Greek problems at Duquesne University
 

I am new to this site but I would like to start a thread about the decline of Greek fraternities and sororities at Duquesne University. Recruitment this year and last year is way down and the fraternities are very small. Alot of the sororities were kicked off their wings to half wings or no wings.

If anyone out there is interested in talking about the greek system at DU I am all ears. :eek:

By "Wings" I am assuming you mean their housing situation?

Did the organizations loose their wings because of the decline of membership or because of other factors? If it is a numbers issue, you might want to take it up with your office of Greek Life.

Thanks for responding MaggieXi! I've been out of DU for about 4 years and what I am hearing from friends in my chapter as well as in other chapters is that the wing housing was being forced on the fraternities and sororities. Alot of people want to live on the southside and not be forced to live in Towers. Duquesne tried to force the girls and guys to live on the wings and it got nasty...yelling and screaming at members and at greek life office.

But it seems to be a systemstic decline in all areas of greek life not just because of housing.

DUgrad, fill us in on more detail regarding the decline of Greek Life @ DU....
- What seems to be the problem?
- Is the DU student population not interested in Greek Life?
- Is there any negative attidude towards Greek Life?
- Has the local IFC, NPC and other Greek Councils did any research as to why the recruitment numbers were low...last year and this year?
-Is the University not supportive to Greek Life and want to begin the elimination of the Greek Life @ DU?
- Is space/location (housing) a problem?

These are just some questions that come to mind.

People don't want to do things for their fraternity or sorority anymore...the concept of living in the housing as a responsibility to the GLO is going to the wayside. 2 sororities at Clarion don't have their houses anymore and I think it's partly because of this.

But honestly, if the housing is creating that much of a drama, it's better to let it go or reduce it. The school has to fill the housing and if people don't want to live there the school might force the cost onto the fraternities/sororities as a whole.

DUGrad - are you still around here? I honestly think a lot of it has to do with the rising costs of everything (I don't even want to think about what y'all's tuition is now) with less disposable money for dues and the fact that the South Side has pretty much turned into part of the campus, it's so full of college students and particularly Duq students. (I'm guessing that some bars whose names I won't mention aren't being very careful w/ the IDing either.) Combine this w/ the fraternities and sororities cracking down on risk management and there you go.

For the unknowing - the South Side is the area in Pittsburgh where there's a bar every 2 feet. I look for it to soon implode under the weight of the college students because they all come down there now instead of staying near their campuses, and the people who have been going to the SS for the last 20-30 years are getting sick of it.

And also for the unknowing, Duquesne is a Catholic university.

I live in upstate New York. What I can say is that after talking with a lot of my sisters that there has been a systematic removal of fraternities and sororities at DU. It started with the local frats, then local sororities. Yes, there was a sorority that had a sister die from alcohol poisoning.

But, IFC and NPC have the numbers and the last two years DU has brought in the largest freshmen classes and had the smallest number of people go through recruitment. I think they should ask the students on campus why they aren't pledging a frat or sorority. Maybe they don't want this information out?!

Until they ask the students at DU why they aren't pledging I guess no one will know why the numbers are so low.

Housing has been a big issue over the last couple of years and yeah, the southside is one big party for the DU students.

Locals are getting tossed out at a lot of places because they don't have a national org to back them up if anything goes wrong. If they don't have a strong alumni corp behind them, they are pretty much done.

The school could care less why people aren't pledging, unless alumni donations decline considerably.

And I'm not exaggerating when I say however it was on the SS when you were here - multiply it by about 100. It's changed that much (i.e. the college scene has expanded that much) in that short of time.

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But, IFC and NPC have the numbers and the last two years DU has brought in the largest freshmen classes and had the smallest number of people go through recruitment. I think they should ask the students on campus why they aren't pledging a frat or sorority. Maybe they don't want this information out?!

You say that DU has brought in a large freshman class, was it ever discussed by the IFC/NPC and the University to advertise "Greek Life" in general inside the freshman orientation packages. I know several universities in NY & NJ are allow to advertise during orientation. It worth looking into doing something like this. What the IFC/NPC needs is to spark the interest back in Greek Life.

Devodude,

Its a great idea to put info about IFC/NPC in orientation packages. I will suggest that to my sisters.

Another issue that came from one of my sisters was something about housing. I didn't quite understand it but she told me that the Greek Life offices and Dean of Students were making them pay for things on their wings like paint, carpet, plaster, etc. If that is true, we were never asked to do that. Maybe things are really different from when I was there. That might be the reason so many are moving to the southside.

As someone who went to high school in a Pittsburgh suburb, I can tell you that a lot of it has to do with a decline in greek life in general in the north east (especially in the burgh).

