The Gettysburg College swim team releases a statement after a racial slur was “scratched” on a student's body

The Gettysburg College swimming team spoke out this week after two team members were accused of carving a racial slur on another teammate's body.

On September 19, The Gettysburgian reported that both students were suspended from the team after they were accused of using a racial slur against another student. Gettysburg College released a statement to PennLive saying the students were suspended after they “used a plastic or ceramic tool” to carve the racial slur.

On Tuesday, the college said only one of the suspended students was still enrolled. The other student is working with school officials and family members to determine the most productive way to move forward, a spokesman said.

The following statement from the swim team was posted on its website Wednesday evening:

“Given the intense attention surrounding recent events on campus, the Gettysburg College swim team is compelled to address the incident head-on.

“We recognize that the last few weeks have been exceptionally difficult for many people within our campus community and beyond. Our thoughts are with everyone who is directly and indirectly affected by this. The pain and anguish caused by the heinous act and subsequent media coverage have affected people around the world. As a swim team, these days are some of the most difficult of our lives, both collectively and individually.

The swimming team emphasized that the discrimination was not due to team encouragement or an “unhealthy athletic team culture,” as team members were responsible for reporting the incident to university officials.

“The national spotlight has unfortunately led some to believe that our team or the culture within our team is complicit in the racist incident. “This couldn’t be further from the truth,” the statement said. “Racism has no home here – neither at Gettysburg College nor on our team. We agree that we condemn the acts that took place.”

The swimming team also said the social gathering where the incident occurred was not a team-organized event.

“We know the character of this team. We believe in our team. “Staying silent while our reputation was unfairly tarnished was torturous,” the team said in the statement. “It was deeply hurtful to see something we love so much being falsely associated with something so abhorrent.

“In a few weeks we will return to the swimming pool determined as always. We will represent this college with pride, both in and out of the water. We will emerge from this as a stronger, more unified team, and as many others have said, our campus has the potential to become a stronger institution as a result.”

Gettysburg College President Robert Iuliano issued a statement a few days after The Gettysburgian's initial report. He thanked the upperclassmen on the swim team who reported the alleged racial discrimination and expressed “deep disgust” over the incident.

“I recognize that the lack of details surrounding this incident could be frustrating, and we ask for your forbearance,” Iuliano said during the ongoing investigation.

The names and ages of the students involved have not been publicly released.