How do Greek communities compare among schools

College Search & Lists
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<p>I think that one of the things a lot of that students compare to make a college decision is the Greek community at a school. Interestingly almost every school likes to downplay the Greek community. If you’re one of those people, then this thread is not for you!</p>

<p>Now that that’s out of the way, I think it would be interesting to compare schools’ Greek communities…and the overall impact on the rest of the college.</p>

<p>For instance I went to SMU and it was like…yeah so what? Everyone is in a fraternity, what’s the big deal? I guess the effect on SMU would be that everyone wore Gucci or Armani and drove beautiful cars that put my new Mustang to shame…</p>

<p>I went to OU and Greek involvement was scarce. Greeks were shunned, and you got a sense that the campus was mostly ran by independents. There were still a lot of Greeks on campus, they just weren’t involved in campus activities very much. They use their letters instead as a status symbol instead of a way to get involved on campus. OU, being ran by independents, gave me more of a liberal, political activist-type school and less of a preppy laid-back school. Freshman must live in dorms.</p>

<p>I went to TCU and they didn’t have enough room for their Greeks. TCU owns all of the Greek houses, which are on a separate campus close by. It’s a cul-de-sac of identical Greek houses surrounded by one huge parking lot. I didn’t like that at all. There was no neighborhood sense…it felt like a shopping mall or something. A lot of Greeks had to live in the dorms…or chose to live in the dorms instead. I thought that was weird. Greeks had no more opportunities to get involved than independents because the intramural sports leagues were all open to everyone regardless of independent of Greek house.</p>

<p>I went to OSU and Greek involvement was kind of a good mix. Greeks were embraced around campus, in fact the SGA pres/vice pres were Greeks, and their predecessors, and so on. My campus guide was Greek, even though he was not allowed to tell me which Greek house he belonged to (I later found out he was a Fiji at Greek Discovery Day). At OSU Greeks aren’t as upscale and use their Greek letters as a way to get involved on campus instead of as a status symbol. Ultimately that was a big factor in choosing OSU over the other 3 that were my main contenders.</p>

<p>Ultimately I found a place that had a Greek community with your typical party scene (safe environment for unsafe practices, as they say), that stressed campus involvement with its own separate intramural sports leagues, dominance over campus leadership, as well academic performance. It was a helpful comparison over the other 3 schools because I already had a good idea of what kind of campus community I would be surrounded by and what all I would be able to take advantage of. </p>

<p>Does anyone else have more colleges to add, or any comments on that?</p>

2

<p>Well I’m going to Dartmouth, and greek is a pretty big deal there. I think the stats say over 2/3 of all eligible students are in a frat or sorority (freshman aren’t able to rush). But when I visited they were all very open and kind, definitely not elitist or closed doors kinds of places at all.</p>

3

<p>I never understood the point of closing off Rush to freshman in order to preserve original dorm life or whatever for freshman. If freshman are supposed to first experience “original dorm life” … doesn’t having a system where dorms are mostly just for freshman anyway kind of defeat the purpose?</p>

4

<p>I think the idea at Dartmouth was more of class bonding. They’d rather you spend time with members of your class and getting to know them freshman year instead of getting superinvolved with your house and not investing in your classmates. Same sort of idea as sophomore summer in a way.</p>

5

<p>Wouldn’t Greeks doing stuff within their pledge class be similar?</p>

6

<p>Kind of, but it would narrow down your social network almost immediately. This way you have a chance to get to meet and befriend other who will eventually join a different house than you, or not go greek at all, and have those friendships established. Also, the entire freshman year gives you a chance to look at the greek houses and decide which one you really feel like you fit with. -shrugs- it’s not a perfect system, but neither is the other, and the both have their merits.</p>

7

<p>That’s true. Both have their merits and both have their downfalls…same as going Greek and staying independent. In fact they have the same merits/downfalls…it would seem.</p>

8

<p>The #1, most fundamental, absolute basic rule of Greek Life: It’s different on every campus. There may be overall similarities - greeks are either involved or they aren’t, greeks either have good grades or they don’t, etc…but in terms of what’s considered “normal” or tradition, or the way things run, every place has a unique circumstance.</p>

