<div dir="ltr"><div>Hello all,</div><div><br></div><div>We hope this email finds you and yours well. We're in the midst of renewing our club status with MIT and need <b>MIT students to fill out this form to confirm their membership (<1 min to fill out): <a href="https://engage.mit.edu/submitter/form/start/405022" target="_blank">https://engage.mit.edu/submitter/form/start/405022</a>. </b>Students can also consider adding themselves to the Lindy Hop organization on engage directly: <a href="https://engage.mit.edu/organization/lindyhopsociety">https://engage.mit.edu/organization/lindyhopsociety</a>. Student groups are required by the ASA to have at least five MIT student members confirm membership each year.<br><b></b></div><div><b><br></b></div><div>We'd also like to take this opportunity to update everyone on MIT's COVID-19 response, send out our yearly anti-hazing and non-discrimination statements, and provide resources that might interest you to get your dancing-fix from home.</div><div><br></div><div><h1>COVID-19 update</h1>
<p>We interpret <a href="https://ovc.mit.edu/summer-student-options-travel/" target="_blank">MIT's April 24 post about summer programming</a>
to mean there will be no student group events physically on campus
through at least June 28, 2020. MIT decisions regarding the remainder of summer
will be made likely in late May and posted on MIT's official COVID-19
website: <a href="https://covid19.mit.edu/" target="_blank">https://covid19.mit.edu/</a><br><br>
If you have any questions or concerns about the swing dance, please write back to us at <a href="mailto:swing@mit.edu" target="_blank">swing@mit.edu</a> .<br><br>
Stay well, everyone, and we look forward to seeing you when dances resume.</p><h1>Dancing at Home<br></h1>
<p>Boston Swing Central has a mailing list and facebook page where they have been sharing online and livestream events (sign-up and learn more here: <a href="http://www.bostonswingcentral.org/">http://www.bostonswingcentral.org/</a>). Events this <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/669598900491913/">Friday</a> and <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/577654079544561/">Sunday</a> are already posted on Facebook -- feel free to check them out! They have been coordinating a calendar of other virtual events and providing information to support local teachers and musicians, so please consider joining that online community!<br></p>
<h1>Massachusetts Anti-hazing and MIT Non-discrimination</h1>
<p>All MIT student groups are required to follow the
Massachusetts Anti-hazing law and the MIT Non-discrimination
policy. As required by section 19, the text of this law is
distributed below.<br><br>
If you have any questions, concerns, or want to report
questionable behavior or violations of these policies,
please email <a href="mailto:asa-president@mit.edu" target="_blank">asa-president@mit.edu</a> (confidential,
non-archived) and/or Ethan Feuer (<a href="mailto:efeuer@mit.edu" target="_blank">efeuer@mit.edu</a>, Director
of the Student Organizations and Engagement).</p>
<h2>TEXT OF ANTI-HAZING LAW:</h2>
<h3>THE GENERAL LAWS OF MASSACHUSETTS, Chapter 269</h3>
<p>Section 17. HAZING; ORGANIZING OR PARTICIPATING; HAZING
DEFINED: Whoever is a principal organizer or participant in
the crime of hazing, as defined herein, shall be punished by
a fine of not more than three thousand dollars or by
imprisonment in a house of correction for not more than one
year, or both such fine and imprisonment.<br><br>
The term hazing as used in this section and in sections
eighteen and nineteen, shall mean any conduct or method of
initiation into any student organization, whether on public
or private property, which willfully or recklessly endangers
the physical or mental health of any student or other
person. Such conduct shall include whipping, beating,
branding, forced calisthenics, exposure to the weather,
forced consumption of any food, liquor, beverage, drug or
other substance, or any other brutal treatment or forced
physical activity which is likely to adversely affect the
physical health or safety of any such student or other
person, or which subjects such student or other person to
extreme mental stress, including extended deprivation of
sleep or rest or extended isolation.<br><br>
Notwithstanding any other provisions of this section to the
contrary, consent shall not be available as a defense to any
prosecution under this action.<br><br>
Section 18. FAILURE TO REPORT HAZING: Whoever knows that
another person is the victim of hazing as defined in section
seventeen and is at the scene of such crime shall, to the
extent that such person can do so without danger or peril to
himself or others, report such crime to an appropriate law
enforcement official as soon as reasonably practicable.
