Underground Chapter
 

I read a news article that concluded an underground chapter of Alpha Delta Phi has and continues to exist at Williams College 35 years after the college trustees banned greek life as a "matter of educational policy".
The article states"ADPHI still holds secret meetings on campus and maintains a chapter meeting room." from the Williams Record 12/5/03, Does anyone have any further information.
By way of explanation Williams abolished its once strong greek system in 1968. Recently Williams administrators reaffirmed the ban and added by way of insult that their "oh so qualified students agreed with the ban and no real interest in reviving greeks existed on campus".
What a self serving load of BS, especially if an underground has survived for 35 years with a threat of member expulsion. Some student must seek out greek life.
I really don't understand the trend in colleges and our larger society to limit freedom of assembly and expression.

PS check out the Williams site, they allow all sorts of groups, just not greeks.

KA Society and Theta Delta Chi also supposedly had undergrounds at Williams( at least the 150 year DU history so states) anyone have the scoop.

No one really has "the scoop" thanks to the persistent threats of the Williams Gestapo. Their intellectual dishonesty about freedom of association is breathtaking.

Watch for another school, Franklin & Marshall, to reverse its roughly 15 year old prohibition of social GLOs before the begining of the 04-05 academic year. Their prohibition has been ineffective, and they are tired of having their proverbial heads in the sand.

Sorry for no replies, I think this is a sensitive matter as the school officials might lurking around gc and finds out what GLO went underground.

Yes, but I know several GLOs (older GLOs) went underground in the anti-greek campus, especially in the east coast.

Good luck finding the info! :cool:

I think with the advent of national programming and national organizations being very serious about stopping hazing, it is time that anti-greek colleges give a second look. We are offering a more positive experience than ever.

I have to hope that as GLO's evolve we stop shooting ourselves in the foot so often with negative press. It's great that these universities are considering reopening. However, how many (Alfred) have recently shut their doors due to the stupidity of individuals within GLO's?

I know a fellow who was in a "underground" chapter at F&M before he transferred to Marquette...I couldn't believe some of the stories I heard.

Let's hear some! :cool:

Delta Psi Ignoring William's Offer of Amnesty
 

By Christopher Marcisz
Eagle Correspondent


WILLIAMSTOWN -- Williams College officials say they have received no
response to an offer of amnesty last month to members of an underground
fraternity still believed to be active on campus nearly 40 years after
the college began eliminating the Greek system locally.

Details about the group known as St. Anthony Hall, such as its size and
activities, remain sketchy. Its presence on campus came to light this
summer when an alumnus approached the college about gaining access to the group's ceremonial "goat room," which is in a college-owned building that now houses the Center for Development Economics.

'Join the fold'

In offering the amnesty, Dean Nancy Roseman said it was an invitation
to the group to rejoin the campus community with certain conditions.

"That's the whole concept behind the amnesty," she said. "It is about
saying to the organization: Join the fold."

The move would require the group to abandon some of its practices,
including its secretive behavior, close links to a national organization and
demands for exclusive use of its ceremonial room. So far there has been no
response.

Speculation about the group had long been circulating, according to
Roseman. Conversations among alumni about their college years, and concerns expressed by some students, have kept the issue on the radar screen.

Williams began the long process of rooting out fraternities in 1962 in
an effort to create a more inclusive college environment and decrease
on-campus drinking and hazing. The organizations were an entrenched part of campus life, with roughly 44 percent of students living in fraternity houses.

The college's policy on fraternities remains clear and has been
reaffirmed through the years by the board of trustees.

"Williams students may neither join nor participate in fraternities
during their time at the college," the college handbook reads. "The college
will take disciplinary action against students who are found to be
participating in such organizations. Penalties may include suspension or expulsion from the college."

The student newspaper, the Williams Record, reported in November that
St. Anthony Hall, also known as Delta Psi, had been active underground
since the 1970s. According to the paper, students have been meeting in a barn in Pownal, Vt.

St. Anthony Hall is a national organization founded in 1847, with nine
active chapters across the nation. It bills itself as an "undergraduate
literary society" rather than a fraternity. Unlike many fraternities,
it admits women and claims its activities include literary gatherings.

Officials at the group's national office in Ithaca, N.Y., declined to
comment.

Its Web site states, "We remain to this day a group of college students
interested in the bonds of fraternity and sharing a common passion for
the love of learning and the appreciation of a well-rounded education."

Last summer, John Shaw, a member of the class of 1962 and a former
national chairman of the group, approached college officials about regaining
access to the fraternity's ceremonial "goat room."

The room is in the basement of the fraternity's former house, now the
Center for Development Economics at the corner of South Street and Route 2.

