Quote:
Originally posted by oncelurked
Just to clarify what they mean in the article, the Stanford Row is not all greek. In fact, at this moment, only 10 houses are actually greek. The rest of the 33 houses are theme dorms, co-ops, or regular student housing.
Freshman Orientation being dry is nothing new. It's just new wording for the same age-old policy that Stanford has had in the past. I am guessing the new wording is a direct result of Stanford's inability to keep the campus 'dry' for the period they desire.
I agree that the wording of the policy probably isn't good, but Stanford's been shifting blame of underage drinkers steadily since President Hennessey was inagurated and his son started college. They have also been cracking down on everyone on every infraction since the new police chief was hired - from MIPs to lack of bike lights. There might not be a connection with the campus administrators having kids in college at Stanford, but from a recent alumna's perpective, it sure seemed like it while I was a student.
Once these kids are out of college, the attitude of the campus may change. Or someone needs to re-hire Gerhard Casper.
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Great post! As an older alum, I am amazed and disappointed at the way Stanford has changed over the last twenty years regarding greek life. While the sororities were not housed while I was there, there were at least 13 housed fraternities (Alpha Delts, Dekes, DU's, Delta Tau Delta, Phi Delts, Theta Delts, KA's, Kappa Sigs, Betas, Sigma Chi's, SAE's, Theta Zi's, and Zeta Psi), with Phi Kappa Psi, Sig Eps and Sigma Alpha Mu unhoused. This, coupled with the six sororities (Pi Phi, KKG, Thetas, DG's, Tri Delts, and Alpha Phi), led to a pretty fun greek life. I didn't even include the NPHC fraternities and sororites (Alpha Phi Alpha, Kappa Alpha Psi, Omega Psi Phi, Delta Sigma Theta, and Alpha Kappa Alpha). After Don Kennedy left as president, the university really cracked down and started booting off houses (some were for legitimate reasons like they were not making quota), but others for minor infractions. Long story short, once you lose your house-kiss it goodbye because there is NO WAY the university will give it back to you unless you do some SERIOUS butt-kissing (or maybe have a really wealthy alum donate a couple hunderd million with the stipulation that part of the money has to go to building a new greek house).
Now, Stanford will never be compared to a state school in terms of greek life-most students there are not interested in joining as there are so many other housing options, but prohibiting freshmen from drinking the first week at the fraternities (because basically this was meant for the fraternities and sororites), is really short sighted, and it does put the upperclassmen in a bad position.
Poor SAE's-the best part of freshmen orientation was always the Friday night beer fest at the SAE house...the trick was to spot the high schoolers from Paly (Palo Alto High School, which is right across from campus), trying to sneak in and get drunk...
Oh well, I must leave now to go down to Palo Alto to see Stanford get killed by USC in football (Damn, I HATE those Trojans!!!). Hopefully we can keep it somewhat competitive!
