Two members of the Gettysburg College swim team have been suspended following a report that one of them scratched a racial slur onto another student’s body, according to a statement released by the college.
The story was first reported by the school’s student-run newspaper, The Gettysburgian, on Wednesday, which reported that the two students scratched a racial slur onto another student’s body. After reporting, a parent of an athlete on the team has contacted SwimSwam to say that one student scratched the slur onto another student, and those were the students who were suspended (the student who did the writing, and the student who was written on), and that there was not a third student involved.
“The college has received a deeply concerning report of a racial slur being scratched onto a student using a plastic or ceramic tool. This is a serious report, which is being actively assessed through the student conduct process,” the statement released by Chief Communications and Marketing Officer Jamie Yates read.
The students are suspended from participating in team activities pending the investigation’s outcome.
Local television station WGAL’s News8 team contacted the Gettysburg police. The station reported that Chief Robert Glenny Jr. said the police “contacted the college [when it heard the report] and was told the victim chose to handle it through the college’s internal investigatory process.”
At this time, the college is not providing further details on the incident, including the names of the students involved due to “privacy laws and the ongoing nature of the student conduct process.”
Gettysburg College’s Full Statement:
“The College has recieved a deeply concerning report of a racial slur being scratched onto a student using a plastic or ceramic tool. This is a serious report, which is being actively assessed through the student conduct process. At this point, the students invovled are not participating in swim team activities pending the outcome of the student conduct process. Given privacy laws and the ongoing nature of the student conduct process, we are unable to share further details.”
In an email sent to the campus community, Gettysburg President Bob Iuliano said that an upperclassman on the team reported the incident to the school. Iuliano thanked that person for reporting it.
“Let me underscore my profound distress about what happened, its impact on those who have long been underrepresented on this campus, and its implications for a community continuing its evolving efforts to create a truly inclusive environment,” Iuliano said.
In Fall 2024, 71.8% of the domestic, full-time, degree-seeking undergraduate student body at Gettysburg College identify as white, while 12.6% identify as Hispanic or Latino, 5.5% identify as black, and 2.2% identify as Asian.
Iuliano’s Letter
Dear Campus Community,
By now, some of you have heard about a student conduct report that recently was filed with the College arising from an incident where a racial slur was scratched onto a student by another student at an informal social gathering at an on-campus residence. I should note that it was the upperclass students from the swim team who first reported the incident, and we thank them for bringing this to the College’s attention.
Let me underscore my profound distress about what happened, its impact on those who have long been underrepresented on this campus, and its implications for a community continuing its evolving efforts to create a truly inclusive environment.
No matter the relationship, and no matter the motivation, there is no place on this campus for words or actions that demean, degrade, or marginalize based on one’s identity and history.
Please appreciate that the College cannot speak to an ongoing investigation where witnesses are being interviewed and key information is still being understood. Beyond that, we are constrained in discussing a student-related matter governed by federal privacy laws. I recognize that the lack of details regarding this incident might be frustrating and we ask for your forbearance.
In times like these, we may be tempted to speculate about what happened based on fragments of information that may or may not be accurate. Instead, I’d strongly urge us to let our well-established student conduct process play out. I have every confidence in its ability to conduct a thorough review and, together with College Life and Athletics, to respond appropriately to what the investigation reveals.
Let’s also focus on our collective responsibility to foster a truly inclusive environment and to uphold our mission statement that underscores who we are: a dynamic educational environment starts with an unwavering commitment to the “worth and dignity of all people.” We realize the fullest potential in ourselves and in each other only if we honor each other’s common humanity in all of our interactions.
As a community, we will learn from this and renew our commitment to support those who need it most.
As a reminder, a listing of campus resources is below:
- If you experience or witness an act of bias, please report it as soon as you are able.
- All students – Counseling and Wellness Services at [email protected] or 717-337-6960
- All employees and students – Diversity and Inclusion, Eloísa Gordon-Mora at [email protected] or 717-337-6376
- All students – College Life, Cristina Garcia at [email protected] or 717-337-6921
- All employees –Human Resources, Employment Assistant Program at [email protected] or 717-337-6202
- All faculty – Office of the Provost, Michelle Schmidt at [email protected] or 717-337-6840
Sincerely,
Bob Iuliano
President
Former swimmer of Gettysburg college, graduated a few years ago and still have connections to the team as well as the coaches. This is what I have heard. Let me firstly say that both of these boys that were involved are not the brightest. They were in a dorm room together drinking, and one of them saw a box cutter. He then said to carve something on him he proceeded to carve the n word. A multitude of people came in and out of the dorm room afterwards. Then, swimmers had a party and at this party, the boy who got carved pulled up his shirt proudly to show everyone the work that his fellow freshman swimmer did, laughing about… Read more »
Swimmer48 sources: Trust me bro!
Why was the victim suspended/dismissed?
Because he’s not a victim or so I have heard. He asked for something to be carved on him by the other freshman boy and was then proudly parading through a whole team gathering afterwards lifting his shirt laughing and showing everyone what was carved into him. That made captains go to coaches the next day and it was an immediate expulsion from the team. The gettysburgian is a hack journal run by students that are chomping at the bit for their 5 minutes of fame and only reported what was told to them instead of actually performing investigative journalism, if that actually happened and the “victim” didn’t lie to his parents, these headlines would look much different.
“only reported what was told to them” what do you think investigative journalism is? “Video of the entire incident start to finish or it didn’t happen”?
