University Cheerleader With Down Syndrome Denied From Every Sorority on Campus
 

Thoughts?
http://https://themighty.com/2018/09/down-syndrome-sorority-george-mason-university-anncatherine-heigl/

In reading the comments below the article, it is stated that she withdrew from the process (if I'm reading that right?) and also that another young woman with Down's is a sorority member on that campus. I don't know that either of these are facts, but the comment is there.

Many women are released from all chapters every year and we tend to tell them the same thing when they ask "why?" We can't tell you why. There are a multitude of reasons. I'm not feeling a quick instinct to point a finger at the chapters as being discriminatory without hearing their side of the story, not that they are obligated to share their membership selection info.

This is a tough one...

I’m not sure there is enough information in this article to make any kind of informed opinion. It doesn’t specifically state that she was released from recruitment nor does it say that she dropped out. All it says is that she didn’t get a bid which we all know can be caused by one of the two things mentioned above.

Situations like these are never easy and your heart breaks for all involved.

I could not tell if she was a Freshman or an upperclassman. It alludes to the idea that she was on some kind of alternative plan. Depending upon this plan or what she did in high school, it could have been that she did not even have a GPA. I can not speak with authority here, but I would imagine that could create some problems in the membership selection process.

Overall, it is very sad and I feel for the University, the girl, her family and all of the Greek Life Community at George Mason.

Supposedly (per that other site) this was her second time rushing, and she withdrew on her own because she didn’t like the chapters she got.

It’s just as discriminatory to assume that because of her Ds, she’s a wonderful person who can do no wrong, as it is to release her solely because of it.

Also I wonder if her mom and sister (who went to competitive Greek schools) obtained recs for her, which most likely would have helped immensely.

And can we stop the fiction that cheerleaders are always guaranteed sorority membership?

I dug a little to find out the details of the MasonLIFE program. For anyone who is interested:

"Students completing their four years with The Mason LIFE Program will graduate with a George Mason Certificate of Completion with a catalog concentration and a work specialty area."

It sounds to ME, that she was eligible to rush because she's a GMU student. It doesn't sound like she'd be eligible for most (if not any) chapter because she's not matriculated as a degree-seeking student.

Now that I know this, I honestly find it repugnant that the sister (and others) has branded this as disability discrimination.

GMU Panhellenic had this to say: https://twitter.com/GMUPanhellenic/s...9202485530626/

There's a reason that 80 percent of George Mason University graduates are employed within six months of graduation. It's because 80 percent (or so it seems) of the student body are already employed while attending school - a very big percentage employed by federal agencies in the DC area. Many are in some way "sponsored" by the various agencies. The GMU graduates I have known and worked with are (as a group) extremely serious people and very career oriented and motivated. They will usually stay with the agency that has paid their tuition. Of all the people I've known who attended GMU as undergraduates, none belonged to a fraternity or sorority (or at least admitted it to me) and they all had flexible schedule jobs with federal agencies while they attended college. They were not night students. I also doubt many of them attended a single Greek function - even though they were the same age as the typical undergraduate student. The expense of Greek life likely prevented them from joining those groups, though they were the type of people the Greek organizations would love to have.


What I'm trying to say here is that GMU is not the typical four-year college.

LOL the irony is that the only GMU people I know were Greeks.

But NPHC Greek life is self-sustaining regardless of the type of campus.

Darned if you do, darned if you don't...

If you find any more info on that, please do post it. If that’s the case, her family should be ashamed to suggest she was dropped because she has Down’s.

Having been involved with GMU greek life personally and a sister of my own about to go to college next year who has an intellectual disability, I have a few thoughts on this (some more pertinent than others).

Clemson has a similar program to this called ClemsonLIFE. There have been women in this program who have gone through recruitment and joined sororities. To what degree they were involved, I cannot say, but this situation is not unprecedented. Additionally, given that a number of chapters at GMU also exist at Clemson, to paint any of the chapters who did not extend this woman a bid as discriminatory is too simplistic.

