• Define hazing and reduce or eliminate pledging
Nationals also need to present a consistent message about hazing. They should begin by formulating a clear definition of exactly what is proscribed and then support it with a Unanimous Agreement, the strongest measure possible in the National Panhellenic Conference. Currently there is no Unanimous Agreement prohibiting hazing, yet there is one concerning the media: “It is in accord with the dignity and good manners of fraternity women to avoid negative publicity on Panhellenic matters.” This imbalance teaches college students to prioritize image over action, and spin over safety.
Once a hazing definition is in place, Nationals should not have contradictory policies. If they define hazing as anything that distinguishes pledges from sisters, then Nationals cannot differentiate pledges from sisters with different pins and pledge-only exams—and cannot exclude them from ritual ceremonies and the revealing of sorority secrets. Some Greek groups have begun to transition their pledge program to a “Membership Development Program,” which is intended to educate and include all members. This is a step in the right direction.
Nationals recently began referring to pledges as “new members,” because for some, the term “pledge” suggests a period of having to earn membership. “Something as simple as changing terminology can assist in changing a culture of hazing in an organization,” according to an educational resource called the Greek Gazette. In fact, Nationals might consider forgoing the pledge (or new member) period entirely. If recruits were to have the opportunity and the time to learn about the sororities before they accepted a bid, then they wouldn’t need the interim time as a pledge to decide whether or not they truly wanted to become a part of the sisterhood. They could be initiated the day after Bid Day.
What’s more, sororities have a large number of local advisers who are expected to assist the chapter. If Nationals insist on having a pledge period, they could at least reduce it to one week and have an adult supervisor on site for the full period. With all of these adult volunteers, it makes great sense to utilize them by requiring adult supervision and oversight at any time during which hazing might occur.
• Emphasize supervision and de-emphasize the house
Along similar lines, if sorority Nationals, unlike fraternities, are going to serve a role in loco parentis, then they should make certain that the adult supervision they advertise is not only present but also influential and effective. At the sorority house that would not allow me access, the adviser knew very well that her house—which openly displayed drug paraphernalia and what appeared to be cocaine—had a drug problem. But when she heard the sisters discussing drugs, she laughed it off and looked the other way. At other houses I visited, the house mothers were nonentities, rarely venturing from their private apartments, not serving as supervisors in the least. Chapters do not allow a house mother to supervise meetings, rituals, or other closed activities if she isn’t a member of the sorority; as an uninitiated woman she is not entitled to know the sorority’s secrets. Given the nature of sorority secrets, however, it seems unreasonable to forgo adult supervision merely out of a fear that an unaffiliated adult might be privy to the sorority’s secret knock.
But for the adults at both the national and regional levels, acting in loco parentis does not need to translate to micromanaging girls’ lives, dictating whom they can speak to or what they can wear. Sororities can have strong sisterhoods even if the girls are allowed to be individuals.
Moreover, Nationals should not have quotas. If they truly believe their own ideals and in the notion of sisterhood, then numbers shouldn’t matter. The Phi Sigma Sigmas at the University of Pennsylvania should not have lost their chapter simply because they didn’t have a specific number of sisters. If they don’t have the money to maintain their house, so be it. A house isn’t necessary for a sisterhood. I spoke with sisters in non–historically white sororities who had no house and fewer than ten members, but they still had strong sisterhoods they were proud of. I also heard from girls without houses in historically white sororities who were relieved they could have sisters without living with them.
Nationals should also consider abolishing rules that require sisters to live in the sorority house for a certain number of years. It is one thing to welcome girls into a club but quite another to force them to reside with each other. Many girls told me that they would rather have had the choice to live off campus, with nonmember friends, or on their own so that they could have an escape from the sorority and a life outside of it. Vicki, in particular, would have preferred to live outside the house. Requiring girls to live in the house forces them to live under the kind of constant scrutiny that encourages conformity and discourages independence and initiative. If Nationals need to fill rooms in a house to maintain it, they could rent rooms to nonaffiliated boarders or share the house with another sorority—both scenarios that currently exist at some universities today.
• Adjust activities
Sisters, too, could take the initiative to make some changes. If the pledge period remains, instead of having pledges perform useless crafts and nonproductive errands for the sisters, pledges instead could be required to spend their “bonding time” performing community service activities together with sisters. Further, sorority policies of fining sisters who can’t attend events or refusing to allow them into social events are counterproductive, particularly when the sisters in question, like Sabrina, work one or more jobs merely to pay for their dues. An Ivy League sister I spoke with said that after two years in her sorority, her financial situation deteriorated so that she could no longer afford to pay dues. She wrote a letter to her sorority’s national office asking if it could reduce her dues or assign her alumna status so that she wouldn’t have to disaffiliate. The national office refused. If Nationals are so fixated on the financial bottom line that they prioritize money above sisters, then it is up to the sisters to look out for their fellow members. When a friend can’t make it to certain events because she has to work, sisters could attend extra events for her and assign her their points.
