HAPPINESS 15 HAVlNS
Page 2
EDITORIAL
Monday, April 29, 1963
The Weekend Ahead
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WHAT MAKES a University great?
Immediately, one considers an institu
tion's research programs, it's national
prestige, distinguished alumni, outstand
ing professors the criteria go on and on.
HOWEVER, ONE component, tradition,
is seldom listed among the "musts" for
a great university. But, a meaningful tra
dition contributes much to an institution's
existence in that it gives the students a
pride and interest in their school. Without
this, a school cannot be great.
And, we at Nebraska are still holding
on to one of our remaining traditions . . .
Spring Day-Ivy Day week end. At this
time, each year, former students return
to relive their college days or to watch a
son or daughter be recognized for out
standing achievements. Students partici
Just Can't Wait . . .
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By SID MOODY, AP
Few campus characters
are more loved and loathed
than that endearing Greek
American institution, the
college fraternity.
To its foes, the Greek
letter fraternity is a relic
hopelessly overgrown with
ivy, featuring orgies on
every floor and supported
by snobbery, bigotry and
beery-eyed alumni who
never quite outgrew the
sophomore year.
To its friends, it is an in
valuable teacher of self-reliance,
the social graces,
democracy and scholarship
all welded together by that
mystical bond called broth
erhood. Last year, Williams Col
. lege gave the Greeks one of
their sharpest setbacks.
Williams, a genteel men's
school rich in fraternity
tradition, liberal arts and
conservative alumni, de
cided its 15 fraternities
would have to go by 1966.
Williams' action comes at
a time when fraternities
(and their sisters, sorori
ties) are present in record
numbers on American cam
puses. There are 262 na
tional collegiate Greek let
ter societies. They have
16,006 chapters and a mem
bership of grads and under
grade of 6,773,253. There
are fraternities for Jews,
Filipinos, engineering stu
dents, Poles, Negroes and
soon.
Challenged by Times
Yet while at a numerical
and fiscally prosperous
peak, fraternities are be
ing increasingly challenged
to justify themselves in an
age that has seen soldiers
marching to integrate a
university ant 'n a country
sensitive to the egalitarian
mood of the world's new
nations.
At a time when the na
tion cries for brains, the
hand-wringers see fraterni
ties as anti-intellectual
playgrounds where the
bonds of brotherhood tie
louts of conformity and
the climb to the social
graces too often stumbles
into a trap of hooch, hazing
and well, the Greeks have
a word for it
Is this a valid profife of
flie Greeks? To find out the
SEVENTY-SECOND YEAR OF
PUBLICATION
Telephone 477-8711, ext. 2588, 2589, 2550
14tb L R
Member Associated Collegiate Press,
International Press Representative, Na
tional Advertising Service, Incorporated.
Published at: Room 51, Student L'uion,
Lincoln 8, Nebraska.
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Associated Press polled 150
campuses across the na
tion. The fraternity emerges
as particularly strong in
the Midwest and South, un
der fire in the Northeast
but everywhere being re
formed in varying degree
either from within or with
out. On one coast, at Oregon
State, they are "welcome,
not just tolerated, for their
generally wholesome en
vironment and valuable
housing." On the other
coast, Boston University
Dean Staton R. Curtis says,
"Time is running out, I
fear," citing fraternities'
"fiscal mismanagement,
low academic achievement
and failure to choose a rep
resentative membership."
The average fraternity
house (they can be worth
as much as $300,000) may
have 50 or 60 members,
half of whom live in, a
drinking room lined with
irreverent cartoons of the
brothers, a secret meeting
or "goat" room, perhaps
with a skull or other cere
monial equipment. If the
house is lucky enough to
have a good cook, living
can be easy.
And the living can inspire
lyrical praise:
"Brotherhood isnt just a
50-50 deal. It's a 60-60. It's
that extra 20 that really
counts." Fraternity hand
book at Arizona State.
... Or scorn:
"(Greeks) are colorless,
personality-less men who
feel confident, wearing a
pin. The University is pa
ternalistic enough but the
Greeks want to go further
and find their childhood"
a German exchange stu
dent at Michigan State.
... Or indifference:
"M alumnus owes loy
alty first to his college,
then to his class and lastly
to his fraternity if he can
remember the name of it"
a Dartmouth graduate.
Flame Out?
If the ancient Greeks in
vented democracy, some
say their latter day fra
ternal namesakes have let
the flame go out. "I do not
see how a fraternity can be
truly democratic. They are
selective by nature, but his
tory, by tradition and by
necessity," says Dr. J. Earl
Moreland, president of Randolph-Macon.
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EMTOBIAL (TT AFT
I
pate in Spring Day and feel a renewed
identification with their university and the
campus community, and student leaders
and scholars relinquish or accept respon
sibilities which parallel their achieve
ments. THUS, THESE traditions are ones of
purpose, and we must support them in or
der to insure our continued greatness.