GMU is one of the fastest growing 4 year universities in the country. It is also primarily a commuter school. I'll echo previous posters that there is a bigger emphasis placed on job preparation than school spirit. Having been an NCAA division 1 athlete at a school that competed against GMU, I personally doubt the chapters would have paid much consideration to a PNM being a cheerleader at the university outside of possible time commitment issues which, since it's mainly a commuter school, would likely be an issue. It's not like Ole Miss where being a Rebelette, while time-consuming, is a place of prominence on campus. (as an aside, I personally found the sister's comment that this PNM was a "division 1 athlete" insulting since cheerleading is not an NCAA sport.)

Finally, as we all know, sororities are selective by design. With the exception of Tufts, a school cannot force a chapter to accept a PNM. If this particular PNM has a challenging intellectual disability, she may not have met the high school or college GPA requirement. No matter how many PNMs whisper about "grade risks" in tents, GPAs matter. And frankly if my own sister were to rush, I doubt her being a legacy would help counteract her GPA that much, and I accept that. Even the least competitive sorority in the country at Random Tiny University still has the right as a private organization to select its members.

Is it disappointing that this PNM was (apparently) dropped by every chapter? Yes. It's heartbreaking for any PNM to get released by any chapter. But it happens every year, regardless of ability, race, wealth, etc. Hopefully she finds another way to stay involved on campus.

I can confirm that at least this part is true. She is a regular matriculating student studying to earn a bachelor's degree though.

Question, are there sororities that specifically state that women joining their organization must be working toward a diploma? If so, those chapters would be obligated by their National Bylaws to only accept those who are seeking a diploma and not a Certificate of Completion.

DaffyKD

Is she regularly matriculating bachelor's degree student and also a participant in MasonLIFE? I ask because, in the news article interview I read, she says that she is a MasonLIFE student.


Regardless......the fact that there is currently a MasonLIFE student with Downs Syndrome as a member of Gamma Phi Beta at GMU, I have a hard time understanding the Heigl family's claims that AnnCatherine was specifically discriminated against because of her disability.

The MasonLIFE brochure includes a photo of a group of students and one is wearing an Alpha Xi Delta letter shirt. :confused: Here -- https://masonlife.gmu.edu/documents/...-brochure.pdf/

The university VP is quoted in this article as saying that other MasonLIFE students have been in fraternities and sororities -- https://www.indystar.com/story/news/...ty/1357681002/


SO.....is the bottom line here perhaps is that this young lady, like many others across the country, went out for rush and simply didn't get a bid? It happens. Just because she has a unique quality, that doesn't mean that the sororities "have" to take her any more than they "have" to take anyone. We've already established a pattern the GMU sororities do accept MasonLIFE students; so, perhaps there is more to this story.

Seems like the bachelors program issue was the dealbreaker, to be honest. People in graduate and certificate programs are excluded from membership under most circumstances, too, because they're not in a traditional undergrad/bachelors program. If there is another girl at the school with the same disability who is both in a sorority and a fulltime student in a regular degree program, then it's not too hard to figure out what likely went wrong.


Even putting the bachelors program requirements and GPA aside, if you're not enrolled in what your college would consider a regular full load of units, that could be a bar, too. The school in question is nontraditional in a lot of ways - the LIFE program, night school, part-time, etc. - so I can see why people would be shocked when sorority groups might appear to be unfairly "singling out" someone who is otherwise a normal part of their college life, but hundreds of women across the continent get cut - or outright excluded from rush in general - because they don't meet basic, objective membership requirements, either.



I'm frustrated with the girl's sister because she's painting with a hugely broad brush, which effectively a. slams organizations which may have actually wanted her sister, and b. gives the PNM the impression that *nobody* wanted her. Some of the chapters may have excluded this PNM out of hand when they realized she had Downs Syndrome. But others may have genuinely wanted to keep her on, and couldn't because she didn't meet minimum requirements.



I don't know anything about this girl that hasn't come from her sister, but if she is as active in school activities, as nice, and as eager to participate as she seems, I'd guess that my chapter, at the time I was a collegiate member, would have been happy to have her as a sister. But if she didn't meet basic GPA/matriculation requirements for my org and my university, the choice would have been out of our hands.

