The WSA passed a resolution Sunday night supporting the existence of Greek organizations on campus. The resolution does not change policy, however, and does not assure the future existence of Greek organizations on campus.
Representatives of Beta Theta Pi (Beta), Delta Kappa Epsilon (DKE), Psi Upsilon (Psi U), La Unidad Latina, and the Ethnic Greek Council including Zeta Phi Beta attended the WSA general assembly meeting to voice what they perceive as an effort by the University to eliminate, or at least significantly redefine, Greek life on campus.
DKE President Michael Barbera ’07, Beta President Brent Taylor ’07, and Psi U President Max Vargas ’07 each took the floor to describe the history of their fraternities. All three stressed the brotherhood and leadership qualities that their organizations fostered, and mentioned the unpublicized but notable community service continually performed by the Greek organizations.
“DKE has always been an organization that exists to help its brothers,” Barbera said. “We have done a lot of good things that people don’t hear about; they hear the less positive things, but we care about our community.”
The fraternities also pointed out the influence of their alumni, a high percentage of whom contribute to alumni drives and University capital campaigns.
The Greek groups approached the WSA with the hope that a show of support from the student body would help them in their larger efforts in talks with the Administration to solidify the future of University Greek life.
“It would be important for us to get recognition,” Taylor said. “Not ‘I love fraternities,’ but ‘I recognize their right to exist.’”
The WSA resolution affirms that Greek life and Greek organizations have been an integral part of the community and that they have the right to a continued existence on campus with the support of the University.
In recent years, the three fraternities with houses on campus, DKE, Psi U, and Beta, have run into discrimination issues, as fraternities traditionally only welcome men to board. The University’s housing policy requires that all housing welcome all parts of the student body.
Due to their refusal to board women, Beta has been off campus since 2003. Psi U was given off-campus status this academic year. DKE has opened its doors to female boarders and is officially considered an on-campus program house. DKE currently has one female boarder.
“The alumni are not thrilled with the notion of a female living in the house but understand it is essential to our existence,” Barbera said.
Currently, Psi U and Beta’s boarding members pay the University for rooms on campus, although they live in the fraternity houses. Because of this, there are currently about 40 empty rooms at various places on campus that are assigned to the fraternity brothers who instead live in the fraternity houses.
Beta brothers are currently paying a “double rent,” as they pay the University for their unused room on campus and also pay Beta for their room in the fraternity house. Psi U’s brothers also pay for unused University rooms, but Psi U alumni pay their Psi U room rent.
“I think it’s frankly ridiculous that Wesleyan is wasting rooms by having fraternity members pay twice,” said WSA Finances and Facilities Committee Chair Gabe Tabek ’06.
“We all applied for off-campus housing and we were all denied,” Vargas said. “We believe that were we to co-educate, we would want to do it for our own reasons and not because of outside pressure.”
Still, representatives of Greek groups said that housing woes were not the objective of their appearance before the WSA.
“Greek life at Wesleyan has been in very unproductive conversations with the Administration for years,” said Garth Mitchell ’08, a WSA Student Affairs Committee member and DKE brother. “The resolution passed at Sunday’s meeting offers these Greek organizations bargaining power with them.”
The Office of Residential Life declined to comment.
Dean of the College Maria Cruz-Saco was in attendance for the discussion but couldn’t speak on the ongoing nature of Administrative discussions.
“Personally, I don’t think I know enough to give an intelligent opinion on this matter, but I am listening,” said Dean of the College Maria Cruz-Saco. “The [fraternity situation] is not consistent with the broader principle of Wesleyan’s residential life policy…this is the impasse. It has to be stated in the mission [of the house] that they will be open to all.”
In an earlier iteration at the meeting, the WSA resolution stated that Greeks had been a “valuable” part of campus life, wording that raised some objection among WSA members and threatened to derail the resolution’s passing.
WSA Community Outreach Committee Chair Annie Fox ’07 was not comfortable with the original wording and questioned whether fraternities and sororities actually are a valuable part of campus life.
“I completely understand that they do wonderful community service works and provide safe space and empowerment for many students, but they also contribute to the extreme segregation of the campus,” Fox said. “For example, some students feel that DKE provides a safe space for students who don’t fit the artsy liberal stereotype, and [is] a haven for more dissenting political views…that’s certainly valuable, but it also means that those voices get limited to that space and are more silenced in the rest of the community.”
WSA Community Outreach Committee member Jason Harris ’09 said that whether or not a group was “valuable” had no part in the discussion.
“If we were to focus on the individual ‘value’ of each student group in relation to every single student at Wesleyan there would be varied opinions which would produce an endless war with no resolution,” Harris said. “I came into this fraternity discussion with the basic assumption that every student group on campus is ‘valuable’ to someone.”
Though the WSA resolution technically does not change any policy, the Greek organizations view it as only the beginning.
“The resolution passed yesterday in the WSA meeting is a very important step to future conversations with the Administration revolving around Greek life issues to date,” Barbera said. “Once Greeks as a unified group come together, as we will, and discuss what issues we want to tackle first, the WSA will be an integral voice in our work with the Administration to resolve these issues.”
Taylor said he agreed that a unified Greek front to work together with the Administration would be the next step.
“I am very satisfied with the response from the WSA,” Taylor said. “Having faced so much strong opposition from the University in the past few years, it is very comforting to know the students support our right to be here.”
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