military excellence competition emphasized physical fitness and excellence. Events ranged from an 8k run around Beebe Lake to an Iron Man competition, a conglomeration of sit-ups, pull-ups, push-ups, running and swimming. This race took place at Helen Newman pool, alumni fields and Barton Hall. There was also a swim competition and a truly Roman coliseum like relay race — minus the death and lions — around the track in Barton, with all 600 midshipmen and cadets screaming for their runners. University of Pennsylvania Midshipmen Joseph Payne VI said, “Cornell ROTC did a great job with this CUIDC, this is my first year here and I am duly impressed by the professionalism and efficiency of the unit. Hopefully, I’ll be back next year and will probably do better because I ran really, really slow this year.” CUIDC is planned and executed by the undergraduates in Cornell’s [Naval] ROTC program which, “comes with huge responsibility and is great experience for the future naval officers NROTC,” Aquadro said. The basketball competition was played into the night on Saturday and continued Sunday morning before all schools departed for home to begin a fresh week of classes and military education. “ROTC is a serious commitment and leads to an officer commission in the Navy, Air Force or Army. Competitions like CUIDC helps to bring about inter-service understanding,” Harris said. While all schools contended valiantly, the majority of awards went to the United States Merchant Marine Academy and Penn State. Cornell placed well in the military excellence competition — awarded the top three slots in nearly all of the events. Archived article by Kris Reichardt