Sisters could also decrease the number of fraternity socials and replace them with sister activities; after all, sisters aren’t in fact joining all-girl groups if the activities all hinge on men. (And not every girl is as lucky as Amy to have a willing gay backup date.) They could also encourage the girls to bring friends rather than dates to events, if the girls so choose. In the same vein, if sororities are going to continue to have rituals like candlelights to celebrate relationship milestones (or hang banners announcing a lavaliere, as did Alabama’s Zetas), they are inevitably going to alienate sisters who don’t find steady boyfriends. These rituals ought to be expanded to address achievements that have nothing to do with sex. Furthermore, historically white sororities are known to have closed parties while historically black sororities open events to all students. There is no reason why white sororities need to be so insular. Some schools have at least worked out a compromise: sorority parties are closed for two to three hours before they are opened up to a guest list that includes nonmembers.
• Strengthen the sisterhood
No girl should be so uncomfortable with her sisters that she cannot stand up for herself. Sabrina’s alienation could have been prevented if any of the other sisters who observed the situation had said to the girls making racist comments, “That’s racist, and that’s wrong,” or “That’s unacceptable. We won’t tolerate that.” Or suggested to the exec board that they have a speaker come in to discuss race issues. Or even just shown the compassion and consideration to ask Sabrina how she was doing. Perhaps sororities should use their speaker budget to invite someone who specializes in team-building exercises and can help sisters open the lines of communication within the chapter.
The current arbitrariness of sorority rules is troubling—particularly involving such notions as “questionable reputation” and similar ideas. Sisters should not be able to oust a fellow sister unless they not only have involved responsible adult
s in the process but also have done everything they reasonably could to help the sister in question. Rather than disaffiliating a girl for drug use, the local advisers, the house mother, university personnel, and sorority sisters should help to get her into a rehabilitation program. Instead of rejecting a girl for public sexual antics, sisters should address the deeper insecurity and self-esteem issues that the girl may be experiencing. Advisers and house mothers should be trained to recognize problems and, at the least, to make appropriate referrals when necessary. If sisterhoods were truly stronger than friendships, then, like real sisters, sorority members wouldn’t cast someone out merely for making a mistake.
What Universities and Graduates Can Do
• Establish authority
In the 1980s, colleges and universities shied away from direct responsibility of Greek houses because of stricter host-liability laws regarding student drinking. Among the sometimes conflicting rules of national sorority offices, campus Greek administrators, and local advisers, students have slipped through the gaps between the various levels of authority. Consequently, so many people try to impose rules that the rules are often never enforced. There are things that universities can do to try to turn sororities into more positive and useful campus groups. And graduates, whether or not of the Greek system, have a strong voice that can persuade universities to make the right decisions.
Universities must assert that they still hold the ultimate power over sororities. “Sororities need to realize that they are part of an institution—the university—and the institution is not part of them,” said Alfred University’s Daryl Conte. Any of the recommendations in the previous section could be demanded by universities; in fact, some schools are already taking steps to move rush from first semester to second, when freshmen are more accustomed to campus life. School administrators have the capacity to tell sororities that if, for example, they actively exclude minorities, encourage bulimia, or prevent members from going to class and doing homework, they will no longer be recognized by the university. By providing resources and, in some cases, housing to Greek groups, universities imply that they condone those groups’ behavior and standards. It is well within an administration’s discretion to withhold or limit those resources if a sorority does not comply with university policies.
Universities cannot continue to let Greek alumni dictate the composition and comportment of these campus groups. Nor should universities allow sorority national offices to insist that students answer first and foremost to them. Whereas university administrators are trained officials with degrees, national officers aren’t necessarily qualified to counsel or supervise students. As Kathleen Cramer said, these sorority volunteers are stuck in the past, “struggling with change.” If universities could wrest greater control of sororities from the national offices, then perhaps individual chapters on a campus would be more on a par with each other, with less elevation of one sorority above another, less Chanel over Kmart.
In addition, adult representatives at the NGLA Conference suggested that Greek advisers are young and underpaid and therefore should have some flexibility in the time and energy they put into supervising students. That is no excuse. There will usually be some trustworthy adult who would be willing to serve as mentor and adviser to these students despite low pay and long hours. If a university furnishes a Greek adviser, then the university should at least find someone who is willing to take on the full responsibility of the position.