Investigative journalism IS reporting what people tell you. You also didn’t say anything that refuted anything that they reported.
It was a too-far prank
They were drunk and they have an edgy sense of humor
When you do dumb things like this, it ALWAYS ends poorly for everyone.
If you have ever been a recruit at Gettysburg, it is not surprising this happened during a drinking party. I was told when I was there that the coach called the team “a drinking team with a swimming problem,” and that was a few years ago. Glad to see he has done a lot to make the team better…
This is a weird (and horrible) thing to happen regardless of how strong the drinking culture is.
They had a HC change roughly 7 years ago. I’m not familiar with the current culture, but this would be an accurate assessment of the previous culture, where the HC (Mike Rawleigh?) had been in place for something like 20+ years
Students who did this to another student should be kicked out of; and barred from college permanently.
This was a horrible incident. No excuse for the actions of these boys. Compiling this are the inaccuracies and misleading information that began with the original article, which has continued to trickle down through every other report of this incident, including this one. The two boys were the only active participants. There was never “another student”. Once they did what they did, and were bragging about it, all members of the swim team, captains, and coaches were appalled and addressed this with ZERO tolerance. Within 24 hours of knowledge of the incident, it was reported by the team and coach, the boys kicked off the team, and the AD and college notified. Abhorrent and stupid behavior, yes, but no crime… Read more »
Where did you see the rest of the team condemned? I’ve been clicking through the stories and haven’t seen that. Was it on social media somewhere?
Not boys, it was men that did this.
110%!
Well, I think the nature of the actions proves that they are boys, rather than men.
Well, “yes”, legally, technically, they are adults …. but men? Ah, no. It’s not like this a squad of soldiers, factory workers, or whatever, age 18-22, who have actually experienced the real world.
Temporarily living on a college campus, going to school, mostly on their parents’ dime?
Come on, they’re boys.
I don’t think “he’s sheltered rich kid” is a viable excuse.
What does them being on a swim team have to do with anything? Seems no more important than if they are both business majors or part of the school research program? It’s not fair to the other 40 plus members of the team to be lumped into this for the deplorable actions of two acting on their own.
This is a fundamental misunderstanding of “sports”.
You tell people your kid is proud to represent their school right? That’s why they’re the Gettysburg College swimming and diving team, not just the college swim and dive team of central PA? The Gettysburg College business school doesn’t have a website where it maintains rosters that are part of the department.
Colleges publicize student-athlete representation of the school. As do the student-athletes. As do, I assume, you.
It would be the same as if the valedictorian did this, or the president of the student-body. Some students hold a different level of visibility from others, and this is done on purpose. That intentional visibility carries both risks and rewards.
Your kid is definitely… Read more »
I guess these morons never read SwimSwam. If true, in what world is it ok to do something like that?
I dont think you need to read swimswam to realize how terrible this is…..
Everyone is leaving out the fact that this was two Freshmen students, drunk at a party and they did this to each other.
No one was harmed, there was no “victim” or “crime to report to the police. One student asked the other student to scratch a slur onto them and the other student did it. The student who asked for it then showed it off to other students at the party with a “look at me, look at me” attitude. This was two drunk Freshmen students at a party doing something stupid to each other. Is it reprehensible, absolutely, yes. The media has now taken this to a level of titillation that sells clicks.
This entire incident… Read more »
I will never get over the way that 18-22 year old boys justify the dumbass things they do.
“The media”
“For clicks”
“They were drunk”
This is why the legal drinking age is 21. Admitting to breaking a law by drinking under age isn’t the defense to carving racist slogans into each others’ bodies that you think it is.
Callously using racial slurs at a party is absolutely not a victimless crime. College kids make mistakes but being drunk and new to campus doesn’t justify any of the behavior in question. A quick glance at their roster indicates this team has non-white athletes. Imagine being a minority on a team and your teammates find it funny to write dehumanizing words on themselves without recognizing the harm in doing so. Having had a similar issue arise when I was competing collegiately, I don’t understand the need to try to find a solution that exonerates people that demonstrate their inability to adhere to basic standards of respect for other human beings. Props to the team members that reported this.
Insane that these kids thought that this was ok or “cool” to do. My mixed 2026 and 2027 swimmers will not be looking at Gettysburg because of the posted statistics of 72% of the school being white. This is not a victimless crime. The crime was that these 2 white freshman were ok and comfortable using whatever term they chose to “etch”
Jen, how bold of you to assume that both freshmen involved were white. One was in fact a PoC.
Jen – I do hope you know that 74% of the population of Pennsylvania is white. This is a fact reported by the US Census Bureau.
There definitely was a victim, and what happened was definitely wrong.
But where you are wrong is insinuating that the institution is somehow racist when their student population’s demographics closely match the state’s overall demographic.
If you’re that upset about 72% white at Gettysburg, I have a big shocker for you that 71% of the total US population is white.
#facts
Double check your data. 2020 Census says US is 57.8% white
There is a release by the family of the victim. They seem to imply it wasn’t by choice or anything like that whatsoever. So, somebody is not being honest. If it is NOT by choice, why would you stand there and let it continue unless there were other factors involved maybe not being discussed (holding against will etc). Or, it WAS by choice and again, somewhere there isn’t honest info.
https://gettysburgian.com/2024/09/victims-family-speaks-out-on-racially-charged-hate-crime-at-gettysburg-swim-team-gathering/