Although the five-minute walk between Alpha Delt’s grotto and DKE’s basement can seem like the distance between two worlds, Residential Life (ResLife) has been working this year to bridge the gap with changes to the way it handles Greek organizations and societies and the relationships they maintain with each other.

“As a general trend over the last couple of semesters, Alpha Delt and other Greek houses have become more receptive to throwing events for the larger Wesleyan community and interacting with other Greek organizations,” said President of Alpha Delta Phi (Alpha Delt) Peter Hull ’10. “Houses like us, and houses all up and down the street, have the power to organize and it’s a shame that we don’t do it more.”

While Alpha Delt, Delta Kappa Epsilon (DKE), the Eclectic Society (Eclectic), and Psi Upsilon (Psi U) are still technically considered program houses and abide by the same set of University rules, ResLife is now making a greater effort to accommodate their distinct needs and qualities. House Managers for Greek houses on campus now receive supplemental training from ResLife on how to deal with situations unique to Greek life. Some inter-Greek events have been going on for several years, such as the upcoming annual Beta-Eclectic Barbeque, scheduled for April 25.

Director of Student Activities and Leadership Development Timothy Shiner said there has been an increase in the number of coordinated events between various Greek houses, such as a showing of the movie “Busted!” earlier this year co-hosted by DKE, Eclectic, and Beta Theta Pi (Beta), which is not considered on-campus, and a joint fundraising between Alpha Delt and Beta for the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life volunteer event later this month.

“We hope to focus our rivalries in a positive manner that will allow us to promote not only our own chapters and societies but, more importantly, the whole Greek system,” said Beta President Graham Gnall ’11.

Last year, former Head Resident for ResLife Michael Lubrano ’09 came to the administration with ideas about changing the University’s approach to Greek life on campus. He hoped to improve the relationship between the houses and the University.

“The current ResLife model for program houses wasn’t necessarily fully supporting the Greek organizations,” Lubrano said.

Although not all of Lubrano’s suggestions, like an inter-Greek council, stuck, ResLife has begun facilitating dialogues between Greek societies and encouraging them to co-sponsor events this year.

“In consultation with my office and other campus administrators, Residential Life in particular recognized, and not for the first time, that the Greek houses on campus were not of the same mold as program houses and made an effort to treat them differently,” Shiner said.

Members of the Greek houses have also been working this year to dispel any negative perceptions that students may have of fraternities. According to DKE President Todd Keats ’11, the fraternity has been making efforts to reach out to the larger community. Recent events like PNK@DKE, a punk show that took place in the basement of DKE, were coordinated with other campus organizations to attract students to the fraternity who might not have visited it before.

Shiner, who oversees all the approved events on campus, also noted that DKE has been engaging in community service and other activities recently.

“It’s easy to forget that at the end of the day we’re all students at this college together and that’s just a shame,” Hull said.