On March 2, seniors across campus found a stern email from their class presidents in their inboxes.

“Over the past few months,” the email began, “there have been a number of incidents of misconduct reported at senior events.”

Highlighting incidents ranging from “disruptive behavior, to vomiting, to property damage and theft,” the message stated that such occurrences jeopardize the class’s “ability to hold future Senior Nights and the San Francisco Senior Nights.”

In a joint email to The Daily, the Senior Class Presidents Kevin Gao, Pamela Kum, James Mitchell and Shyam Ravindran, explained the reasoning behind the statement.

“With any events we hold where alcohol is served, there occasionally are incidents of overdrinking or rowdy behavior,” they said. “Our weekly Senior Nights are our primary events with access to alcohol, and that’s where the majority of incidents occur.”

In their email, the presidents outlined their expectations, discouraging “excessive pre-partying,” and asking that no personal alcohol be brought to events. They also said that students who vomit on Marguerites or chartered buses will now have to pay the $500 clean-up fee and that “students who are reported for misconduct (belligerent behavior and serious alcohol misuse) will be referred to the University for appropriate action and may lead to barring the individual(s) involved from future senior events.”

Some seniors explained that these problems were a result of past behavior or strict rules and limitations at certain events.

According to senior Whitney Sado, a sports editor at The Daily, the e-mail’s message is a far cry from the “student-friendly” attitude of Stanford security earlier this year. She noted an incident during which the security guards let a “clearly intoxicated” senior onto the Marguerite, “merely reminding him not to bring his drink on the bus and to act as sober as possible once at [Pub Night].

“I think seniors quickly realized that the rules weren’t being strictly enforced and that they could get way with small things — bringing alcohol onto Marguerites for example — and then it just kind of snowballed,” she said.

Senior David Louk blamed the locations at which some of the events were held for the problems that the class presidents addressed in their e-mail.

“I think the issue is that closed events with high drink prices, many students feel the need to do all their drinking beforehand,” he said. “Some people don’t want to pay $8 or $9 for drinks, so they end up grotesquely drunk on the Marguerites.”

The presidents said that the recent number of alcohol-related incidents did not appear to represent an increase from previous years or within this year alone.

“These types of issues occur every year, and it’s difficult to judge whether there’s a qualitative difference between this year and previous ones,” the presidents told The Daily. “It’s difficult to say whether there’s been a trend or not through the year; there have been points where we’ve advertised less in regards to our alcohol policies and warnings to the class in general.”

The email also alluded to “recent problems at our Semi-Formal,” and sources tell The Daily that a number of students were caught breaking into stores of alcohol at the event. However, the presidents said that “no particular incident prompted the class e-mail.”

“There have been a few incidents recently to where we felt it necessary to reinforce our policies and think of ways to continue improving upon our operation of Senior Nights and class events in general and ensure that our future events would take place without incident,” they said.

The presidents’ email was drafted “in coordination and contact with” the Senior Cabinet and administrators at such as the Office of Student Affairs and Vaden Health Center.

In his discussions with the presidents, Ralph Castro, manager of the Substance Abuse Prevention Program at Vaden, said they discussed how to avoid problems at future events, and added, “There have been a number of problems associated with the Senior Nights where students have [had] too much alcohol.”

Castro worked with the presidents to phrase the language of their message and the expectations that they wanted to give to the seniors who attend these events.

According to Castro, he and the presidents approached the situation by “looking at the line between what the University’s expectations are and the students’ expectations are and trying to find some middle ground.”

“We’re trying our best to preserve Senior Nights and our general privilege to serve alcohol at class events, and we think the [seniors] understand that we’re working hard to do that,” the presidents said.

Castro agreed, also noting that the trouble is coming from only a small portion of seniors.

“The senior class presidents have been doing a really good job of follow-up and just being proactive,” he said. “The vast majority of students are making good decisions. Everyone really needs to be aware and look out for each other, because the fun of one can jeopardize these events happening in the future.”

Senior Corie Geballe agreed that students are ultimately responsible for their actions and should know how to behave at events.

“By this point, seniors should know their tolerance level,” she said. “It’s kind of ridiculous that people are throwing up on the Marguerites.”

The presidents noted that they had “generally heard positive or neutral comments regarding the email.”

Sado agreed that the presidents are doing a good job of communicating with their class.

“As far as the senior class presidents go, I think they’re doing really well with the senior events,” she said. “It seems like a pretty thankless job where people are quick to criticize. [The presidents] get security, send out repeated warnings to the seniors about proper Pub Night behavior and should just be able to trust us.”