British student coming to UCLA - fraternity?

1Dreamer
Wed, 04 May 2016 19:03:36 +0000

Since no current students have answered, I’ll chime in as an alumni who wasn’t in a fraternity, but has some knowledge from my day of how things work.

I would say it’s not likely you’ll have the fraternity option open to you. While there is no rule set in stone that I’m aware of, they are usually looking for someone who will add to the fraternity over the course of years rather than the months you would have left as an “active” member after going through the pledge process.

Even if you were able to get in one, there are only so many rooms available in each house, and which active members get to live in those rooms is usually determined by the end of the previous school year. It would be very rare to have an opening mid-year and then priority would probably go to a more senior member first.

That said, you’ll still be able to attend fraternity rush parties if you want. They are open to anyone, and if you end up meeting friends who are in fraternities or sororities, you may still be invited to other parties and events they have. I had several friends in fraternities and sororities who invited me to various parties and events.

My suggestion would be to make arrangements to live in a dorm if possible where you will have the best opportunity to meet and make friends with other students. There’s a large neighborhood of apartments behind fraternity row where students live when they move off campus (look on google maps for the area between Gayley and Veteran Ave.). That neighborhood is virtually all students and is basically considered an extension of campus housing. There’s another area on the other side of Wilshire Blvd. from Westwood Village where students live, but this is a little further out and while still walkable, it’s not all students and you have to think a lot more about whether you have time to run home between classes, etc. and plan accordingly.

But moving into an apartment is normally something students do sometime after living in a dorm where they meet friends to move out with. I’m afraid you’d be robbing yourself of a lot of the “college experience” available at UCLA by not living in a dorm or living in an apartment further away, so I would try to live in campus housing - or as close to campus as you can in the event you can’t get campus housing.

Hope that helps, and hoping you have a great experience!