hey guys,
I’m really excited to say I got into Georgia Tech (class of 22’) this month! I just put down my enrollment deposit and couldn’t be more excited. Since I’m OOS, I was planning on rushing to make some friends. And, since GT isn’t known to be a hardcore “party school”, I think the Greek life route will allow me to make the most of my college experience. However there’s just one thing- I am really apprehensive about rushing due to my sexuality. I am completely fine with who I am, but I know that fraternities have always been a bit more conservative, especially in the south. Are fraternities at Georgia Tech also like this? Or, maybe there’s a few frats that are more liberal? If anyone has any first-hand experience or knows anything about Greek life at Tech I would appreciate it a lot!
Go jackets!
There are a number of fraternities that have a history of creating an inclusive environment for all their brothers. I’m not going to list names publicly, but feel free to send me a PM and I’ll be happy to share the names of the fraternities I know to be welcoming. Not surprisingly, there are other fraternities whose brothers have historically been intolerant, and in some cases even opening hostile, toward the LGBTQ community. This will likely be pretty apparent during rush, so I don’t think you’ll have a terribly difficult time sorting out where you should focus your efforts.
On a volunteer basis, the LGBTQ resource center hosts trainings as part of their Greek Allies program aimed at making fraternities and sororities more inclusive, welcoming, and supportive of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning students. You can reach out to Aby Parsons, the director of the center, for more information. She may have a list of which fraternities have members who have participated in the training.
http://www.lgbtqia.gatech.edu/greek-allies
http://www.lgbtqia.gatech.edu/users/aby
My daughter’s worse experience at Georgia Tech was with Greek life at GT. We went to orientation with her, went to convocation and left for Maryland the next morning. All was fine when we took off, but we landed to get a text from our daughter that she had been dropped from all of the sororities by text int he middle of the night. She was out of state , didn’t have HS people to support she admission and that was it. She had not even started classes and her whole view of GT had changed. She says now that she is glad that she did not make it into a sorority, she made great friends that she remains in contact with. All I can say it sat it is a very closed group if you are a straight white girl out of state, don’t expect them to accept you…but it may be better if they do not. You will find your people. It is a great school, your will get a great education, you will have fun and you will make great friends…whether or not the frats embrace you. The frats and sororities are not very welcoming to lots of people…get over it and make GT yours…GT and you will be better for it
75% of GT students do not join fraternities. However they look fun to me
but seem somewhat football oriented, at least some of them. There are fraternities
for racial groups and for athletes as well. A substantial number of GT freshman do not go to even one rush event.
Its all fine. You can find your tribe at GT with clubs as well. There is an LGBT club on campus.