As leaders for the Virginia Tech Greek community, Interfratenity Council President Matt Penny and Panhellenic Council President Camille Waldron aspire to dispel negative stereotypes associated with Greek life.
Penny said many television shows and popular movies portray fraternity members as living a heavy-drinking, disruptive lifestyle.
"For us it's a huge, huge task getting that negative image away," Penny said. "It's probably the number one thing we target, especially with fraternities."
Waldron said a major part of Greek life is making the surrounding community a better place than it was before.
Both Penny and Waldron feel the solution can be found in the proactive education of new members and by reaching out to them as soon as possible.
"Our biggest tool is education," Waldron said. "We don't want women to come into this community thinking sororities are all about drinking and hazing. We want women who can come into the community looking to get involved with philanthropy or want to attain a leadership position on campus."
Penny said that the best way to educate new members is to teach them about Greek life at Tech and the university and IFC policies on things such as hazing and alcohol.
"We've taken the approach of doing educational events for freshmen before recruitment happens," Penny said. "They're used as a recruitment tool, but they're also used as an educational tool to show them what Greek life is really about versus what people think from stereotypes and movies."
Penny and Waldron also like to focus their roles on other things, such as giving the Greek community new and exciting events that can have a positive influence on the Tech campus and surrounding community.
"Last semester we had a Greek Week, which I thought had a really good response from it," Waldron said. "Many other schools sort of use Greek Week as a second homecoming, social-type thing, but we really focused on the philanthropic aspect of it, and many members really appreciated that."
Penny also pointed to a program intended to welcome visiting football fans.
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Sure, maybe 100% of all Greeks aren't all like the steretypes say. But about 95% are. They get more people because of those drinking stereotypes anyway.
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clearly you aren't a member of greek life here
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anon is right. greek life at VT is horrible. most stereotypes are true, and this one surely follows that. how many times on the BT do you hear a girl say "I hate my sorority, I wish I knew more about it before freshman year. I'll just mail nationals and say I have too much schoolwork because this is dumb." Don't PAY hundreds of dollars a semester for your friends.
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Chris you are clearly not a member of a greek organization. I don't understand my non-affiliated hokies feel they have the right to speak so poorly of their classmates. You would never catch a greek hokie bashing a person who chose not to become greek. They respect your decision, so you should respect theirs.
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The fact that you greeks have to differentiate yourselves from everyone else ("non-affiliated hokies") illustrates your unfounded hubris.
Personally, I just didn't see the big deal in being in a fraternity which I didn't get rushed or whatever you call it. It's just so generic - Tech has so many unique organizations. And why exactly would I need to pay a bunch of guys to be my friend? And all the hazing seems really homo-er*tic.
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Chris you are clearly not a member of a greek organization. I don't understand my non-affiliated hokies feel they have the right to speak so poorly of their classmates. You would never catch a greek hokie bashing a person who chose not to become greek. They respect your decision, so you should respect theirs.
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Congratulations, CT. You have successfully swallowed a steaming pile of IFC/Panhellenic PR nonsense and made it a part of the public record. Bravo.
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To Commentariat and those who criticize Greek life: I challenge you to really research what Greek life does on this campus, both good and bad. I have no doubt that you will find some bad out there. BUT you will also find overwhelming amounts of good being done for the campus, and the surrounding community through fraternities and sororities. For instance; Greeks Move In (Members of fraternities and sororities help freshmen and their parents move in during the weekend before classes begin), The Big Event and Relay for Life (many Greek organizations register multiple teams to participate and fundraise in these events), Chapter Philanthropies (On our campus some of the most money raised and hours served for charities, come from Greek organizations. They raise easily in excess of $100,000 a year for everything from cancer research to food banks and local shelters) and the list goes on and includes coaching little league, mentoring children and collecting canned foods etc. All that I ask is before you judge these organizations, research what they’ve done both GOOD and bad.
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No one said they don't do good. We know they do. But to deny the drinking and partying sterotypes is ignorant. Just take a walk around Blacksburg Friday/Saturday night.
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Fraternities are g*y. During rush all of the brothers paddled me and one of them made me touch his wee-wee.
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