Yes, I believe she participates in both programs. She was admitted to GMU under the same standards as others -- SAT score, high school GPA etc. I didn't know if that might make a difference when it came to membership selection as some speculated. If there's an AXiD sister who only participates in the MasonLIFE program, then that seems to negate the claims of this young woman and her family.

In the article, it was mentioned that she indeed graduated from DC Public Schools with a 3.7 GPA and full high school diploma.

33girl mentioned the other site. I just went and looked - over there they are insisting that she was invited back to two chapters. George Mason Panhellenic's statement was, "This past weekend, it was brought to the Panhellenic Executive Council’s attention that a student in the MasonLife program was released from our Formal Panhellenic Recruitment process." Was she completely released or did she withdraw? I can imagine the upset that a young lady would have when she takes cuts from 8 down to 2. Perhaps she was just too upset over the cuts (or didn't like the chapters she had left) and withdrew. We see it here all the time with girls at universities from all over. Though, the older sister's statement said that she was released on Sunday morning, which appears to the 3rd and final round before Bid Day. So, she was invited back to round two and released before pref?

If she was invited back to two chapters, then I think Panhellenic and the university need to clarify this.

Agreed! I can guarantee she would not have been the only girl that dropped to two houses. And they’re also saying she rushed (and dropped) last year.
??

So this student was definitely enrolled in the degree program? For some reason I gathered that the example of girl who had been enrolled in both LIFE and the bachelors program was a person who was already in a sorority at the school.



If the subject of the kerfuffle dropped out of rush this year with two chapters still on the line, this is on her. And she rushed and dropped last year, too? No wonder.

I truly do not mean to sound accusatory Homeward Bound, but I am curious. What is your connection that you know the status of AC at GMU?

I think there is some confusion. Unless I missed something, homeward*bound and I are both referring to a student with Down Syndrome, Madison, who received a bid to Gamma Phi Beta at this campus last year. homeward*bound was saying that Madison participates in the MasonLIFE program but is also on a bachelor's degree program track. So she was confirming the enrollment status of our own Gamma Phi Beta sister.

AC is the young lady at the center of the current debate who did not receive a bid.

I have two neighbors who are GMU graduates, and were members of different NPC chapters. I chatted with one of my neighbors (over a glass of wine!) last night, and she confirmed that participants in Mason Life have been deemed eligible to participate in recruitment and join Greek chapters. The university announced that back in 2017, so it has been in effect for the past two rounds of formal recruitment. It's a different issue if the nationals of a GMU chapter won't allow them to extend a bid to a PNM who isn't in a degree program. FWIW, my neighbor told me that, according to several alums of her chapter, AC was invited to pref at two GMU chapters on Sunday; they were apparently not among her top-choice chapters, so she declined the invitations.

But I don't think we'll ever learn what really happened unless or until GMU Panhellenic provides more specific facts. Panhellenic Council's typically won't discuss the details of formal recruitment due to privacy concerns, both for PNM's and chapters. But if the rumors about a possible lawsuit are true, details might end up being revealed during the legal process.

Thank you Navane. I found the post confusing.

Forrest, maybe big sister is trying to jump start her legal career?

While I admire her desire to pursue a legal career addressing disability issues, I'm a little concerned that at least some of this situation is contrived controversy, rather than a legitimate issue which requires redress.

Yes.

Yes, my sister Navane is correct. I was attempting to remain as non-invasive as possible with our collegiate sister's information while confirming that there is at least one current sorority member there who has Down Syndrome. I am a Gamma Phi Beta, and I also have a personal connection to Down Syndrome. If you have any further questions, please feel free to private message me.

On the one hand, people with disabilities (I am one) wish to be treated the same as everyone else. That includes the chance that you won't get a bid. (Assuming she met all other requirements).

I've been told on another site that the young woman in question was indeed cut from all chapters during Recruitment. However, I think that some women on here are closer to the situation, and can possibly give me a better informed answer. Did she withdraw this year, or was she released with no invites?

Although I expect AC's sister Lillie to have had a full and complete grasp of AC's true recruitment situation before Lillie's twitter posts I, too, would appreciate further clarification if indeed the 'rumors' are true that AC chose not to continue her Fall 2018 greek journey. There are very recent, online-available articles and tv segments that continue to insist AC was indeed cut by all the sororities on campus.