I urge students to educate themselves on Greek life, their national history, the history of WashU chapters, and the AGL movement overall. Moreover, students must share their experiences with each other. If not, WashU will have to wait for the next calamity before a future generation of students uncovers the issues and harms occurring under our noses.

Starting this spring semester, the international fraternity Sigma Chi is returning to WashU and accepting founding fathers. The fraternity has been absent from WashU since 2021 after voluntarily leaving campus due to incurred penalties from the university for violating COVID-19 policies at the time. 

The chapters of both Kappa Sigma and Alpha Phi have been temporarily suspended at Washington University pending the results of a student conduct investigation into an incident involving students throwing eggs and potentially saying racial slurs at Bear’s Den (BD) dining hall, March 21, per Dean of Students Rob Wild. 

How can an organization built upon the idea of social exclusion, that some people deserve material benefits because they fit the vibe, ever be inclusive enough to include those of us that don’t fit their mold?

Two years after Title IX policy changes, fraternities have developed alternative methods to remove alleged perpetrators of sexual assault from their organizations. 

The repeated pattern of suspensions—both temporary and permanent—amongst IFC organizations suggests that the existing sanctions are insufficient in rectifying issues related to alleged hazing or alcohol-related activities.

Moving forward, we urge the Office of Campus Life to continue making changes to improve the behavior of the Greek life organizations that it oversees, and the recent revision of social policies and the website modifications represent progress toward this goal.

To some within the black community, joining a white fraternity can be considered taboo.

When an attention-grabbing event happens, such as a fraternity being placed on social probation, a natural increase in discussion follows. With more awareness of accessible information, however, a more consistent discussion can be fostered within and between chapters. The goal is clear: Fraternity parties, and our campus as a whole, need to be safer for students.

Assistant Director of Fraternity and Sorority Life Austin Sandoval-Sweeney and Executive Director for Campus Life Leslie Heusted hosted the forum to serve as a space to provide reasoning for new policy changes in addition to encouraging feedback on how they could best improve the policy to suit the needs of Greek members on campus.