<p>As a Greek alumnus, I certainly find the issue of deferred recruitment/rush problematic. Most usually the defense of the practice is based on either improved social network, or more often, rush is put off so that pledging doesn’t “get in the way” of adjusting to college as a freshman. Some other arguments frequently brought forth include the “this way freshmen will get a chance to see what all the houses have to offer and won’t go on stereotype” or the “fraternities and sororities will have improved recruitment because they’ll get people who otherwise wouldn’t have joined a chapter an opportunity to see what the Greeks actually do”.</p>

<p>I find the “adjustment” rationale to complete BS…good chapters with good pledge programs help their members adjust to college by providing guidance and opportunities for growth, with a support network in place to help those who struggle. Now, in terms of socializing, if you already go to a small school, it’s possible that pledging would decrease your likelihood of meeting everyone, but in your big schools, going greek early makes things EASIER, by narrowing the scope a lot. It’s a lot less intimidating to be in a Greek community of 3000 students than a general student population of 25000. </p>

<p>I also think the “loss of stereotypes” argument is awful as well…most students, unless they already know people in the system have zero clue what each house is like when they come to campus anyways…why give them a semester to hear nothing but “ABC’s are the nerds, XYZ’s are the jocks, MNO’s are the sluts, GHI’s are the preps” etc. </p>

<p>Lastly, the “more people will rush” argument is probably the worst of them all…for every kid who decides that they will rush when they weren’t going to before, there’s probably 4 who thought about joining and decided they were “too busy” to pledge…Get students in early, expose them to being busy early on and they’ll stay busy for the rest of their time in school. </p>

<p>It’s been a while, but the NIC has successfully threatened legal action against several state universities on Constitutional grounds that deferred rush represented a violation of the rights of assembly and free association by a government agency (the state-funded university). Of course, such a threat wouldn’t work against private schools, and so they are more likely to have rules against freshmen rushing.</p>

9

<p>ya I’m looking for a school with a sweet greek life…</p>

<p>my sister went to SMU and was a Pi Phi, and it seems pretty fun there, but like you said it’s all super rich kids with Range Rovers and Gucci shades.</p>

10

<p>SMU Greeks are great at burying their head in the sand and staying uninvolved so they don’t dirty their hands. Greek letters there are just a status symbol… it was part of my justification for not going to SMU. Although I might be kind of biased since I thought SMU was just too damn close to home! lol</p>

<p>Bigredmed, I wholeheartedly agree with everything that you were saying. I didn’t want to be so bold as to suggest deferred rush as a ploy to put the Greeks down and minimize their influence, but that’s really all it is. You will almost never see it at a school whose president was Greek. At schools where the president was a GDI (god-damn independent) you almost always see deferred rush, among other strategies…probably aimed at hurting the Greek Community and minimizing their campus impact.</p>

<p>What the rule would seem to do…and has done at OU and other similar schools is that the campus leader-types are too busy by the time they are even eligible to rush. It’s great at diminishing the influence of the fraternities. At these schools the Greek scene is usually a joke, and they never have the campus leadership types. At schools where Greek houses are free to recruit someone as soon as they are admitted to the school you see that those Greek communities are the ones that have campus leaders and emphasize leadership skills and campus involvement…because they’re able to go after all of the good students before they’re too busy.</p>

11

<p>I’m not sure I’d place a lot of blame on whether the University President is affiliated or not. </p>

<p>In particular, in the case of OU, at least as I vaguely remember, going to deferred rush was one way for them to survive. I was in Norman for a football game against my alma mater, back in 2004 right after the campus had a severe alcohol poisoning/death (I don’t remember exactly which) and the University had put all the fraternities on social probation (they still hosted a nice house party for me and my chapter brothers…though I almost got in a fight for saying Jason White shouldn’t have won the Heisman !yikes!). I think deferred rush and having substance free housing were two of the major items the University put them up to in the wake of the tragedy. Now maybe it has resulted in a drastic change in campus climate (I haven’t really paid attention), but what I’m getting at it that there were likely larger external forces in place than just some vengeful Gamma Delt University President…</p>

<p>I’m also not sure I’d say that deferred rush by definition limits the influence of fraternities. It’s not a matter of getting the “leaders on campus” to join the greek system and then pointing to them as examples of what the Greek experience can do…those people would have gotten involved anyways. Good greek systems take the guys and gals with potential and then encourage them to tap it by getting involved on campus (that’s what happened to me in my chapter). With that model, there’s little reason why the influence of Greeks should be lowered, you still have quite the opportunity to get talented people and make them better over the remainder of their college career. If Greeks lack a presence on campus, then what they’re offering, or how they’re pushing their membership is faulty. The Greek systems that “run” their campus do it by filling the ranks, not just by having one or two people at the top.</p>

