Sig Ep votes to allow transgender men as members

[AOII Angel]

http://theodysseyonline.com/fsu/sige...rothers/139216

The Sigma Phi Epsilon Fraternity announced on Sunday that at its National Board of Directors meeting in December that it had opened its membership to transgender males.

Interesting move. Way to be leaders, Sig Ep!

[33girl]

I hate to be a cynic, but I think that the chapters that were comfortable with transgender members were already bidding them regardless of what their HQ said. Maybe chapters that aren't comfortable with it will be eventually, but I think that's going to take meeting and getting to know someone in real life - not just a switch flipped with the passing of a policy.

[DeltaBetaBaby]

It's still meaningful that an organization is willing to say "f**k all the concern trolls who keep telling us we could lose single-sex status, equality is important to us."

[Sen's Revenge]

YAY!!!! Way to go, SigEp!

[AlwaysSAI]

This always confuses me. A transgender male is a female-to-male transition, correct?

SAI's legal counsel gave a workshop on this very issue at Convention just a couple weeks ago. I learned some interesting tidbits concerning transgender members and single sex fraternities/sororities. In 2014, Title IX was amended to include a statement that colleges and universities are to treat transgendered individuals as the gender with which they identify. Therefore, a transgender male at Hometown University would be classified as a male for all University related purposes. Additionally, as that applies to single sexed greek organizations - because social greeks are exempt from Title IX we have the ability to determine membership criteria. And, most importantly, as long as the organization in question appears, acts, and makes every reasonable effort to remain single sexed, it is single sexed as far as the law is concerned - regardless of if a sex transition has been completed.

(I hope I explained that correctly. We weren't allowed to video/audio record the presentation, so I'm sharing from memory. If there's anyone more versed on this topic, feel free to chime in!)

Kudos to Sig Ep for taking the lead on this issue! I have a feeling it will be coming down the pipeline for many organizations.

[DeltaBetaBaby]

Originally Posted by AlwaysSAI

This always confuses me. A transgender male is a female-to-male transition, correct?

It's someone who was born with a female body and currently identifies as male, regardless of whether they've taken any steps to physically transition.