New Fraternities/Sororities at HPU
sidebar: What about housing?
by Chris Thurley
A lot of talk has been moving through the HPU campus about whether there's going to be a new fraternity and/or sorority soon. Some students are attempting to start a new fraternity and the sorority girls on campus realize that due to increasing admittance they need another sorority to lessen the amount of girls for rush. When Gail Tuttle, the Dean of Students at HPU and Meredith McCrea, the Greek Life Advisor at HPU were asked some questions they had a lot to say; and not just about new Greek organizations but about where they're going to live as well.
Does HPU need more Greek?
Greek Week this year had two fraternities with one sorority, three sorority’s with one fraternity and every group had just recently (within the last 3 years if not the year before) been with that exact same group. It was obvious something was making this whole process a little confusing and irregularity. Kappa Alpha Psi had too few members to be paired with a large sorority and the Alpha Kappa Alpha’s and the Delta Sigma Thetas had to join in order to have enough people to participate with a fraternity. This confusion upset the Greek community but only gave rise to what the school was going to do in the years to come, especially with increasing admission rates and the amount of students at HPU. For the fraternities a question of another one seemed questionable; although some students think this is a good time to start a fraternity for a growing campus. Zac Gillard, a senior and brother at Lambda Chi Alpha says that these new fraternities will, “[…] generally tend to be started by people who aren’t accepted by current fraternity members and they have a hard time finding new members”. But as Adrienne Sperry a junior and sister of Zeta Tau Alpha exclaims a new sorority, “[…] would help us out with taking too many girls that we can’t handle” and needs to be on their “’to do’ list now”.
What fraternity’s and sorority’s is the school at?
Within the next “two to five years”, as Dean of Students Gail Tuttle expressed, there will be the possibility of acquiring new fraternity (s) and/or sororities (s). The beginning actions of new fraternity’s are already progressing as members of Phi Kappa Sigma’s nationals came to present their fraternity to the Inter-fraternity Council yesterday 12/9/08. Two students are helping move the idea of a new fraternity on campus with an emphasis on: Phi Kappa Sigma, Kappa Sigma and Sigma Alpha Epsilon. The school’s Greek Advisor Meredith McCrea said the main possibilities for sorority’s on campus are between: Delta Delta Delta, Chi Omega, and Kappa Kappa Gamma.
With the many directions that the school might pursue for the fraternity’s “[…] there’s a little more burden on the students […] it often times [comes down to] student group that do the bulk of the work to start a new fraternity” explains Meredith McCrea. The work is in progress and the student interest is in so now it comes down to time, in order to get these new fraternity’s and/or sororities on campus.
As junior William McNamara exclaims “there would be no issue with people leaving us” and Zachary Gillard reaffirms, “I won’t being seeing or probably even hearing about any of the influence [of these new groups] they’ll be creating in the near future.”
How will the school deal with Greek housing?
“We would love to eventually have a sort of ‘Greek Row’”, Meredith McCrea says with a hint smile in the corner of her mouth. The problem with meeting space and living together as Adrienne Sperry said about new girls in her sorority is a big problem. But until this “long-term” goal is completed the school is just looking for an “immediate goal is finding some space for all the Greek organizations to do that”- Meredith McCrea. How long will a Greek row take HPU? Don’t Hold your breath it will be anywhere from five to ten years.
Interviews:
Gail Tuttle
Adrienne Sperry
Meredith McCrea
William MacNamara
1 comment:
Chris, you have some great interviews and research on the topic. My problem is with the bulky grafs. It makes it very difficult to follow your story. We talked about short, concise paragraphs and that would really help make the story less confusing.
I also had trouble finding your sidebars. You provide the headline for one sidebar but where is the actual story that should follow?
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