I graduated in 2023, so technically I'm only two years out, not five. But I've talked to enough alumni who are five, seven, ten years past graduation to know what they wish someone had told them earlier. And since I'm already watching my own relationship with Greek life shift faster than I expected, I figured it was worth writing down before I convince myself everything was perfect. ... Read more

So Stanford just lost a chunk of its sorority community, and honestly, the story is a little more complicated than the headline makes it sound. According to The Stanford Daily, several sorority chapters have departed from campus - some disaffiliating from their nationals, some shutting down entirely. And before you write it off as a Stanford-specific quirk, I'd slow down on that. Because what's happening there is a symptom of something a lot of Greek life communities are quietly dealing with right now. ... Read more

Before I joined a fraternity, I spent about a year and a half watching Greek life from the outside. And what I saw mostly came through a screen - polished recruitment videos, perfectly staged bid day photos, Formal content that looked like it was shot by a professional. I had a genuine opinion about Greek life based almost entirely on curated content. That's probably more common than anyone wants to admit. ... Read more

Every Panhellenic council has one. Maybe they call it something different - standings, rankings, chapter health scores - but it's the same machine. A way of sorting chapters into winners and losers based on criteria that, if you actually look closely, reward the chapters that were already winning. I spent two years on Panhellenic council watching this play out in real time, and I'm done pretending it's a neutral process. ... Read more

There's a moment on bid day - and I've watched it happen from the outside as an IFC guy - where something shifts. A girl opens that envelope, or rips that bid card, and for a split second the whole world is just her and that piece of paper. Then she screams. And then she runs. And then about forty other women are running toward her. I've seen that happen on campus and I genuinely don't know how anyone watches it and stays cynical about Greek life. ... Read more

When I was still a GDI - before I rushed Sigma Chi my sophomore year - I watched a few guys from my floor come back from semester abroad looking like they'd fully disconnected from their fraternities. One of them had missed so many chapter events that his brothers barely acknowledged him at parties. Another came back and basically had to re-introduce himself to the pledge class that had crossed while he was gone. I filed it away as: Greek life and study abroad don't mix well. Then I went abroad myself, junior spring, and realized it's more complicated than that. ... Read more

Somewhere between 2018 and now, Greek life stopped being something that mostly existed on campus and started existing everywhere. Your parents could see it. Your high school friends in different states could see it. Random people with no connection to your school could see it. And if you were in a chapter during that shift, you felt it in ways that were genuinely weird to process in real time. ... Read more

Everyone acts like formal recruitment is this sacred, untouchable process and informal recruitment is the sketchy back-channel thing chapters do when they didn't get enough bids. That framing is wrong, and if you've spent any time on a Panhellenic council actually enforcing these rules, you know how much more complicated it really is. ... Read more

Every semester, sorority chapters across the country go through one of the most emotionally charged rituals in Greek life - the Big-Little reveal. And somewhere along the way, it quietly became a full production. Like, a full production. The Her Campus piece on three ways to surprise your sorority Little is sweet, genuinely helpful, and probably well-intentioned. But reading it as someone who watched sorority reveal chaos unfold from across the quad for four years, I have some thoughts. ... Read more

The Yale Daily News ran a piece recently on what they called the "allure" of Greek life - why students at an Ivy League school, with every club and society imaginable at their fingertips, still line up for rush. It's a fair question. And honestly, it's one more schools should be asking out loud instead of just quietly watching bid day photos go viral on Instagram. ... Read more

You have made one of the biggest decisions of your life to go to college. Congratulations! However, that’s not the only decision that you’ll have to make when it comes to college life. Another important decision that you’ll probably make is the decision to go Greek in college. Greek life has lots of benefits to offer to its members – opportunities to build a network, social/community activities to participate in, a strong brotherhood bond to maintain, and many more!  However, one of the biggest challenges college guys face at the beginning of their Greek life is choosing the right fraternity for themselves.... Read more

Another week, another hazing investigation at a major university. This time it's the University of Oregon, where a fraternity is under scrutiny after detailed hazing allegations surfaced through reporting by Lookout Eugene-Springfield. And look, I want to be honest about my reaction when I read it: I wasn't shocked. I was tired. ... Read more

I graduated in 2023, so technically I'm only two years out, not five. But I've talked to enough alumni who are five, seven, ten years past graduation to know what they wish someone had told them earlier. And since I'm already watching my own relationship with Greek life shift faster than I expected, I figured it was worth writing down before I convince myself everything was perfect. ... Read more

My chapter had a GPA floor. Not a suggestion, not a gentle nudge from our academic chairman - an actual hard floor. You fell below it, you went on academic probation with the chapter. You stayed below it, you faced suspension. And I remember thinking, as a pledge, that this felt strict. Almost unfair. But three years later, standing at my graduation with brothers I'd pulled all-nighters with, studied with, pushed through midterms with - I got it. That standard wasn't punishing us. It was shaping us. ... Read more

So Stanford just lost a chunk of its sorority community, and honestly, the story is a little more complicated than the headline makes it sound. According to The Stanford Daily, several sorority chapters have departed from campus - some disaffiliating from their nationals, some shutting down entirely. And before you write it off as a Stanford-specific quirk, I'd slow down on that. Because what's happening there is a symptom of something a lot of Greek life communities are quietly dealing with right now. ... Read more