The university had "Panhel Housing" (shared sorority housing) until 1959, but there has never been individual chapter housing at Duke before. Duke has had at least one active sorority since 1911. Today there are 9 active chapters.
According to news reports, and word-of-mouth, Panhel proactively applied for housing for all 9 chapters, even though at least one chapter did not vote to apply for housing. I guess it was perceived as an equity issue, plus would really seem to change things if some chapters were housed and others weren't (or so it seems to me).
The University apparently now claims that they are legally required to provide sorority housing because of Title IX (they provide fraternity housing and the fraternities have always been chapter housed at Duke). I find this laughable - in the 80s, 90s, and early 00s, several sororities attempted to get chapter housing, and were told that it wasn't available/an option because of spacing constraints. Now they have no choice?
In any event, I do feel this has the potential to really shape/change/craft sorority life at Duke. Duke has deferred Greek recruitment (2nd semester, so January) and traditionally women have had strong networks of friends in different sororities - and lived with them too. In fact, almost all of the roommate pairs I can think of from college involve women from different sororities.
http://dukechronicle.com/article/pan...ing-first-time
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