Fraternity And Sorority Life GPA vs. Non-Affiliated Student GPA

<p>Saw this in the campus newspaper today:</p>

<p>Congratulations Fraternity And Sorority Life!
Fraternity and Sorority Life GPA - 3.15
Non-Affiliated Student GPA - 3.04</p>

<p>415 Fraternity/Sorority Students on President's List (4.0 GPA)
716 Fraternity/Sorority Students on Deans' List (3.5+)
(*I go to a school with 13,780 full-time undergraduates where 23% of girls join sororities and 17% of guys join fraternities)</p>

<p>I've seen this phenomenon at many schools where the push by the Greek Life office to join a fraternity/sorority is because the Greek Life GPA is higher than the Non-Greek Life GPA. I've been torn over whether to join a fraternity for several months now. Is there a secret to the higher GPA or is this just a case in which the non-Greek Life GPA is a bigger sample than the Greek Life-GPA?</p>

<p>Even at Purdue I believe the average Greek Life GPA is higher than the all-Men’s/Women’s average. Every fraternity/sorority has an Academic chairperson who makes sure everyone is doing well or maintaining a certain GPA. Some houses also have a required GPA in order to stay in the fraternity/sorority. I believe Delta Sigma Phi, an IFC fraternity has a requirement during pledgeship and when your a brother. Most houses nowadays also have a “library” of coursework, quizzes, exams that brothers/sisters keep for future reference. There are even academic fraternities/sororities as well such as Evan’s Scholars.</p>

<p>I think (just a thought) that people in frats/sororities are around brothers/sisters that have experience about certain courses or are taking it and since they are united under this club they are more willing to help them out to succeed</p>

<p>^ True. I had a lot of brothers help me out with my work and they always proofread my stuff for me. Everyone helps each other out since you know who majors in what.</p>

<p>What Magneto said. Also, depending on the school a lot of the frats and sororities might have a lot of members who just take easier courses. And of course, there are academic/honor frats and sororities. And a lot of frats/sororities want to keep a good image, since they’d rather not seem like Animal House.</p>

<p>Also, the people in Greek Life are also the ones that are getting out their and are ambitious and willing to try new things. This doesn’t surprise me! And the above mentioned points also hold true from what I heard from my friends that are in Greek Life! You also have an awesome social life which may help deal with the stress by making you happier. When you’re happier it lets you relax and pay more attention to school/classes!</p>

<p>In my opinion, the “library” that Jimgotkp referred to explains a good bit of the phenomenon the OP discussed. (At Georgia Tech, we use the term “word” to describe the “library.”)</p>

<p>It’s common for professors to post sample questions from previous exams for all students’ benefit, but it’s undeniable that actual past exams help. Learn how to do those questions, and maybe, just maybe, they’ll show up again in slightly modified form on your test.</p>

<p>Relying on indirect evidence, my roommate from last year was a math TA. He once told me that when he was grading the last exam before the final, he was unable to find a student’s exam even though he saw the student take it. Naturally, he was very nervous as he was afraid the student would complain, causing all sorts of problems for him and the professor. The student, however, never complained! He suspected that the student took the exam with him for his fraternity’s “library.” According to him, the student had done very poorly on previous exams and was going to fail anyway. But, he said he could never prove that was the reason. All he knows is that the student never complained. I add that that was only one student. There may have been other Greeks who had performed very well in that class for all I know.</p>

<p>Is there anything wrong with the “library” system? I personally see nothing wrong. It’s a perk of Greek membership.</p>

<p>I feel the library system is a bit unfair as it does give a definite advantage over people without access to it.</p>

<p>Heck, I remember a professor or two that had crazy difficult homework sets that would take over fifteen hours a week, but he used the same problems every year! While we’d all eventually solve the problems, we found out our friends in the Greek system would finish in about two hours since they’d be able to sit there and learn off of the solutions.</p>

<p>I personally think it’s a perk because nowadays there are websites where people attach worksheets and tests/quizzes so others can use it. I forgot the names of the websites though…</p>

<p>Here we call that a “test bank,” but yeah, same idea.</p>

<p>Also, I think people who join Greek life are the ambitious ones of a group anyways–correlation doesn’t necessarily imply causation. Just because someone goes Greek doesn’t mean that their GPA goes up, and vice versa.</p>

<p>I don’t think its fair to say that people who join frats are more ambitious and that its because these people are more outgoing and “happy” that they do better.</p>

<p>^But they do build strong relationships that often last for the rest of their lives. It’s all about networking.</p>

<p>Why isn’t that fair? Sure, I know gregarious people that didn’t pledge somewhere and are as ambitious as anyone, but the majority of those kinds of people are drawn to Greek life because of the benefits it offers them–strong social skills, networking, a familial bond for the rest of their lifetime, and, yes, a test bank.</p>

<p>Many people don’t even think about the “test bank” when they are rushing/pledging. The social benefits, networking opportunities, and familial bond they get is what they want as karabee said.</p>

<p>I’m in a fraternity. There’s not really a secret to the high GPA, but there are a variety of reasons:</p>

<p>1.) College is difficult. You need a support system of friends who will help you through. In the general population, there are students without this support system; they try to do college by themselves and fail miserably in most aspects, including academics. In a fraternity/sorority, your brothers/sisters are your support group and ensure that you don’t fall behind. If one of my fraternity brothers needs help, I come to his assistence. The same applies vice-versa.</p>

<p>2.) The test banks are an excellent resource. It’s no secret that we all have them. I don’t see this as unfair in the sense that any group of friends can collect them, and professors usually make their past exams available.</p>

<p>3.) The bias of more ambitious people joining fraternities and sororities is true to a certain extent. This matter would be irrelevant to whether or not joining a fraternity or sorority will help your GPA.</p>

<p>With that in mind - I suggest you show up to a few rush events the next time recruitment season comes. You have not committed yourself to anything until you say yes to a bid. Go out and meet a few people in the Greek system. Ask them these questions. Then, make an informed decision.</p>

<p>greeek life!</p>

<p>you don’t have to justify being in a fraternity to me. im pledging.</p>

<p>but i don’t see a correlation between being social and getting good grades. there are plenty of kids who never go out and spend time studying and get good GPAs. and i know people in fraternities who have great GPAs too.</p>