The Record quotes Shaw as writing in a 2002 St. Anthony Hall
publication that he hopes his efforts will succeed.

"This effort will not be bloodless, and I anticipate opposition from a
variety of quarters, but our flag will once again fly in Williamstown."

Some students have responded sharply to the acknowledgment of the
group's presence, in weblogs and columns in the Record, urging more aggressive disciplinary action against a group that clearly violates college
rules. But Roseman said the overall response to the offer has been muted.

Roseman said exposing and punishing the members would be a difficult
process. "I don't know where to begin," she said. "I don't know any
members."

She added that official pressure "would drive it deeper underground."

Apparently the staff writer is just really upset by all of this discovery. I highlighted the worst in bold.

Fraternity policy aside, it does sound like a nice liberal arts school, if pricey (about $33,000 per year).

No amnesty for fraternities
Aidan Finley - STAFF WRITER

To matriculate as Williams College students, we signed two documents: the honor code and the fraternity pledge. Both are helpfully printed in the student handbook and can be found on the Registrar’s webpage. As befits a binding document, the fraternity pledge is simple and unambiguous: “Williams students may neither join nor participate in fraternities during their time at the College.” Furthermore, “penalties [for violation of the fraternity ban] may include suspension or expulsion from the College.”

And yet, this past week finds confirmation not only that the agreement has been willfully violated but also that the administration has failed to take appropriate action. A fraternity has been uncovered at the College (“Internal tensions expose frat; College offers amnesty,” Nov. 18, 2003) but the administration is not moving to suspend or expel anyone. Instead they have offered “amnesty,” something that doesn’t appear in the statement concerning fraternities, or under the list of “appropriate penalties.”

Seeing as the fraternity pledge states it explicitly, the College presumably believes that: “in making…important decisions over…three decades, the College has had as its central goal the sustenance of a community characterized by openness, academic vitality and equality of opportunity.” This is not a “minor goal,” or an “easily dispensable goal;” this is a “central goal.” The College, as a vibrant community, depends upon “openness, academic vitality and equality of opportunity,” three important values impugned by the presence of fraternities.

But the administration is apparently willing to compromise, even abnegate, these allegedly “central” principles. Dean Roseman did not even bat an eye in offering the fraternity complete amnesty: “If this group would like to enter the fold of Williams College, we would be delighted to have them and would not discipline any current or former members.” This collective shrug, this appeasement, this pandering response to very serious allegations does this College a grave disservice. Moreover, this willful deception on the part of my ostensibly fellow collegians makes me quite angry. But, what makes me angrier still is the intentional ignorance or deliberate blindness of the administration, leading to their abject failure in detecting and eliminating this pervasive (and repeated) circumvention of our “central goal.”

The Record reports that the former national chairman of the St. Anthony’s Hall fraternity (a Williams alumnus) has made repeated entreaties to the Provost’s office to purchase or otherwise exclusively secure the Center for Development Economics (CDE) goat room. Somehow, this strange request did not raise any flags, and as the Record notes, “administrators opposed the alums’ proposal because of the College’s general policy against granting exclusive use of campus spaces to specific student organizations.” What is more damning is the recent revelation that there has been a secret “Lambda” chapter of this fraternity on campus since 1973! Williams has sold us a fraudulent bill of goods: the supposedly “fraternity-free” College we’ve paid for has not been fraternity-free at all.

One of the reasons I applied to Williams, and one of the reasons I wanted to come to Williams was precisely because this place was fraternity free. I didn’t want my social life intertwined with pledging, hazing, racism, sexism, anti-Semitism and the rest of the “community values” fraternities’ offer.

I embraced the College’s elimination of these pernicious organizations from campus. I am not happy to discover that I have been duped, that the College has tacitly allowed an “underground” fraternity for thirty years, negotiating with its national board over purchasing the goat room, looking happily the other way as class after class of Williams students graduated with “secret” fraternity members, making a yearly lie of our paper pledge.

Why is there only bemusement when we hear of this? Why do we blithely smile to learn our fundamental community value, the College’s “central goal” has been contravened and that there is to be no penalty? A couple of years ago, the University of Virginia discovered a widespread cheating ring that had penetrated and made a mockery of their honor code, the nation’s oldest, and most severe, with the only penalty being expulsion (“UVA dismisses 48 in cheating scandal,” AP Nov. 25, 2002). After a long investigation, UVA expelled 48 students, demonstrating that their honor code is binding and cannot be taken lightly.

