I can barely make it through a day anymore without reading about a new problem with the Greek System in our country. As someone who has devoted many hours in order to make the system better, it hurts me every time I read about another chapter or another student doing something stupid. To say it just puts our entire system in a bad light is not true. In fact we are in the spotlight now and that spotlight is a glaringly bright focused light which should make each of us committed to making the system better, instead we react and over react like never before.
We earned this scrutiny. It's easy to make the argument that in this era of "instant news" the media is chasing our story and trying to bury us. However, this story exists because we, the alumni leaders, the university staffs and the national headquarters, have failed to change our culture while society has changed around us. What was "acceptable" 20 years ago is no longer tolerated. And I'm not sure it would have been acceptable then if the media would have investigated with the intensity they do now. So how have we earned it? Let me make a list.
1. Failure to provide adult leadership.
2. Recruiting men and women based on values other than the prescribed values.
3. Not understanding the changes in the leadership experience and training of our college students.
4. Allowing undergrads to not be accountable for their actions.
5. Not creating membership development tools
6. Mandating diversity
Adult Leadership: We evolved over time with strong alumni boards and live in house directors. In the 70's the house "moms" of the world left fraternities. Add to that local alumni stopped staying in town after graduation and the last thing alums who lived in town wanted to do was help their chapters. The end result was a long distance management model with alums meeting with chapters a few times a year on site. In the worst case scenario alumni boards did not even bother to meet on site. They were in reality property managing from 100 miles away.
We managed to keep afloat during the 80's, although a combination of a changing campus culture and "instant news" brought issues to the surface. Then the 90's happened. Students as a whole seemed to join fraternities for one reason, to party. Our ideals were left on the front porches. All this while there was radical change in the insurance world. Instant news magnified our worst practices and the litigious nature of our culture pointed the target at the Greeks. We couldn't get insurance. And without insurance no one was willing to accept the potential personal risks. Fraternities banded together to "self insure". With the risk now solely on the national fraternities attention to eliminating risk evolved. New rules were written. And with the new rules came resistance to change. Already secret traditions went further underground.
The "electronic revolution" of the past ten years exposed these secrets to the daylight. Universities and national fraternities began investigating reports of hazing, alcohol abuse and sexual assault with only anonymous emails as evidence. The era of "substantiated" facts was behind the Greeks and a new direction of chasing rumors emerged. While many of these rumors were not proven, enough were found to be true. What was buried deep underground was now very raw and at the surface.
So how could adult leadership have helped bring these things forward sooner? There are a few reasons. First, having a house director and active board of directors and/or chapter advisory board would have exposed the issues earlier. I do believe students will do the right thing when challenged to act responsibly. However, sometimes they need to be told what the right things are. Fraternity culture (not exclusive to fraternity by the way as athletics, military and even marching bands have the same issues) has nurtured the "rights of passage" mentality. These traditions are often perpetuated by the worst members, the members behind in their bills, with the lowest grade point average and often the first to sign up for every "bar crawl." Adult leadership helps to take away their influence.
Second, I have learned over the years fraternities can be basically broken into 20-60-20 models. Simply said for every 100 man chapter there are 20 leaders, 20 idiots and 60 riding the fence. In good and great chapters the 20 leaders influence the 60 in the middle. In bad chapters the 20 idiots lead the 60 down the path of destruction.
Adult leadership and presence boosts the 20 leaders and provides them with the back bone they need to make the right choices more often than not. Looking at chapters across the country, most of the good and great chapters have a strong alliance with adult leaders.
Recruiting men and women based on values other than those prescribed.
Said simply, alcohol has been a major influence in recruitment across the country. Joining the chapter with the best social calendar is often listed a "reason to join." And the Greek system has paid the price for that mentality. I've often "lectured undergrads" complaining about how they can't control drinking in their chapters that "they recruit alcoholics and then wonder why they have a drinking problem." Young men and women often make one of the most important decisions of their lives under the influence. I'm sure this is not unique to the Greek system, but it is a sad commentary. Many campuses have instituted dry recruitment and certainly this is helping. Fraternities who recruit based on a higher standard have better men and have more success in the long run. Bold statement I know, but I strongly believe there are enough potential recruits drawn to the system for it's advertised values, things like networking, leadership development, friendship and also a controlled social environment, that you could not only fill the chapters but also turn people away.
We need to go back to the things that got us started in the first place. Our values are truly worth boasting about. We just need to live those values everyday. It may mean throwing people out and even closing chapters, but in the long run we will be healthier.
Not understanding the changes in the leadership experience and training of our college students.
I often hear about how different students are today. Well yes, they are different. The world they grew up in is vastly different than the world I was in. The internet alone lends to a dramatic shift in entertainment, information exchange and communication with friends and family. When I was in school my father might call me once a week, and even then it was 7 AM on a Saturday morning when I wasn't "at my best". Kids today communicate with their parents daily via text, email, skype or even in person. Parental influence is apparent. This has a good and bad side. On the positive side, students have a stronger attachment with their parents and have come to expect them to help them make hard decisions. On the down side, many of the students are afraid to "go out on their own."
Students today are afraid to take risks. They have been sheltered their whole lives with parents who don't want them to fail. Here's a dramatic insight, IT'S OK TO FAIL. Certainly constant failure won't move you ahead, but an occasional set back it fine. Haven't we all be taught we learn from our mistakes. Well it's time for our students to have a set back or two.
In my unprofessional opinion it's not that students don't have dreams and aren't interested in stepping out to achieve them. It's just that students today are afraid to take the first step towards achieving their dreams We as mentors and leaders need to help them learn to take the first steps. It might take some hand holding. It might lead to a failure. And it might just be the best learning experience the student has in college. This again is where a stronger adult presence can help. Just being there to pick up the pieces for failed attempts and encouraging students to try again will make a remarkable difference in our culture.