There, most frats/sororities have declined to the point where it's simply a social thing (like big parties, etc.). When I went home after pledging and told people I joined a sorority, they looked at me like I was crazy. As one person put it: "why pay money to go out and party with people when you can go to a bar for free/only pay a small cover?"

Also, DU (and all the other schools around, like Pitt, CMU, and even Carlow) are becoming increasingly difficult to get in/difficult to succeed academically. Possibly people aren't pledging b/c they feel that they can't handle their course load plus greek life??

Just a few thoughts I have on that.

That's true; it was a little presumptuous to say that NE greek life is declining. But in my experience (or at least, what I gather from talking to my friends from high school), it is becoming less popular, for multiple reasons (social, fiscal, time commitments, negative press, stereotypes, etc.).

I would think Duquesne also would have problems with greek life because it has a fairly large commuter population.

And many of the students who do live on campus go home to their parents' houses in the Pittsburgh suburbs for the weekend!

kddani,

I was not from Pittsburgh originally but having gone to DU for 4 years you are right that everyone seems to go home on weekends. I think that is a bit weird but I watched it go on year after year.

You are required at DU to live on campus your freshman and sophomore years so even though there is a large commuter population you would think that people would stick around on weekends. Instead the partying goes on over on the southside and the campus is empty.

Of course, if the greeks are getting bullied by the adminstration like on housing then why should anyone join? I still think they should ask the whole student body why they aren't joining a greek group. Maybe that would get things out in the open and they could fix things.

It sounds like Greek Life at DU needs some serious PR. Maybe consider doing some all greek events in the fall (like an all greek BBQ or fall fest) just to make the Greeks visible. It seems like your saying that all the GLOs are facing difficulties. Maybe if all the GLOs can ban together, like Greek Life should be promoting, the unity may bring more interest. Also, one thing that my alma mart used to do (and possibly still does) was every wednsday the organizations would wear their letters or t-shirts all day to classes. This made the greeks very visible!

I just received a long email from one of my sisters who is currently living on the southside and what is happening at DU. They are on spring break so she was able to give me some answers to the questions everyone has been asking.

She said that housing at DU was a horrible mess this year. Greek groups were sent a memo that was vague and didn't tell them what they needed to know about greek housing. That led to almost everyone losing their full wing housing..I think she said maybe one or two have a full greek wing housing contract.

Greek Life didn't help them with the problem nor did Panhellenic so each group just did what they thought was right. Then, dean of students got upset because the wings were not filled. They all started to yell at each other. She said everyone is demoralized, angry, pissed off, etc. Some are starting to rethink why they decided to go greek in the first place.

Also, they said greek life office demands so much of them that they can't get their studying done. If you don't show up they yell at your group for things and check to see who was there/not there at things that should be fun.

Carnival is stuck in Palumbo this year for just a day or two and none of the greek groups were told much until the last minute. Its been thrown together and they still have to do some cleanup thing on the southside the same day.

It seems like it is a bunch of different issues all coming together at the same time.

Yes. I have noticed that the interest for Greek Life is somewhat on the decline in the Northeast. I can remember back the the 80's where Greek Life in the Northeast was exploding with high recruitment numbers, but then again that was over 20 years ago. I do not know what happen. It's just like the bottom fell out in the mid/late 90's and has continued.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

From this post (and some of your others) it seems like the issue is the office of Greek Life. Have you spoken with your faculty advisor?

Wow, what a cluster-F! I agree that it sounds like the problem lies with the Greek Life office and just poor organization on their part.

I'm going to talk to more of my alum sisters and the undergraduates and see if they have been talking to their advisers. I've been getting bombarded by unhappy sisters. Some are talking about buying a house on the southside and not telling DU because they are fed up with the new head of greek life and with the head of student..I think he is a priest..at least that was the guy that was there 4 years ago. The sisters used some expletives when they talked about him

From what I can tell, Sororities only lost one chapter in the last 10 years

I'm not sure. I know that the Lambs are gone. Before that, according to my alum sisters, there were Tau Delts, and fraternities are nearly wiped out. Zebes, Betas, STG's, Playboys, Sheiks, Tekes, Kaps, etc. Recruitment is really, really off for both frats and sororities. If you have the largest freshman class and less than 120 pledge a sorority what does that say? Something is terribly wrong. More and more I think that DU and the greek life offices don't want greeks at all.

When I was there a guy by the name of Ron was head of greek life. He motivated everyone. Two of my sisters said they hate the new head of greek life and don't trust her after the housing mess.

Remember, I am hearing this through others. I don't know how this will turn out for the chapters. I had a great experience as a sister and it is sad to see these postings.