Williams finds itself in an analogous situation in which a deliberate, intentional and consistent violation of our community has occurred. The appropriate response is not amnesty but discipline. Amnesty merely condones the now consequence-free act of founding or joining a fraternity. The honor code comparison is instructive. Academic honesty, so essential, is enforced by a committee of students and faculty. When students violate it they are not offered “amnesty,” and even those who come forward and confess are punished severely. The fraternity ban, allegedly essential, has been left to an administration where the will to enforce such standards is lacking.

This is my challenge to the College: stop being hypocritical. Eliminate the fraternity pledge, which is a document you obviously have no interest in enforcing, or else enforce it as we agreed it would be enforced. Expel or seriously punish the students (and alumni) involved in this admitted fraternity and make abundantly clear, again, that these organizations are wrong for this community.

Don't bet on it. That law that congress passed several years ago has yet to be tested in the courts.

Hey Aidan! You're a massive tool!

That is all I have to say. :)

Question...


If the college did find out who the members were and decided to punish them, how could they punish the alumni as the author of the article suggests they do. Since they aren't in college anymore, they have no authority over them.

They could revoke his degree.

Actually, I doubt they could - he graduated in 1962, which, according to the article, was the same year they decided to start getting rid of GLOs.

You're probably right. Unless the 1958 William's honor code has a provision for alumni behavior.

This article contains the following big words for those playing the home game:

impugned
abnegate
pandering
ostensibly
abject
pernicious
bemusement
blithely
analogous
contravened

Which illustrates why Williams is the #1 ranked liberal arts college... again.

Damn, I'm gonna ask Santa for a new dictionary.

And these self-righteous twirps have the gall to call fraternities "elitist"! This demonstrates why I had no desire to attend a private, liberal arts college that attempts to indoctrinate its students into a state of intellectualist "group-think" way beyond the levels of conformity that they claim are the evils of fraternities! :mad:

I have to laugh at writers who employ "big words" to make a point. The best writing is clear and to the point. Individuals who can't write clearly, usually can't think clearly. The poor girl who wrote the editorial at Williams College obviously has a problem on both levels.


InterFraternally:


Glenn Adams

Disclaimer:

Some disjointed writers are worth reading. I would suggest the poor girl at Williams begin with Kant and Faulkner.

I support these guys. Both the ADPhis and Delta Psis seem like they actully care about what happens to their fraternity enough. I love Greek life.

That is the weirdist sentiment I have ever read regarding GL0s.

The lack of GLOs as a reason to attend a school???

I never had any desire to join a social GLOs. Have nothing against them, just not for me. But I view GLOs as a part of college life and expect to see them at colleges. I would view a school that didn't have them as strange. And to not even have professional, honorary, service and other types of GLOs is also strange.

This person has no idea of what pledging is. Hazing is not a value that any fraternity offers. Most (if not all) ban it. Racism, sexism, and anti-semitism are not values that fraternities offer. This may have been true at one time with some, but no longer. Many GLOs are quite diverse, especially when you consider the many co-ed GLOs.

Sad.

If he doesn't want to join a social, that's his choice. I made that choice. But why prevent his fellow students from choicing to?? I prefer that others make that decision for themselves, rather then barring them as this school has done.

I almost went to Williams.

But, I wouldn't be Greek if I had!

/randomness

But boy they do like to sing there! I counted 8 different acapella music groups (co ed and single sex).

I don't know about the rest of you, but I personally contravene the statements made by this pandering tool. I'm bemused by his ostensible pernicious points. I impugn and refuse to abnegate to his stupidity. I abject this punk, but in a blithely way nonetheless, analogous to most idiots at these schools.

Look maw, I done got me an edumacation. Ain't that the darndest thing ya done ever seen.

All I know is this tool needs to be put back in the toolbox and locked away in the toolshed forever.

boy, you're sure tellin me. Old maw's really happy I gets ta fix that there outhouse with the kinda money I'm bringin home from them there dip spittin contests, all thanks to my edumacation and all praise to god.

Wooowee! I sure done gots to get me one of them there word-lernin' books!

:D

yes siree, you need to g'on an getcha un. That's one thing I always carry...My Bible, My word-lerner, an a can a ol' Cope in my back pocket.

Cool. I'm gonna use this post to study for my GRE.

PsychTau

good luck on that.

Thought you might be interested in this article
 

Fraternity ignoring offer of amnesty
By Christopher Marcisz
Eagle Correspondent


WILLIAMSTOWN -- Williams College officials say they have received no response to an offer of amnesty last month to members of an underground fraternity still believed to be active on campus nearly 40 years after the college began eliminating the Greek system locally.

Details about the group known as St. Anthony Hall, such as its size and activities, remain sketchy. Its presence on campus came to light this summer when an alumnus approached the college about gaining access to the group's ceremonial "goat room," which is in a college-owned building that now houses the Center for Development Economics.

