In a recent article in the APA Monitor, contributor Dr. David Wilder is quoted as advocating the following: putting adults into fraternity and sorority houses, having gender integrates Greek clubs to help offset insensitivity and sexual aggression, and limiting alcohol consumption.

However, because Black fraternities and sororities seldom have official housing on campus, these strategies have little impact on them. The national organizations have a limited ability to control what their chapter members do off-campus.

One fraternity, Omega Psi Phi, has taken the novel approach of countersuing a former pledge who had filed suit claiming he had been hazed by fraternity members.

"This is an attempt to protect the fraternity against individuals who participate willingly in these activities, pop up injured, and then seek to bring action against the fraternity," says Emerson Carey, the attorney who is representing Omega Psi Phi in the countersuit.

"We will not sit idly by and let Omega's good name be tarnished and our long record of service and community leadership be diminished," says Dr. Dorsey Miller, Omega's Grand Basileus.

The following are suggestions national Greek organizations might want to consider to send a clear and powerful message that hazing will not be tolerated:

* Sit down with younger members and negotiate a difficult nonviolent pledging process that undergraduates -- and their big brothers and sisters -- will accept as legitimate.

* Create a Web site or 800 number, that is open to the public, where pledges have to register in order to be officially entered into a Greek organization's membership rolls. This way the national offices can control who gets to be listed as a "real" member and which chapters can operate membership intake programs.

* Offer a substantial reward or scholarship for anyone who reports hazing to the police. This would send a powerful message to young members who believe they are upholding the fraternity's or sorority's traditions.