I'm a current student at Duq and I heard that greek groups were getting kicked out of their wings mainly because the wings had more independents than brothers or sisters. When living on that campus the only thing that you look forward to is becoming a Junior and moving to the off because its a hell of a lot cheaper and you have a hell of a lot more freedom, so that might be a reason that they can't keep the beds filled. Hell, thats what most of my brothers have done (myself included). Also, there are so many freshman on campus that they now have a couple of Freshman wings in Towers. This is something we discovered last year while helping out with the Freshman move in.

As far as which groups are gone and which ones have stayed, the only local left is Gamma Phi. The Lambs did get kicked off my freshman year and then a chapter of Sig Kap got on campus the following year. The Zebes turned in to SAE a number of years ago (or so i've been told, so don't quote me on that).

Carnival is in Palumbo this year because they're doing work on the football field. It was originally slated for the week of March 3rd and it was supposed to be held in the ballroom in the Union. They then figured out that the ballroom didn't have enough electrical outlets, and that is when it got moved to Palumbo and it is not the week of April 14th. It does suck that everything was changed around but the current change is the best. If it was still held during the week of March 3rd, it would have been right in the middle of mid-terms. Plus now all the groups have a lot more time to get everything together.

Jeremy,

Thank you for your response. When I was a junior I moved to the southside too. It is way cheaper. The dorms are ridiculously expensive. Do you have any answers as to why so few are even going through recruitment? If the freshman classes are so large why did less than 120 women sign a bid card?

The housing problem only seems to have gotten worse but the anger towards res. life, greek life offices and Fr.H. is really, really bad. My sisters just hate the three of them combined

Unfortunately I can't answer that question for you. I'm a brother of A-Phi-O, so we aren't too involved with Panhell or IFC. As far as this semester goes, it might have just been a small turn out. In the fall we had 8 men come out to rush and four pledged (we usually have 4-8 men pledge each semester), but this semester it was like pulling teeth to get people to come to rush. We work very closely with GSS and they have had between 25-40 girls come out each semester. Compare that to this current semester where the pledge class number was only in the high teens. It might also just be a problem with general promotion. In years past, I recall Panhell rush posters being everywhere. The only place I really saw them this year was in the Union (they may be in the dorms, but I haven't been in there in 2 years). I also recall seeing a handfull of fraternity fliers around campus, too. But again, it may have just be one of those years with a low turnout.

Ok, I hate to sound like the traditional yinzer xenophobe, but is the Greek life director from there? Or is she trying to run things like you guys are out in the middle of nowhere (i.e. Slippery Rock, W & J etc) instead of a school in the city? Because it isn't the same, that's for sure.

33girl,

You are so right! A city school is way different than a school in the sticks(sorry to all of you in the rural areas...no bad feelings). I don't know the new head of Greek Life at Duquesne. It is very different to live and go to school in the city. There are alot of places to live besides dorms! The dorms were always expensive at DU but they forced you to live in them through the sophomore year.

The juniors then went to live on the southside or in Brottier..another dorm that was once an apartment building. From what I gather. Greek Life, res life and Fr. H wanted juniors living in Towers which is now a freshman/sophomore dorm. No junior in their right mind is going to pay to live in that dorm when it is way cheaper to live in Brottier, split the cost 2-3-4 ways or live on the southside.

They bullied all the greeks and tried to force them to live in Towers and the girls in my chapter told res life...forget it.. That's when alot of the trouble began. There are more independents and others living in Towers...no junior will live there. Besides, the girls told me their parents said no way to the expense of living on campus...its too expensive when you have tuition, books and room and board.

Duquesne was rare for a Catholic university in permitting fraternities and sororities to exist on campus. In the very old days, the fraternities took their member along ethnic lines, ADP was predominately Italian American, Betas were Polish American (according to some Beta I knew when I was at Duquesne, Beta Pi Sigma stood for Brotherhood of Polish Student), Kaps and Gamma Phi were predominately Irish American.

When I was Duquesne, 1976-80, the Greek community wasn't that large -- hey, it was the 70s. I understand that the Greeks prospered in the 1980s and 1990s. The university has gotten a lot larger since I graduated.

In addition, when I was in college, the Social Clubs (Sheiks, Playboys and Mynx) were quiet large as were some of the pharmacy organizations (Phi Delta Chi, Kappa Psi). Alpha Phi Omega functioned more like a social Greek organization than a service organization.

The wing system in Towers never quiet worked in practice as it should have worked in theory.

That's why I always get a little nervous when they start talking about "Greek Villages" at any of the state schools...it would be great if it worked, but I'm afraid it would turn into 1) shunting the Greeks into an out of the way area and making them even less visible on campus 2) forcing people into housing when they can get better, cheaper housing elsewhere.

You guys are really hamstrung because Duq does hold more power over the students than the other local universities.

Does anyone who is a Duquesne alum or a current sister or brother know why Brottier is so much cheaper than the other dorms?

