Duke's 9 Sororities Get Chapter Housing for First Time Since 1911

[Blue Violets]

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

[dukedg]

This is really exciting! Blue Violets, are you a Duke alumna?

[dukemama]

Wow, this would be interesting if it actually happened. When I was at Duke in the mid-80s there never seemed to be a concerted effort to get the sororities housed together like the fraternities (NOTE: There are no "houses" per se for the fraternities; they simply live in dorms specifically set aside for their particular organization). Of course, I wasn't Greek at the time so maybe there was chatter about this that I just wasn't privy to, as Blue Violets' post implies.

I wonder which of the 9 NPC chapters didn't apply for housing?

[DubaiSis]

To save everyone the effort:

Duke University
(Trinity College)
Durham, NC
January 14-22, 2012
Quota last year=40
***************
Alpha Delta Pi Omicron 1911
Zeta Tau Alpha Phi 1915-1987/2005
Kappa Alpha Theta Beta Rho 1928
Kappa Kappa Gamma Delta Beta 1930
Delta Delta Delta Alpha Omicron 1931
Pi Beta Phi North Carolina Beta 1933
Alpha Phi Beta Nu 1935-1970/2003
Delta Gamma Beta Theta 1939-1974/1986
Chi Omega Mu Kappa 1976

[ASUADPi]

Originally Posted by Blue Violets

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?

My question if this is true, that by Title IX, they must provide housing, how come other universities aren't required to provided individual houses for sororities?

My experience is strictly with ASU, but the fraternities have had houses for as long as I can remember and the sororities were housed in a dorm. Now some of the fraternities still have houses and some live in a Greek dorm. The sororities are still housed in a Greek dorm.

Honestly, it seems only fair. If the university is providing/allowing housing for the fraternities it is only fair and appropriate for them to provide/allow housing for the sororities.

[33girl]

It's not true. Title IX has nothing to do with facilities. If it did, my school district (and many many many others) would not have a football stadium that looks like a college one. I doubt that a similar structure is provided for women's volleyball, basketball, or any other women's sport.

Do Duke students commonly move off campus as upperclassmen? Because honestly, this sounds like nothing more than an attempt by the university to get rid of off campus, un-policeable unofficial Greek housing. The women will be forced to live in the housing whether they want to or not - thereby killing any off campus facilities. That's the way it comes across to me, of course I could be all wet.

[ElieM]

I note it's not just the sororities but other student groups & multicultural fraternities as well.

[DubaiSis]

Yeah, I'm reading "revenue stream" and nothing holier than that. I don't know the dynamics of the campus, but if students tend to live in the dorms their freshman and maybe their sophomore years, by having the sororities live in dorms for more than that would make the university a lot of money, especially when you're talking 9 sororities!

[Low C Sharp]

I'm sure a Duke grad can give more recent data, but at least in the 90s, most Duke undergrads lived on campus as juniors and seniors. I doubt that this change is about forcing more upperclassmen to live in the dorms.

[33girl]

Originally Posted by Low C Sharp

I'm sure a Duke grad can give more recent data, but at least in the 90s, most Duke undergrads lived on campus as juniors and seniors. I doubt that this change is about forcing more upperclassmen to live in the dorms.

Thanks for the clarification.

If that's the case, I would say this is to shut someone up who bitched about it and didn't know the facts of Title IX.

[dukemama]

Unless things have changed fairly recently, Duke guarantees housing for students for all 4 years. Hence most people live on campus because, to be honest, Durham is not all that happening a town (although I hear it's much better than it was 25 years ago). Many new dormitories have popped up on campus in the last 10-15 years, giving the students even more housing options.

I lived on campus all 4 years, the last two on "Main West" (main campus, hub of most social activities) and I wouldn't have had it any other way!

[anygreekmom]

I was a KD at Duke in the 70's and really liked that we didn't have houses. It made for much more mixing of the various sorority members - it was more about what dorm that you lived in rather than the sorority you belonged to. Duke has an East, West and Central campus (all connected by bus service and all land in between owned by the university). All freshman live on East campus but, as dukemama said, West is where the "action" is and, in my day, was definitely the preferred place to live. It sounds like from The Chronicle article that the sorority housing will be on Central Campus (apartments) - and that will be interesting to see how it will be received. I'll be curious to see how it all shakes out next year!

[dukemama]

Things are moving forward! Here's a picture of the Alpha Phi sign at their new housing on Central Campus:

http://instagr.am/p/QDlLoHTfr7/

[DGTess]

Originally Posted by dukemama

Things are moving forward! Here's a picture of the Alpha Phi sign at their new housing on Central Campus:

http://instagr.am/p/QDlLoHTfr7/

GORGEOUS!!!!!!!!!!!

[FSUZeta]

How exciting for the Duke sororities!