<p>Considering what a positive impact the Eating Clubs have had on most Princeton classmates that I know, both during school years and thereafter, I have been continually amazed at the negative vibes that I have observed that last few months on these message boards, mostly coming from people that attended other schools or from high school students and their parents. Can we list some of the reasons here why people are making such negative comments?</p>
<p>I would like to review each one separately then comment, including potential misunderstandings.</p>
<p>midat, so in reality, compared to Fraternities and Sororities that have the members start during Spring semester of Freshmen Year or Fall semester of Sophomore year, the formal involvement in Princeton Eating Clubs is much less - only Junior and Senior year.</p>
<p>The eating clubs, for my DD, were a wonderful experience of socializing, eating quality food, meeting new people (plenty of non-members too), enjoying House Party date weekends in the spring, and dancing to a variety of bands. While the clubs were a center of socializing in spring sophomore and junior year, by senior year the influence decreased as couples formed, and the demands of senior theses grew.</p>
<p>^Thanks for the link. I just read the report. It seems to get at the heart of the important issues surrounding the clubs.</p>
<p>I hope some of these suggestions will be put into place, including an interesting suggestion for a new member selection process. This new process would allow clubs to continue to be selective if they desire, but removes the current cruelty from the bicker system.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I would love to hear what some of the Princeton apolo. . . um, alumni think of the report.</p></li>
<li><p>I had to laugh a little, though. The 70-year-old who said that Princeton bicker was the worst experience of his life? He meant, of course, to be saying it was that bad, and all I could think was that his life had been that good. Too young to remember WWII or the Depression, too young to fight in Korea, probably too old for the Vietnam draft, but not too old for the Sexual Revolution. Unprecedented prosperity during his prime earning and saving years. Talk about being born at the right time!</p></li>
</ol>
<p>JHS, I read the report, and only found this part to be new/interesting:</p>
<p>“Data from a questionnaire that the Admission Office distributes each year to all admitted students show that among enrolling students, 39% say the clubs had a positive or strong positive influence on their decision to enroll and 15% say they had a negative or strong negative influence. Among non-enrolling students, 16% say the clubs had a positive or strong positive influence and 49% say it had a negative or strong negative influence.”</p>
<p>In other words, pre-frosh who don’t like the eating clubs only come to Princeton at a rate of 23.4%. This rate spikes to 55.6% for indifferent kids and 70.9% for kids who like the clubs.</p>
<p>What was new and interesting about that? That almost a quarter of students accepted at Princeton who hate the idea of eating clubs come anyway? (Sure, if they didn’t get in anywhere else they liked more, or could give them better aid.) Or that Princeton only gets 70% of the students who LIKE eating clubs? (That’s the one that I can’t figure out.)</p>
<p>What interested me most about the report were two things: First, how strong negative feelings about the clubs remain within the Princeton community. As an outsider, I really haven’t seen that at all. I have posted many times that all the Princetonians I know either love the clubs or don’t mind them at all, and that prospective students should stop thinking of them as some strong negative. I may have been wrong about that. Second, the ground rules for the report and the composition of the committee are a massive demonstration of just how much power the bicker clubs have at Princeton. They tied themselves in knots to make certain no one was allowed to ask the question “Should we have eating clubs at all,” even though every indication is that if such a question were asked it would be answered with a yes. Except maybe not, see above. Also, while the report takes pains to make clear that the eating clubs were well-represented on the committee, the report does not permit anyone to tell whether non-member students or alumni were actually included, too. In any event, no one cared to make that a rule. Now, I’m reasonably certain such representatives were included, but the failure to have that be an explicit part of the committee’s constitution looks like evidence of epic anxiety.</p>
<p>I would never have thought eating clubs were such a point of contention if I didn’t see this thread. The off-campus Princeton graduates I talked too (granted, there were only two of them) didn’t even mention them.</p>
<p>Well, as the parent of student who will be attending, this is the part that most interested me:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>So in all about 23% of students (73% of 31.5% non-club members) find the clubs to not be a positive for Princeton. I can’t tell whether that includes kids that are neutral toward them or whether they all have negative feelings about them.</p>
<p>To me it is more important that 86% of non-club members are satisfied with their experience at Princeton (along with about 94% of club members). That seems very high to me for both.</p>
<p>As to whether pre-frosh make their decisions based on the eating clubs. Again, I think that the stereo-types are exaggerated by those not attending the school, and that unfortunately influences the easily swayed perceptions of outsiders. This report does nothing to make me think differently. I do, however, hope they follow through on their recommendation that the system of selection be changed to make it less painful and more fair for all.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>JHS, I really don’t get how you see from this report that the negative feelings among Princeton students are really strong. There are obviously criticisms and many suggestions as to how things should be done differently, but I personally believe the basic conclusion of the report which states that overall, students felt it was a positive element in campus life.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>At the end of the report, the members and there affiliations are listed. There appears to be only one non-club member.</p>