Brottier actually costs about the same as the other dorms, depending on your apartment configuration. The rates are posted here. To live in any other dorm on campus, it'll cost you $4273 a semester, that is including a meal plan. For Brottier the costs $4450 for an unfurnished studio apartment per semester, which can fit two people. To my knowledge, that doesn't include a meal plan but I could very well be wrong. I'm also pretty sure that you have to sign a year lease, so the summer rent is another $1780. You also need to factor in that Brottier is kind of a shit hole. They have had many problems with roaches (more than the other dorms), and earlier this year a hot water pipe crashed through the ceiling of an apartment and landed on a person's bed. Thankfully the person wasn't in the room at the time, but all of their belongings were pretty much ruined.

It is a lot better to just move off campus. I get a loan refund check every semester for about $3500, which covers most of my rent and bills for about 9 months out of my 12 month lease (my place costs a bit too much). Depending on where in the city you live, it is very possible that you could cover rent, bills, and food for the entire duration of the lease with little to no out of pocket expense. Mt. Washington has nice places with dirt cheap rent, as well as some places on the Slopes. There are additional costs such as groceries or a commuter meal plan or a parking permit, so in the long run it costs about the same to live on campus for the academic year as it does to live off campus for a calendar year. Another thing that most commuters don't realize is that the University still has jurisdiction over you because you are still a DU student. Even though its harder to get in trouble being off campus, the University can still punish you for "that kegger the frat threw last week", assumming they get wind of it.

long story short, it costs roughly the same to live in towers, brottier, or off campus. I could be completely wrong because I suck at math, but thats why I'm a music major.

Brottier is the old Cricklewood/CitiLine Towers, right? I heard DU built the structure as a dorm, but for some reason, couldn't use it and Towers got built. DU sold the building to the Gumbergs, alumni of course, who turned it into apartments.

yeah, it was the old CitiLine apartments, right down the hill from Old Main. Apparently DU bought it in 2004 and made it into a dorm. It is decent, but it could be a whole lot better. Hell, all the dorms could be a lot better.

That's true about the dorms; I toured all the schools in the Burgh, and the dorms for all of them were god-awful.

The one I remember hating the most was Schenley Towers at Pitt. *Gags*

Sorry, I don't particularly want to live in a wedge-shaped shoebox for a whole year.

Hello All:

So, between all of my little sisters and some of the alumni on this site I still have to wonder how housing became the "showdown" issue. Is it more than housing that has the greek system all screwed up at Duquesne? Is this the only issue that contributed to recruitment being so low? I know the girls in my chapter have told me in no uncertain terms that they won't work with Fr. H any longer and the new head of Greek Life..they have no trust in them any longer. One of the parents of my sisters is in the process of buying a house on the southside for the chapter.

I currently go to duquesne and I am in a greek organization. I can assure you that at the very least 50% of the problem is DU's Admin., Father Hogan, and the new director. The wing rule is something like 100% fraternity/sorrority members on a wing, which at a school such as Duquesne, is rediculous. Father Hogan is trying to basically rid Duquesne of greek life. No senior member of a fraternity/sorrority wants to live in a dorm... with sophmores, juniors, and now some freshmen. It is just rediculous what they are doing. The rules are way too strict. They try to take all the fun out of greek life.

Sorry for the long post.

Du22:

I am getting ready for work at my school but I wanted to confirm that what you have said is EXACTLY what I have heard from my sisters, both collegiate and alum. Fr. H wants to get rid of Greek Life and the new head of Greek Life has made a complete mess of things.

One of the parents of the collegiates bought a house over the weekend on the southside and he said that if he is challenged by Duquesne he will go directly to court. He has a good attorney that said no one can tell someone that can't buy a home and who they can rent to. So, he said any noise from Duquesne and he will go to court and to the newspapers.

What a complete mess Fr. H and head of Greek LIfe have made..NO ONE wants to join a greek group now at Duquesne. Thanks alot, Duquesne!

HI ALL:

Eventually, the bad taste left in everyone's mouth by Duquesne will lead to less money given by alum. I think someone said this somewhere already in this chat. When people are unhappy they don't give and maybe that is what Duquesne needs in order for things to get better.

I am surprised that a priest is in charge of Greek Life. Is there someone above Father Hogan who the greek community can go to?

Fr. Hogan is the executive vice president for Student Life. My understanding is he is basically in charge of damn near everything as far as the students go, including greek life. I believe the only people really above Fr. Hogan are some of the other campus executives and the President of the University. Then again, there is always the alumni since they are potential donors. If there is one thing that I've learned here, its that money talks.

Money does talk. If you have trustees and some of them are greek or alumni from the on campus orgs, you may want to approach them in a friendly business matter.