<p>OSU, with your interest in Greeks at other schools, I think you’d really, really enjoy the NIC’s Undergraduate Interfraternity Institute (UIFI)…great, great program held during the summer every year. They put on a bunch of sessions at Indiana University and a couple out West (they might have other locations now too - I went to it in 2004, so things might have grown), but it’s a co-ed program that brings together fraternity and sorority leaders for a week of training in leadership, service learning, and fellowship that’s geared towards Greeks and the challenges we face. A lot of universities send their IFC and Panhel execs, but it’s open to anyone and I know a lot of the Itner/national organizations have scholarships available to defer costs for those who earn them. I got one from my General Fraternity and only had to pay for airfare…but I think you’d really like it because you’d get to meet Greek men and women from all over the country and find out about ways to improve your campus</p>

12

<p>Thanks for the recommendation, Bigred. Sorry for your experience in Norman…I know it is so bad that a lot of us get turned off by the Sooner crazies (like my parents) and go to OSU for peace of mind. I do remember that about the OU alcohol poisoning death…the guy was a Fiji and his parents led a campaign to put the entire OU Greek community on probation. </p>

<p>The Fiji’s at OU were already kind of the “Animal House” so I suspect OU’s president, former Senator David Boren, took advantage of that to reduce Greek influence. David Boren was the liberal Senator who was Reagan’s biggest adversary in the 80’s. Most people also suspect that he’s gay…not that this is a bad thing, it’s just noteworthy that he has a vendetta against unfairly perceived homophobia. When he attended OU and Yale he was fiercely independent (he was in an “honors fraternity” and lived in the dormitory), wrote many anti-fraternity columns in the OU Daily that are still available for people to read. He did go on to be a Skull and Bones, a Rhodes Scholar, and a big figure on Capitol Hill though, so go figure.</p>

<p>I agree with you that OU’s Greeks probably did bring their troubles onto themselves. One bad house can bring the entire community down. The deferred rush is just the most obvious reason I can come up with for the stark difference in Greek communities. I have a really limited knowledge of Greek life because I am not yet a part of it, and I only know what I’ve been able to glean from my own investigating as well as my rush experiences to date, which I’ve had a good time at for sure.</p>

<p>Oh and thanks for the UIFI info. I am interested in that kind of thing. Actually I know a few fraternities send their pledge classes on trips like that. Most send their leadership on trips like that, usually to the national HQ for that fraternity. Like SAE sends its guys to Chicago. One of the main reasons I’m so interested in Greek life is because I’m a Presidential Leadership Council scholar at OSU, so I’ve had several fraternities actively recruiting me…it’s a great thing when people show they actually want you, and at the same time are able to convince you that you “belong with them.”</p>

13

<p>So how is Greek life at Indiana University…anyone?</p>

14

<p>Try checking out this link, cheezwhiz.
[Indiana</a> University Bloomington: Student: Greek Organizations](<a href=“Indiana University Bloomington”>Indiana University Bloomington)</p>

15

<p>At MIT, a very large percentage of the student body was Greek (close to half the men and around 20% of the women). You get to choose your living group anyway, so it was simply another option that happened to have a certain cultural structure (the pledge period, the rituals, etc). There were a few “partisans” (extremely pro/anti-Greek) in both the Greek and non-Greek communities, but they were small in number, and most people were pretty chill about it.</p>

<p>Fraternity and sorority rush were at the beginning of freshman year, but while freshmen could be affiliated with Greek organizations, they weren’t allowed to live in their Greek houses until sophomore year (a policy disliked both by most Greeks and most non-Greeks).</p>

<p>The houses themselves varied quite widely. There were a few that I would have been happy to see shut down if not for the fact that then their people would have to live in the rest of our living groups, and some that I thought were really great, and plenty in various degrees in between. Average GPA also varied widely between houses. In the end, though, it’s MIT, everyone had to buckle down and study and do the work if they wanted to be allowed to stay at MIT and eventually graduate.</p>