The activities which lead up to the tra
ditional week end are varied the mystic
spooks spook, the jittery juniors jitter, the
singers practice singing, the race predic
tors predict, the tug-of-warers tug. All add
up to an enthusiasm which is unmatched
at any other time of the year.
THIS WEEK END has been set aside for
the students. On Ivy Day. on Spring Day,
our university campus reflects the great
ness which it truly possesses.
. . . and soon!
Froeniflffes;
Mrs. Joseph Davis, execu
tive secretary of alumni of
Omaha University, sums up
succinctly for the contrary
minded: "The Greek system
is a democratic process un
der the constitution. Volun
tary association is a right."
While the fraternities in
sist on their right to pick
and choose their brethren,
the AP survey shows a
definite trend to more liberal
values in selection.
That's a striking recur
rence in the AP survey: That
much of the leadership in
liberalizing fraternity mem
bership comes from the stu
dents themselves.
At Stanford the local Sigma
Nu chapter quit the national
parent organization last fan
because of its discrimina
tory clauses. Stanford Chap
ter President Thomas Grey
explained, "It is becoming
increasingly difficult to find
a good pledge class which
is willing to accept mem
bership in an organization
which denies admittance on
purely racial grounds."
But what of fraternity se
lectivity per se, based not
on any racial or religious
basis but just on whether or
not the brothers like your
looks?
On a large Big Ten cam
pus, where rarely more than
30 of the undergraduates
are Greeks, the non-Greek
can have 4 pleasant, produc
tive years uncaring whatev
er Hellenic pleasures may
have been denied him. But
on a small campus, with a
high percentage of Greeks,
rejection can wound, deeply.
'Bitter Truth'
But adult life, say frater
nity supporters, is one long
process of rejection and ac
ceptance in promotion on
the job, joining a country
club, picking one's friends.
W'hy not begin adjusting to
the bitter truth in college?
Because it's wasteful. It
distracts the real purpose of
a college to educate. And,
anti-Greeks argue, the fra
ternities by selectivity too
often overlook the more re
tiring blossom, the very one
their camaraderie could best
nurture.
Aware of these imperfec
tions in varying degrees, a
significant number of col
leges, fraternities and under
graduates have tried re
forms of the system.
On some campuses rush
ing has been postponed to
sophomore year so as not to
add to the freshman's bur
den of academic adjustment.
Bowdoin, on the other hand,
rushed freshmen before fall
classes begin so students
can buckle down to class
without concerning them
selves with the "deceptive
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Greek systems at the two universities located in Lincoln enjoy friendly relations with the schools'
administrations. Dean Robert Ross at the University of Nebraska has this comment: "The University of
Nebraska and its Greek system have a long tradition of being concerned about, interested in, and sup
ported by each other.
"The Greek system here has been an expanding program, and we have right now the strongest
leadership and best scholarship in several years." Nebraska Wesleyan University's Dean Milton Evans
says, "Wesleyan feels that Greeks make a definite contribution to the campus program. Tjhey encourage
scholarship and they add to the social experience of the students."
I
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University of Wesleyan
Nebraska University
Total Women's Enrollment . 2,696 CIO
Sorority Enrollment 1,021 280
Alt-Women's Average $.836 3.03
Ad-Sorority Average S 912 2.0
Nebraska Wesleyan University uses a 1 to 6 point grading scale with 1 being high; University of Ne
braska uses a I to 9 point scale with 9 being high.
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courtship" of prolonged rush
ing. University of Maine fra
ternities have raised the
grade requirement for
pledges twice in the last 8
years. Many other colleges
insist students have a cer
tain scholastic average be
fore they may pledge.
Scholastic Discipline
Fraternities hold their own
study hours for backsliding
brothers. The National Inter
fraternity Conference eager
ly cites studies that show:
1 Fifty per cent of all
fraternities are above the
over-all average of their
campuses. (Ten years ago
only 40 were.)
2 The rate of dropout an
alarming development in
contemporary higher educa
tionis more than twice as
high among men at a non
fraternity campus as among
members of national frater
nities. While the Greeks are get
ting better marks on their
report cards, their behaviour,
too, appears to be Improv
ing. There is fierce competi
tion today to get into col
lege, to stay in and to get
high enough marks for
graduate school. Academic
pressures have had their
sobering effect on the Olym
pian highjinks of Greek
Row.
"The Mickey Mouse stuff
is dying out," comments
campus editor Jeff Green
field of Wisconsin of the de
cline of fraternity ritual and
hazing. "Help Weeks" have
replaced most of the bar
barities of the old initiation
"Hell Weeks."
Some incidents persist. At
Texas Christian an electric
"hotshot" used to prod cat
tle at stockyards was turned
on pledges during initiatkst;.
The president of the Ore
gon University Interfrater
nity Council quit in protest
of initiation abuses.
Hi Ho Life
Yet some oases still hold
out the pleasure of forbid
den fruit. Alpha Tau Omega
beckonb prospective broth
ers in the Stanford Frater
nity handbook with the lure
of a "full and varied social
program highlighted by the
winter Sewer Party and the
spring Hog Wallow."