• Offer other options
University administrators should understand that one of the main reasons girls join sororities is to find a more intimate community within the larger student body. Universities could offer a range of less exclusionary alternatives that could achieve the same result, such as the residential college system. The residential college system distributes students equally among a number of smaller living communities, which in many schools have their own publications, student government, social committee, and intramural athletic teams. Students have a more personal home base—and the opportunity to transfer affiliations if they choose. Furthermore, Alfred University has for years offered “First Year Experience,” which provides social, academic, counseling, and health programs to freshmen. To make up for the loss of its Greek system, Alfred has also increased the number of social programs it offers students. The student activities office holds events such as dances or coffeehouses every weekend. On Fridays and Saturdays Alfred keeps the recreation center—with a gym, pool, and movie-viewing area—open until 2 a.m. and brings in free pizza for the students. Whether or not a school maintains its Greek system, these are creative ways to offer students alternative entertainment and bonding opportunities.
What Parents, Siblings, Friends, Advisers, and College-Bound Girls Can Do
• Learn about the system
Individuals who want to help prepare a girl for college should educate themselves about the sorority system—and about other alternatives, such as Subrosa—before the girl decides whether to rush. This learning process should not be limited solely to National Panhellenic Conference promotional materials, many of which proclaim only the platitudes the NPC thinks parents and advisers want to hear. Sororities might not be what a seventeen- or eighteen-year-old believes them to be, and she could be further misled during rush—a time when, as I learned, sorority sisters are prone to exaggerating and outright lying. It is important for a girl to know what she is getting into before rush and to be prepared for the level of commitment.
It is also crucial for a parent/sibling/friend/adviser not to allow a girl to go “on silence” during rush. That rule is intended to prevent girls from being influenced by others as they make their sorority decision. But parents, especially, should be able to counsel and to serve as a sounding board for this decision just as they have with many of their daughter’s decisions up until college. Additionally, “on silence” sets a dangerous precedent: girls need to feel that they can talk to their parents openly about sorority life—otherwise parents like those of Kristin High and Kenitha Saafir, the 2002 drowning victims, don’t find out what is going on until it is too late.
EPILOGUE
IT IS BID DAY at Southern Methodist University in 2003. On Sorority Row, party rental and moving trucks slowly wend their way through a parking lot lined with BMWs, Mercedes, Accords, and Jeep Wranglers sporting sorority stickers and vanity plates reading DG—SMU, A CHI O, SMU 05, and IM KEG. The houses are festooned with bright, professionally made banners: “Deep in the heart of DG” on the Delta Gamma house, “Sweet Home Kappa Gamma,” and “True to Tri-Delt.” Middle-aged women—house mothers or advisers, perhaps—fuss with decorations, arrange chairs on the lawns, and scrutinize the movers hefting helium machines and elegant fountains into houses already dripping with fancy chandeliers.
The night before, on Preference Night, girls in black coats and high heels walked solemnly toward the sorority houses led by heavily made up Rho Chis in blue RC SMU sweatshirts and jeans. The rushees lined up on the sidewalks and waited patiently for sisters to come out of the houses and escort them inside. They had been instructed only to wear “cocktail dresses,” but they looked as if in uniform, draped in black, filmy dresses with short, uneven hemlines. When the Pref parties ended at seven, the rushees were shepherded to the ballroom of the Hughes-Trigg Student Center, where they were required to stay until midnight so that they could not communicate with sorority sisters. The Panhellenic Office showed them movies—Girls Just Wanna Have Fun and When Harry Met Sally—to keep them occupied. Several girls quietly sneaked out of the ballroom to be alone for a few minutes or to call their mothers and cry because of the stress of the recruitment and elimination process.
This morning the rushees, with long straightened hair shining, anxiously return to Hughes-Trigg, wearing tight jeans and snug white turtlenecks or long-sleeved tees. A few brave or stubborn girls are in stilettos, the rest in sneakers because they know they will have to run. The Panhellenic Office has made some changes since the late 1990s to cut
down on charges of hazing, but the Bid Day uniform and Pigs’ Run still remain in force. Reluctant to go into the ballroom alone, the girls shiver outside, most without jackets despite the bitterly cold thirty-degree bleakness. Hugging themselves for warmth, they call fellow rushees on their cell phones, meet up with them, and enter the ballroom in pairs, fours, and sixes. Inside the ballroom, guarded by Greeks with clipboards so that only rushees can enter, they wait for their names to be called. A Rho Chi at one of the tables in the room adjacent to the ballroom hands them their small, cream-colored Bid Card (if they receive one), and watches them carefully for their reaction.
* * *
[Name]
IS CORDIALLY INVITED TO BECOME A MEMBER OF THE
[Name] Sorority
IN ACCEPTING SHE IS REQUESTED TO COME TO
[Address]
IN DECLINING SHE WILL PLEASE SIGN AND
RETURN THIS INVITATION.
* * *
If the girl is distraught, the Rho Chi takes her aside, murmurs words of consolation, and hands her tissues. Otherwise the girl takes her Bid Card and waits in the ballroom, where in the chaos girls are shrieking, screaming, hugging, or crying quietly in the corners.
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