<p>I am in no position to argue in defense of the clubs as I have never gone to Princeton and I would never dismiss lightly all the negative aspects of the system that are cited in the report. </p>
<p>I’m just saying that you have to look at this with some balance here. At least the school is openly questioning the negatives of club life and selection. That was the focus of the report, not the positives. But keep in mind the introductory finding:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I don’t think you can take from this report that there is huge dissatisfaction among Princeton students over the whole club scene…There are issues that must be worked on and improved but my perception is they are not a central part of the Princeton experience for the vast majority of students.</p>
<p>*substitute “their affiliations” in post #30</p>
<p>Wildwood, I thought I had made it clear – but if not I’ll do it again – that I do not believe most Princeton students are dissatisfied at all with the institution of the eating clubs. Far from it – I think most Princeton students are happy with the system. On the other hand, I have been saying for years – and I think I said it earlier in this thread – that I was not aware of any significant dissatisfaction with the eating clubs by people who actually attended Princeton. I can’t say that any more, because this report clearly shows that some meaningful portion of the current student body and of the alumni have deep negative feelings about the clubs, and not completely without justification.</p>
<p>Also, the defensiveness of the whole process surprised me. You are right, it is possible to determine from the last page that there is one (one!) Princeton student or alumni on the committee who is not affiliated with any club. Plus three faculty members and one administrator who are not Princeton alumni. That’s out of 18 committee members, 14 of whom were students or alumni. 13-1? Do we think the non-club Princeton experience was fairly represented on the committee? Then there are the elaborate assurances that club voices were listened to in the process – a whole portion of the introduction dealing with how well represented the clubs were (and that doesn’t say whether non-club members were involved at all), and a detailing of how many comments were received from members of each club, with no accounting at all for comments received from non club-members, except for general language that “most” of them were freshmen and sophomores (and thus presumably not yet eligible for club affiliation). I</p>
<p>In other words, great pains were taken to ensure that the committee would be favorable to the clubs, and no systematic efforts were made to make certain non-club input was received. Nevertheless, there is enormous defensiveness about the mild criticisms leveled at clubs in the report. All of that defensiveness is focused on club members; the committee thinks it needs to justify itself to them, not to the rest of the Princeton community. That just seems a little weird to me, and makes me thing that there’s more turmoil below the surface than even the report acknowledged.</p>
<p>I think you are reading a bit too much into this. Clearly there are problems with the club system. The University is trying to address these issues. They should be commended. </p>
<p>There was a survey available on Tigernet so that all Alums could voice their opinions. So it was not as one sided as you are making it out to be.</p>
<p>I was an independent while at Princeton because I could never have asked my parents to write out a check for an “Eating Club”. I saved my parent tons of $$ by eating at the “Wa” for two years. Money they really needed. </p>
<p>Also, I am one of those mentioned in the survey that think that the very idea of bicker goes against everything the University stands for. I felt that way as an undergrad also.</p>
<p>I was very glad too see that the University gets these issues. </p>
<p>Still though, lets see what changes. In the end this exercise means nothing if they can’t fix the parts that aren’t working well.</p>
<p>@JHS: Since I’m a current student, the sort of dissatisfaction expressed in the report is not new to me in any way. There is definitely a segment of the student body that is very disenchanted by the eating clubs, and the administration’s view of the bicker clubs can be described as mildly antagonistic at best. Every year, the Prince publishes columns about the hurtfulness of the selection process, the advantages given to the affiliated, the socioeconomic and racial disparities between the bicker clubs and the University as a whole, ad infinitum, ad nauseum. The res colleges hold panel discussions for freshmen and sophomores explaining all of their “options” and how “you can still have a social life” even if you’re not in your club of choice, or even in a club at all. In turn, each RA group has a study break designed to further allay fears regarding dining options for junior and senior year. The entire thing implies that there’s something “awful” about the bicker clubs, both about getting rejected by them and about the kinds of kids they choose. In fact, I’d say I never hear anything good about bicker clubs except from bicker club members/alumni themselves (and maybe from a few hosees and/or prospective bickerees as well). Thus, I stand by what I said before - what I found interesting was that an admitted student is nearly three times more likely to matriculate at Princeton if he/she has positive rather than negative impressions of the club system. Obviously I knew that type of student would be more likely to come, but I had no idea that it appeared to have such a large effect.</p>
