Mergers...is is still possible?

irishpipes · #39 12-08-2005, 06:22 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Rudey
And nobody is saying to drop all the non-tier 1 schools. I'm saying that there is a focus on big party/state schools as opposed to these schools. Given the risk and upsides involved, it doesn't make much sense to me and maybe others. I don't see why the smaller old fraternities at these top tier schools would want to merge into a larger crowd. I am sure their alumni would be none too happy about it.

-Rudey

I think you are speaking more of male fraternities now, but in case you are still including sororities (women's fraternities), I wonder if some of the reason that GLOs have not opened more chapters at the Ivies is because they don't seem to want us. Just looking at the history of sororities at the Ivy League Schools, it has been very spotty. I am not sure if you would include Barnard as Ivy League, since it technically is not, but since Columbia was not available to women until 1983, I will use it as a starting place. Of course AOII and AEPhi were founded there, but many other sororities (10 total) had chapters there prior to the banning of Greek Life in the early 1900s. Brown followed suit and also banned Greek Life around the same time.

Likewise, Columbia, Dartmouth, Harvard, Yale, and Princeton seem to have limited Greek Life - perhaps because the universities did not admit women until fairly recently. I seem to recall that some of these campuses have unrecognized Greek Life as well, but I am not sure about that. I would think that would be a huge deterrent for any GLO.

Contrastly, Cornell and Penn seem to be bastions for Ivy League Greek Life and tons of sororities have chapters there, but a lot have closed as well. (I believe Penn has 8 active chapters and 10 closed chapters, while Cornell has 12 active chapters and 6 closed chapters.)

Just in summary, it seems that only one women's fraternity is truly entrenched in the Ivy League schools - Theta has chapters at all but one - Dartmouth - which closed in 1992. Alpha Chi has chapters at 4 Ivies, and a bunch have chapters at 3 schools. I just wonder how much of that is due to the climate at these universities rather than the GLOs not wanting to go there. Just a thought.