'Join the fold'

In offering the amnesty, Dean Nancy Roseman said it was an invitation to the group to rejoin the campus community with certain conditions.

"That's the whole concept behind the amnesty," she said. "It is about saying to the organization: Join the fold."

The move would require the group to abandon some of its practices, including its secretive behavior, close links to a national organization and demands for exclusive use of its ceremonial room. So far there has been no response.

Speculation about the group had long been circulating, according to Roseman. Conversations among alumni about their college years, and concerns expressed by some students, have kept the issue on the radar screen.

Williams began the long process of rooting out fraternities in 1962 in an effort to create a more inclusive college environment and decrease on-campus drinking and hazing. The organizations were an entrenched part of campus life, with roughly 44 percent of students living in fraternity houses.

The college's policy on fraternities remains clear and has been reaffirmed through the years by the board of trustees.

"Williams students may neither join nor participate in fraternities during their time at the college," the college handbook reads. "The college will take disciplinary action against students who are found to be participating in such organizations. Penalties may include suspension or expulsion from the college."

The student newspaper, the Williams Record, reported in November that St. Anthony Hall, also known as Delta Psi, had been active underground since the 1970s. According to the paper, students have been meeting in a barn in Pownal, Vt.

St. Anthony Hall is a national organization founded in 1847, with nine active chapters across the nation. It bills itself as an "undergraduate literary society" rather than a fraternity. Unlike many fraternities, it admits women and claims its activities include literary gatherings.

Officials at the group's national office in Ithaca, N.Y., declined to comment.

Its Web site states, "We remain to this day a group of college students interested in the bonds of fraternity and sharing a common passion for the love of learning and the appreciation of a well-rounded education."

Last summer, John Shaw, a member of the class of 1962 and a former national chairman of the group, approached college officials about regaining access to the fraternity's ceremonial "goat room."

The room is in the basement of the fraternity's former house, now the Center for Development Economics at the corner of South Street and Route 2.

The Record quotes Shaw as writing in a 2002 St. Anthony Hall publication that he hopes his efforts will succeed.

"This effort will not be bloodless, and I anticipate opposition from a variety of quarters, but our flag will once again fly in Williamstown."

Some students have responded sharply to the acknowledgment of the group's presence, in weblogs and columns in the Record, urging more aggressive disciplinary action against a group that clearly violates college rules. But Roseman said the overall response to the offer has been muted.

Roseman said exposing and punishing the members would be a difficult process. "I don't know where to begin," she said. "I don't know any members."

She added that official pressure "would drive it deeper underground."

http://www.berkshireeagle.com/Storie...835819,00.html

Williams kids are a strange mix. A lot of the guys I know there would fit well into any good ol' boy club and then there are these atheists pro-women's rights morons running around on campus too. Eh, whatever.

And ranking Williams as the number one liberal arts college is very iffy. If I were going for the small liberal arts college environment, I'd much rather choose Amherst and that tends to attract cooler kids anyway. Some of your comments are harsh as hers - really neither makes sense. The remark about Kant actually baffled me but it's 4 so what do i know.

-Rudey
--I tend to follow the old adage of asking for forgiveness rather than asking for permission so I can understand how anyone pushing for Greek life there must feel.

>>>pro-women's rights morons<<<

Being in favor of women's rights makes you a moron?

apparently in Rudey's eyes......

I find it humorous that they seem to think that Greek life would encourage drinking any moreso than being in the middle of NOWHERE would.

I've been to Williamstown. Pretty, but I think I'd go insane (being around self-righteous asses like the one I know there wouldn't help either).

Though I'd rather be around their feminist "morons" than the empty-headed twits (male and female) that I've met at Amherst...

I think Rudey is referring to the sort who think men should be locked up in cages and women should get whatever they want because they're women and have been opressed (regardless of their actual ability). In short, the ones who make me not want to use the word "feminist."

It was a joke but I guess something like that would easily escape the understanding of a guy who is 45 and still in college huh?

-Rudey

>>>It was a joke but I guess something like that would easily escape the understanding of a guy who is 45 and still in college huh?<<<

It was offensive and the humor escaped me too. I understand that I am setting myself up for some of your criticism, but I will keep in mind that you don't know a thing about me and what I know about you I have gleaned from similar posts of yours.

I know a girl who goes to Williams and I've met more of her friends who go there. They all claim that Greeks are elitist snobs and that sororities are breeding grounds for political wives, blah blah blah - but then they drive a Mercedes, carry a Hermes bag, and wear jeans that Rudey would like. Who's more elitist?

You mean these?

LOL not quite. More like these. :)