If it is fashionable in in
tellectual circles to knock
fraternities, perhaps the
most fashionable thing of all
to say against them is that
they force conformity.
"They are an extension of
the family," said a bearded
student at Rutgers. "They
tell you how to dress, what
to eat, whom to associate
with."
"By living with your broth
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Nebraska
ers," says the fraternity
handbook at the University
of Cincinnati, "you will learn
to express your own opinion
and when to subordinate
yourself to the will of others."
There are those who feel
such control of the individ
ually the group is tragical
ly unfortunate, coming as it
does at a time when the
student is as free as he will
ever be to explore and to
learn, to be himself.
Yet their group-centered
way of life brings the Greeks
their best deserved laurel
campus leadership.
At Ohio State 20 of the
students are Greeks, yet of
200 leaders of extracurricu
lar organizations, only 5 or
so are non-Greeks. This dis
proportion is repeated on
campus after campus.
They are joiners. "They
want involvement," said one
educator. In some colleges,
however, they are also prod
ded by fraternity rules that
require members to go out
for campus organizations
and award points for doing
so. The house with the most
points get a trophy.
Appalls Individualist
This appalls the bearded .
nonconformist but there are
serious educators who think i
it may be beneficial.
"You might say the fra
ternity is the training ground
in college for the organiza-i
tional man," ?tys President!
John Millett ol Ohio's Miami
University. "I happen to
think that this ... is useful j
rather than harmful." .
Certainly 7 million Greeks
can't all be snobbish, 3-but-j
ton suit, no-padded-shoulder j
copies of each other. They
are probably as diverse as
7 million plumbers or bank
vice presidents. WTiat wor
ries some of their critics is ,
that despite their diversity
they too often speak in one
voice or not at all As a
group they seem to havei
surprisingly little to say pub-1
licly on national issues, one'
way or another.
Yet this silence can some-1
times be deceptive. When!
the University of Georgia In- j
tegrated two years ago, the.
fraternities did nothing oth-,
er than Increase study hall
hours. This was not, as
might be viewed from cer
tain northern points, failure
to speak out but an effort
to avoid the violence that
came later to Oxford, Miss.
Despite the heckling of the
anti-Greek chorus, fraterni
ties are not unwanted. On
the contrary. A national sur
vey of college deans showed
they would like to have 500
more fraternity chapters
University of
Nebraska
Total Men's Enrollment 5,697
Fraternity Enrollment 1,483
All-Men's Average 5.232
All-Fraternity Average 5.320
added in the next 5 years.
A building boom is already
under way.
This means desperately
needed housing usually at
private expense for colleges
facing the swift swelling of
enrollment. And the enroll
ment itself means more
members for the fraternities
to help meet their own rising
costs.
But new houses will not be
the saving of the fraternity
system. The growing chal
lenge before them today is
to prove they are a desirable
adjunct to the educational
process, a challenge the
Greeks are beginning to re
spond to.
Social Units
"Once the classes are out,
we feel we've lost the stu
dents," said a Williams pro
fessor. "I think there are
some Chi Psis who don't
ever leave the house except
for classes. They're so happy
just be Chi Psis."
It was to break down this
insularity, primarily, that
Williams decided to replace
fraternities with social units
of 100 students which will
house and feed their resi
dents and provide social fa
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CURRENT EVENTS
FORUM
rhursdey, April SO, et 4:C0 p.m. a Current Events
Forum will bt held in the small auditorium of the
Union.
i
The purpose of the forum is to bring the students
up to dote on domestic and international affairs.
Too often students do not find the time to reod
the newspaper thoroughly enough to be well in
formed on the important issues of the day. Various
topics will be discussed, such os politics, economics,
foreign relations, and science. Professors in the
respective areas will ieod the discussion. The pro
fessors speaking this Thursday are: Bourne, Trask,
Hyde, and Shannon. At the conclusion of the forum,
students will hove the opportunity to ask questions.
CURRENT EVENTS FORUM
NWU 1
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s
2
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Nebraska
Wesleyan
University
558
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3.41
3.3
cilities for beer, cheer and
culture.
A unit, for instance, might
have a chamber music recital
after dinner or a professor
living in the building or an
art exhibition in the com
mons room.
Bowdoin, still pro-frater-tiity,
nonetheless thinks its
seniors would do better to
live away from the fraterni
ties in a more academic at
mosphere and is building a
14-story univory tower to ac
commodate them.
These scattered reforms do
not indicate the fraternity on
the whole hasn't done well.
They indicate some educa
tors want it to do better.
They feel the fraternities'
potential is great: to expand
their philosophy of brother-help-brother
from the social
to the academic realm, to
add lectures by visiting
speakers, good library facili
ties and even resident pro
fessors to stimulate thought
and conversation in a unique
ly relaxed atmosphere.
"We are almost yearning
for them to succeed," said an
administrator at Michigan.
Wrhile it is under pressure,
the decline and fall of the
Greek empire is not yet.
ON CAMPUS
