Penn State’s outing club banned - too dangerous

Post Reply New Topic

It's risky out there! That's why PSU's Outing Club can no longer go outside

I experienced this very thing decades ago when I helped to run our local university's caving club. The club ended up disaffiliating from the Student Union - which, while it meant we were no longer bound by their rules, also meant that we had to severely restrict our trips in order to make them as accessible as possible. The "ball sport" teams were happily being funded just to have their muddy kit washed, while we were refused almost every funding application for essential safety equipment such as ropes and lighting.

The kicker was that our safety record was perfect - in the five or six years I was in the club, not a single person had to go to A & E. On the single occasion that we called out the local fell rescue (for an overdue party who had simply got carried away and lost track of time), we were commended by the rescue team in their report for being well equipped, well trained and following every recommended procedure for a call out. (I should point out that UK caving/fell rescue teams are almost exclusively voluntary, and mostly people who engage in the same pursuits recreationally and love to encourage safe participation.)

Ironically, forcing people who want to experience the underground world to do it via commercial outdoor pursuits organisations has actually made it more dangerous in my opinion. The first rule of caving is "if in doubt, stay out". But when faced with potentially refunding people's money, commercial organisations will take people underground when weather conditions suggest it would be wise to do something else that day. This has been the cause of many high-profile rescue situations, often involving unmanageably large groups of inexperienced youngsters and too few experienced leaders.

It's not just the threat of direct legal action which is a problem here. Unreasonable premiums for institutions to cover third-party insurance for affiliated student activities were often cited by the student union to whom we were affiliated - calculated by insurers who have no idea how to assess the relative safety of different activities.

The bit about being "out of range of communication" just makes me laugh - total self-reliance was a huge part of the thrill and enjoyment for many participants. And what the hell do these people think we used to do 30 years ago when no-one had a personal mobile phone? (not that they would be any use underground anyway.)

^ Yes, definitely for me. Part of why I liked caving was because, once fully trained, I felt fully in command of the "rules" and found it easy to reason out how to act in the best interests of the group; totally unlike how I felt with other social activities or sports, especially during my difficult student years. I found as well that, with caving, there was very little room for people with big egos - any kind of recklessness endangers the whole group in very obvious ways and with outside help not immediately to hand, so big-headed, manipulative people tended to not be tolerated. The totally "alien" environment was a real "leveller" of people, IMHO, and even the most inexperienced person can be a vital team member. I found self-reliance in the face of such an alien environment was a hell of a lot more rewarding than battling "human nature" when "up top"!

It's especially ironic that while fear of litigation is excluding more and more people from these activities, there's more awareness than ever that contact with nature, exercise, and learning those kind of self-reliance skills are so beneficial for our mental and physical health.

I did go to a Penn State branch campus and was in drama, and our advisor did say "Penn State is paranoid about lawsuits" and they needed lawyers so badly that they ended up buying a law school. Yet how can they, PSU, allow a fraternity that kills young men? But then, I'm not NT, so I don't understand why anyone would join a fraternity at all.

I can't believe that caving (risk of getting lost), and scuba (risk of bends, drowning)are any more dangerous than archery (getting poked with an arrow must hurt), boxing (traumatic brain injury), ski racing (high speed collision) and rifle team (yeah, the risk of possibly getting shot I guess PSU does not consider severe).

PSU I think has done some other stupid unrelated things, in a way I want nothing to with them. Oh, and if you are autistic spectrum and want to go to college, choose another university, PSU is not autism friendly (noise, crowds, mostly not so great teachers).