<p>S was invited to join a fraternity. What are the advantages/disadvantages to belonging? This was totally unexpected! The subject of frats never came up in our household before and I didn't think he was interested. Apparently he went along with some friends and visited some houses and got the 'bug'.</p>
<p>Advantages: Lots of good parties and cheap alcohol.
Disadvantages: See above.</p>
<p>Sorry to frat lovers out there.</p>
<p>Aaaiiiyyyyeeeee - not another GREEEKKKK thread!
Sorry Doubleplay, I'm having a bad day, this is new for your family and of concern to you. Please search the forums, there are many threads, mostly negative about frats. There are good and bad things about Greeks, and a lot of it depends on which college you are speaking of.</p>
<p>You're right Cangel. I should not have taken the bait...</p>
<p>Run away, run far, far away from this thread. I'm sorry, I really am -- I know you're just looking for info. But if you search the forums and read just a few of the threads you'll see why some of us get the shakes when we see the topic come around again.</p>
<p>If your son is a freshman, I would definitely say no because he has no information where he can make an informed decision (just hearsay). Let him wait a year evaluate them for himself and see if this is the scene that he wants to be a part of. I agree with Cangel that greek life and chapters vary from campus to campus.</p>
<p>sorry! I guess I haven't been around long enough but I haven't seen it come up, at least in the Parents Forum.</p>
<p>It's okay Doubleplay, Greeks are one of those pushbutton issues that get people's underwear in a knot - both for and against.
PErsonally, I agree with Sybbie in spirit, kids should have a semester or so to become acclimatized to college before rushing, but that is NOT the norm down here, many kids know which frat they want to join, long before arriving on campus. Non-Greeks may have a great college experience, and they may be on the sidelines at a heavily Greek school. The conversation I think you should have with your child is about how he handles, alcohol, drugs and peer pressures, and should go on whether or not he joins a frat.</p>
<p>Learn as much as you can about frat life on his campus, the role it plays in the overall social scene, and what your son wants to get out of it.</p>
<p>You're all actually turning down a chance to bash something you know nothing about? You've had so much fun doing it in the past.</p>
<p>Anyone in college can and does get drunk. This has nothing to do with Greek/GDI.</p>
<p>If I may, who was it that gave him a bid?</p>
<p>636</p>
<p>Having a son join a frat a few years back has changed my mind a bit on this subject. </p>
<p>While they're certainly "animal house" days and nights... there's also a higher GPA by almost half a letter grade than the average male student population at his college. There's time to work with special olympics, habitat for humanity and college activities. It's a mixed bag that should be looked at with an open mind. </p>
<p>While I'm sure there's reasons to hate Frats, there also reasons to appreicate them. Mine's Kappa Sig... right there with Jimmy Buffet and Bob Dole.</p>
<p>Your best chance to be selected for the strongest fraternities or sororities is to participate in recruitment and then accept a bid the first chance that you are eligible to rush. Some schools have deferred recruitment in January, some have fall rush as in the case of the OP's school.</p>
<p>If he turns down a bid, it is doubtful that the fraternity will offer him another one later.</p>
<p>On most universities' webpages, you should be able to find links to the Greek Life pages including GPA reports broken down by overall gpa, overall male gpa, Greek men gpa, non-Greek men gpa and then by each house. This goes for women as well. These usually go back several semesters to provide the Potential New Member (and his/her parents) some information regarding academic performance.</p>
<p>BTW, OfM-I'm a Kappa Kappa Gamma...right there with Kate Spade, Jane Pauley and many others :)</p>
<p>THXZPI636 ? What's with the "636"?</p>
<p>"You're all actually turning down a chance to bash something you know nothing about? You've had so much fun doing it in the past."</p>
<p>Indeed, we're still awed by your previous knowledgeable posts on this issue, especially your educated position of the use of alcohol during hazing rituals like the one at the UC at Boulder that claimed the life of Gordie Bailey. </p>
<p>This little tibbit might be worth filing in your ultra-thin folder about incident that were prosecuted. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Estate of Deceased College Student v. Alpha Tau Omega Fraternity. </p>