Whoever fails to report such crime shall be punished by a
fine of not more than one thousand dollars.<br><br>
Section 19. COPY OF SECS. 17 TO 19; ISSUANCE TO STUDENTS AND
STUDENT GROUPS, TEAMS AND ORGANIZATIONS; REPORT: Each
institution of secondary education and each public and
private institution of post secondary education shall issue
to every student group, student team or student organization
which is part of such institution or is recognized by the
institution or permitted by the institution to use its name
or facilities or is known by the institution to exist as an
unaffiliated student group, student team or student
organization, a copy of this section and sections seventeen
and eighteen; provided, however, that an institution's
compliance with this section's requirements that an
institution issue copies of this section and sections
seventeen and eighteen to unaffiliated student groups, teams
or organizations shall not constitute evidence of the
institution's recognition or endorsement of said
unaffiliated student groups, teams or organizations.<br><br>
Each such group, team or organization shall distribute a
copy of this section and sections seventeen and eighteen to
each of its members, plebes, pledges or applicants for
membership. It shall be the duty of each such group, team or
organization, acting through its designated officer, to
deliver annually, to the institution [in MIT's case the
Office of Student Life Programs (with exception of varsity
teams and club sports, who will deliver attested
acknowledgements to the Department of Athletics, Physical
Education and Recreation)] an attested acknowledgement
stating that such group, team or organization has received a
copy of this section and said sections seventeen and
eighteen, that each of its members, plebes, pledges, or
applicants has received a copy of sections seventeen and
eighteen, and that such group, team or organization
understands and agrees to comply with the provisions of this
section and sections seventeen and eighteen.<br><br>
Each institution of secondary education and each public or
private institution of post secondary education shall, at
least annually, before or at the start of enrollment,
deliver to each person who enrolls as a full time student in
such institution a copy of this section and sections
seventeen and eighteen.<br><br>
Each institution of secondary education and each public or
private institution of post secondary education shall file,
at least annually, a report with the board of higher
education and in the case of secondary institutions, the
board of education, certifying that such institution has
complied with its responsibility to inform student groups,
teams or organizations and to notify each full time student
enrolled by it of the provisions of this section and
sections seventeen and eighteen and also certifying that
said institution has adopted a disciplinary policy with
regard to the organizers and participants of hazing, and
that such policy has been set forth with appropriate
emphasis in the student handbook or similar means of
communicating the institution's policies to its students.
The board of higher education and, in the case of secondary
institutions, the board of education shall promulgate
regulations governing the content and frequency of such
reports, and shall forthwith report to the attorney general
any such institution which fails to make such report.</p>
<h2>TEXT OF NON-DISCRIMINATION POLICY:</h2>
<p>The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is committed to the principle
of equal opportunity in education and employment. The Institute
prohibits discrimination against individuals on the basis of race,
color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, pregnancy, religion,
disability, age, genetic information, veteran status, or national or
ethnic origin in the administration of its educational policies,
admissions policies, employment policies, scholarship and loan
programs, and other Institute administered programs and activities; the
Institute may, however, favor US citizens or residents in admissions
and financial aid.(*)<br><br>
The Vice President for Human Resources is designated as the Institute's
Equal Opportunity Officer. Inquiries concerning the Institute's
policies, compliance with applicable laws, statutes, and regulations,
and complaints may be directed to Ramona Allen, Vice President for
Human Resources, Building NE49-5000, 617-324-5675. In addition,
inquiries about Title IX (which prohibits discrimination on the basis
of sex) may be directed to the Institute's Title IX coordinator, Sarah
Rankin, Room W31-223, 617-324-7526, <a href="mailto:titleIX@mit.edu" target="_blank">titleIX@mit.edu</a>. Inquiries
about the laws and about compliance may also be directed to the US
Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights, Region I, 5 Post
Office Square, 8th Floor, Boston, MA 02109-3921, 617-289-0111,
<a href="mailto:OCR.Boston@ed.gov" target="_blank">OCR.Boston@ed.gov</a>.<br><br>
(*) The ROTC programs at MIT are operated under Department of Defense
(DoD) policies and regulations, and do not comply fully with MIT's
policy of nondiscrimination with regard to gender identity. MIT
continues to advocate for a change in DoD policies and regulations
concerning gender identity, and is committed to providing alternative
financial assistance under a needs-based assessment to any MIT student
who loses ROTC financial aid because of these DoD policies and
regulations.<br><br>
The statement was last updated on October 1, 2019.<br><br>
<a href="http://referencepubs.mit.edu/what-we-do/nondiscrimination-policy" target="_blank">http://referencepubs.mit.edu/what-we-do/nondiscrimination-policy</a></p><p><br></p><p>If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please feel free to reach out to us at <a href="mailto:swing@mit.edu">swing@mit.edu</a>. Thank you to all of our volunteers this last year who helped make our dance possible; and we look forward to seeing everyone in the future!</p><p><br></p><p>Kindly,</p><p>The LHS Officers<br></p></div><div><b></b></div></div>