<p>You are, however, pretty insightful about the defensiveness of the committee. Generally, the clubs go their own way, regardless of what anyone outside of them has to say, so I think the reason the task force needed to have so much club representation was to increase the possibility that the clubs might listen to the findings and recommendations. When the formation of the task force was announced (and representatives from the clubs were invited), my club president mentioned that at a recent meeting of the club presidents (an Inter-Club Council meeting), they had agreed to pay close attention to the composition and stated goals of the task force. If it was stacked against the clubs, or seemed to be on a “witch hunt,” then the clubs would “stonewall” both the committee and its findings.</p>
<p>In my opinion, the task force would obviously be defensive towards club members rather than the entire community because 1) club members are the only ones likely to have any beef with the findings, and 2) club members are in a much better position to try to fix (or resist fixing) whatever “problems” the committee may have stumbled across. You absolutely need the clubs on your side if you want to make any meaningful changes to the Street.</p>
<p>I just didn’t capture that same sense of defensiveness that you did, JHS. I agree, it would seem to have made sense to have greater non-club representation, but I suppose the idea there was to get the actual clubs that would have the power to make changes more on board rather than non-members who, in all practicality, really don’t have a say in how the clubs are run.</p>
<p>And I guess I just question your characterization that the negative feelings are so “deep” among a portion of students or that a percentage of a accepted students that arrive at Princeton “hate” the idea of eating clubs. Clearly, some people could do without the clubs, and the bicker experience can be painful, but I wonder, and I really don’t know the answer, if their feelings are so strong as to color their view of Princeton. I just don’t get that from this report…your interpretation is obviously different, probably because we are coming at it from very different angles.</p>
<p>cross-posted with ray. But I’d like to hear more from his point of view on how much the independents actually care about the club system and if, besides with the immediate effects of bicker, their is a sense of being excluded or an being “an outsider”.</p>
<p>Having worked on annual giving a few times over the years I came across more than a few alums who never gave. Not even $10. To me this can only mean real dissatisfaction. However, this doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the clubs. Probably all universities have their share of dissatisfied alums.</p>
<p>In my case, whatever negative feelings I have about bicker and my inability to join an eating club due to lack of $$ are FAR outweighed by my incredible, life changing experience of being at Princeton for four years. I think most alums who do not like the club system probably feel the same.</p>
<p>My son will be entering the University with the class of 2014. When we went to preview weekend, he expected to come away with an awful impression of the clubs. Instead he came away thinking he will be a great fit for Terrace. :)</p>
<p>The University is in a tough situation in terms of its ability to make any changes to this system because any changes must involve the agreement of the clubs themselves. Although these clubs have graduate boards, they are run by students.</p>
<p>It is very difficult to get a 20 year old with no real life experience to see why some of these changes will be for the overall good of the University and for the clubs themselves. They basically always fight for the status quo. When I was an undergraduate, students were fighting tooth and nail against the impending residential college system. It was going to “destroy Princeton as we know it”. Now, I think most of us would agree, it has been a very good thing. Good thing the administration did not have to listen to us.</p>
<p>MIT is facing a similar situation with its weird dining system. Student love it and are fighting to keep it. The administration knows it needs to be fixed. Again, luckily they don’t have to get the students to buy in. They can do what they think is in the long term best interest of the school.</p>
<p>No school is perfect and no school has 100% of its students or alumni satisfied with everything. When surveys have been taken of Harvard students, they have been more dissatisfied than students at peer schools because of issues such as a lack of faculty availability, sense of community etc. I would assume that if surveys were taken at schools with a large greek presence, a not insignificant percentage of alumni and students would have disliked the prevelance of the greek system. Even Yale (sorry, JHS, but not everyone believes it’s “perfect” as you have claimed :)) has had recent protests about financial aid policies and concerns about crime and the location of some of its residential colleges. </p>
<p>Princeton alumni overall have some of the highest annual giving rates in the country (and in my experience, one of the main reasons alumni refuse to donate is because their children were not accepted at Princeton, not because they disliked the eating clubs). Like soomoo, Princetonians have generally loved their Princeton experience. The purpose of the task force was to examine the eating club system to see if it could be made better, hence the focus on problems with the existing system, and I think that way too much in terms of overall student satisfaction etc. is being read into it.</p>
<p>I have one kid who bickered and got in. One who bickered and got hosed and joined a sign-in club. Neither kid has issues with the system. I joined a bicker club and dropped out because I hated it. Over the years I have come to believe that the system has value. Princeton is the social “High” ivy. Like it or not. And the clubs, the suburban location, the size, all reinforce that position.</p>
<p>I hope they continue to improve the club system. Kindness is good. I never thought I’d become a supporter of the clubs. But changes over the years, and my kids, have shifted my perspective.</p>