<p>Represented the family *of a freshman at *Old Dominion University who aspirated on his vomit and died following the fraternity's Big Brother/Little Brother initiation night. At the beginning of that evening, four fraternity pledges sought to satisfy the requirements for obtaining membership. By the end of that evening, all four had lost consciousness from alcohol intoxication. Client died later that morning, and another pledge was rushed to the hospital in critical condition. ** Discovery in the case uncovered the local chapter's "Top 100" list of fraternity memories, and 11 of the top 12 memories involved drinking or puking from alcohol. The Washington Post featured this incident in an article focusing on the prevalence of these types of fatalities in college. The family accepted a substantial financial settlement prior to trial, which also included non-monetary terms designed to forever change the chapter, its alcohol policies, and prevent similar tragedy.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://www.hazinglaw.com/results.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.hazinglaw.com/results.htm</a></p>
<p><a href="http://hazing.hanknuwer.com/nonhaze.html%5B/url%5D">http://hazing.hanknuwer.com/nonhaze.html</a></p>
<p>I believe you're citing an incident that happened nearly 6 years ago when the OP's new freshman would have been in 7th grade at a school that may or may not be the school that the OP's kid attends and with a fraternity that may or may not be the one that issued the bid to the OP's son. One thing for sure is it's not ATO at ODU because National shut the chapter down following the incident and never recolonized.</p>
<p>Motherdear, my post was in reply to the snide comment of THX, and made a reference to one of his previous posts:</p>
<p>
[quote]
On Gordie:
That being said. This was not part of any ritual of the fraternity. No fraternity ritual involves alcohol. This is the brothers of this specific chapter being morons. Clearly hindsight being what it is, what the pladge class should have done if they felt what had been given to them was too much alcohol, is dump out what they did not drink. Yes, the brothers gave it to them. Yes, the brothers told them to drink it all, but they did not stay there and forcefeed them alcohol before or after someone had passed out from consumption. Please do not assume that all fraternities are like this, haze, are complete morons; it's just not true.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Maybe we should ask the parents of the ODU student if the fact that it occured six years ago has made the pain more bearable, especially in light of the almost constant reoccurences of similar cases. </p>
<p>THX may very well want to be the new College Confidential's Lucifer, but that does not make his "knowledge" of the issues less worthy of a challenge.</p>
<p>Xiggi: While one does have to be careful your selective quoting is very misleading. Shall none of us go to class because our professor might rape us? <a href="http://www.oregonlive.com/education/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1154737525176490.xml&coll=7%5B/url%5D">http://www.oregonlive.com/education/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1154737525176490.xml&coll=7</a></p>
<p>Shall none of us drive because of all the accidents that could occur?</p>
<p>Shall none of us eat meat because of poisoning and mad cow disease?</p>
<p>There are RISKS in life and there are always dangers it's up to the individual to handle things maturely and intelligently.</p>
<p>If the op researches up on the hazing and knows something about the frat then he/she is safe and should be allowed to join. We can't all live behind a veil of fear for all our lives and then have regrets instead of nostalgia at 50 years old.</p>
<p>Misleading quoting? Having to be careful? Pluuuuuuzhe!</p>
<p>The first quotation is followed by the original source. The second quotation is obviously from a post by THX on CC. Anyone wanting to read the full text can click on the link or use the search button. </p>
<p>And, again, I was responding to TXH's comment.</p>
<p>Motherdear, I was also a member of KKG! I had a wonderful experience as a Kappa, but I do admit to reservations about fraternities for my son. However, I also believe that drinking issues are not exclusive to Greek life, and I continue to raise the issue with him whenever possible. It's kind of become a family joke -- "Mom's on her alcohol spiel again."</p>
<p>SJMOM, PM me your chapter! There are a couple of Kappas on CC!</p>
<p>My H and I have warned my daughter about drinking as well ever since high school and will do the same with my son when he enters his 9th grade year. My D did not drink in hs and probably won't a lot (if at all) due to her college sport but my H and I figured a pre-emptive strike was a good idea.</p>
<p>To the OP, google around using the chapter and college. If there has been been anything newsworthy (both good and bad), it will pop up.</p>