These are bright kids who want to succeed. They just don't necessarily know how to start down the yellow brick roads to reach their dreams.
Allowing undergrads to not be accountable for their actions.
This is where we all have collectively failed in our attempts to move the Greek system forward. By we I mean adult mentors, university staff, national fraternity staff and the public in general. We are afraid to confront the undergraduates on tough issues. You would think everyone involved was running for office, wanting to make friends with everyone and win the popularity contest. I truly understand the obstacles. Universities and national fraternities have constituencies they have to deal with. Greek alumni donate lots of money to important projects. I get that. But it's not a good excuse.
I cross paths with alumni who "don't donate" their money or time because they are in part embarrassed by their fraternity experience. It may be something lingering from their pledge ship or may be something they read in the paper last week, But their lifelong bond has been severed. In the course of the past ten years I have drawn the line in the sand with my chapter on the tough issues, hazing, drug abuse and sexual assault. While there are some men in the chapter who felt their "play toys" were taken away as a result of the changes, in total the alumni base is more committed to the undergraduates today and more important, the undergraduates are stronger and happier to live in fraternity who has left the worst behind.
When the 20 idiots are in charge they must be confronted. Truth is they may decide to leave the fraternity. That's not a bad outcome. With a strong adult base the 20 leaders will find their courage to make certain all are accountable. But I caution you, 20 more idiots will replace the 20 who leave. It's as natural as the flower blossoming in the spring, although perhaps a better analogy would be wilting in the fall. Accountability is a full time job as our human nature is to test the boundaries.
Not creating membership development tools
Can you imagine a situation where you would come into a job, receive 6-16 weeks worth of training/education and then be set free for the rest of your life to run the corporation. Welcome to the world of Greek life. We carefully (although sometime carelessly) craft an education program specifying when and where our new members need to be and almost a daily list of duties and materials to study. In a few weeks they become full members of the organization and within a semester or so one will be elected President of the chapter. Hard to believe I know.
A few national fraternities have implemented membership development programming. These programs provide continuing education for members in the semesters after initiation. Brilliant of course. My own fraternity tried to implement a similar program and failed, largely due the the belief this programming was optional.
Students for the most part won't "opt in" for more work. Imagine a student going to a professor and saying, "your class is great, but can you just give me a bit more work so I can do better." It may happen, but certainly not often. We have clear expectation for our pledges during the fraternity education programming. We need to have the same accountability for our initiated members. If you don't complete the programming, you are no longer an undergraduate member. In every sense, you're an alumnus, you've completed your undergraduate experience, thanks for playing, there are parting gifts at the exit.
It falls on the national fraternities and universities to develop relevant educational modules for membership education. Continuing education with real life skills, interviewing, resume writing, transitional leadership for example. You could easily include deeper studies into the ritual and histories of the fraternity for those so inclined to study. But developing curriculum is the easy part. Holding members accountable for completion is the challenge. But it's a challenge well worth exploring.
Mandating diversity
When I was in school we said our chapter was diverse. We defined diversity as members from both the north and south sides of Chicago, with a few down state members thrown in. Today we are truly a diverse chapter with members in the past 5 years from Brazil, India, South Korea, Mongolia, the Middle East and England. Recognizing the university was changing its enrollment focus to international students the chapter set a goal to reach out to a larger recruiting pool. It made sense, both from an educational experience and from a financial standpoint.
I often ask students when you graduate what do you expect the workforce to look like. Will your office workers be all "white suburbanites". The answer of course is that they expect their offices to be multi-cultural. Our living/learning environments can create this same experience. When we set off on this course there were things I never expected to happen. For example, members often invite other members to visit their homes over breaks travelling to other countries and experiencing the culture first hand.
It won't happen because you hang a rush sign on your front facade. It happens when you actively reach out to potential members around campus. Invite them and they will come. After all one of their personal objectives is to learn about the American culture.
Is it worth it?
There are colleges across the country asking this question right now. I'm confident most if not all have weighed the pros and cons of Greek life. Is it worth it? Greek life presents a cultural living learning environment unlike any other in collegiate life. I often say one of the most important life skills Greek system members learn is compromise. Our students are growing up in a culture where they more times than not get what they want. Not many successful businessmen have made it to where they are now without compromise. I'm guessing even Steve Jobs and Bill Gates had to compromise at some time in their lives.
Greek life is the arena for compromise at the collegiate level. Men and women with strong opinions are challenged to defend their positions and often adjust them to keep the peace. I don't think you learn this in the dorms and definitely not in an apartment complex.
I also believe that the men in the age range of 18-20 are facing one of if not the toughest periods in their lives. These men come from the sheltered homes with parental influence and now have to make choices that can affect the rest of their lives. Drugs, alcohol, and sex are just three of the huge life choices an 18 year old now needs to begin to process. A fraternity operating within it's moral code of conduct can be a supportive partner in these choices.
In addition I go back to the concept of leadership development. Like it or not these men and women will be leading our nation in the years to come. Remember I said earlier that students today must be guided into taking the first steps on the path the reaching their dreams and changing their world. Fraternity mentoring will provide that support.
So is it worth it? I think so. The 20 leaders are waiting for us in chapters across the country. Waiting for us to sit down and listen to their ideas for change. Waiting for us to help them hold their members accountable, Waiting for us help them take the first steps toward reaching their dreams. Waiting for us to help them be who they said they wanted to be on that day they initiated into the fraternity and swore to uphold the values of our founders. Let's not make them wait any more.
