Senators passed a resolution in support of gender-inclusive housing at the Wesleyan Council on Student Affairs (WCSA) full senate meeting on Monday, March 23.
The resolution was discussed by WCSA at a Feb. 9 session, but was tabled until revisions could be made.
“Today we have an opportunity to endorse it,” said junior Jerry Lherisson, president of WCSA.
In tandem with the Spectrum Resource Center, Residential Life (ResLife) drafted the proposal under consideration. If it is approved by President Rock Jones, gender-inclusive housing options would be made available to Ohio Wesleyan students as early as next semester.
In addition to logistical considerations, the proposal includes letters of support from the community, the Admissions Office and Counseling Services.
The proposal was unanimously accepted by WCSA, with the full senate voting to endorse the resolution.
Executive members of WCSA also mentioned that their cost sharing initiative, introduced at last weekâs meeting, needs to undergo some changes before progress can be made. “The proposal we have is not in its best form,” said junior Emma Drongowski, vice president of WCSA. “Instead of giving money to the student affairs division, we are looking to fund certain events that are important to students.” The revised proposal will be presented to the senators on March 30.
Students and representatives from the administration reached a compromise at the forum on design changes to the Small Living Unit (SLU) residences.
Thomas Carlson-Reddig from Little Diversified Architectural Consulting led the forum on March 20, and shared schematics of the new SLU duplexes along Rowland Avenue. He also went through floor plans for the first duplex to be built on the corner of Rowland Avenue and Liberty Street.
The design is to have two SLUs in one building, or a SLUplex. However, each SLU will be self-contained with entrances to each only accessible from the outside.
The first of the SLUplexes is scheduled to begin construction by August, with students moving in fall 2016. However, the budget for these designs has not been finalized with a contractor.
âRight now we donât know if we are in budget,â Carlson-Reddig said. âThe next step is to look at the cost.â
He said the total allocated amount for this first project is $1.5 million, which should cover the cost, but if the budget exceeds this amount, they will protect the core project of the building first.
Based on feedback from the first forum, Carlson-Reddig said the designs were updated to focus on fostering community, having connection to outdoors, accessibility, comfort and sustainability and maintaining individuality and identity.
Junior Reilly Reynolds, the moderator of the Tree House said she was pleased with the new designs even though she had concerns with the original plans.
âI was a little bit concerned about how cookie cutter the houses looked at that time, and at the idea of internal bedrooms,â she said. âThe new designs are much more open, unique and I feel very positive about them in general.â
âAs an environmentalist, I am hopeful that the architects will be true to what they are saying about maintaining and improving sustainability in all the houses,â Reynolds said.
The floor plans provide open dining and gathering spaces on the ground floor, as well as some bedrooms for accessibility. However, concerns were brought up about accessibility to the second level.
It was suggested to include a lift in the stairwell, but Carlson-Reddig said there are currently no plans to include it. One could be added later if needed.
Senior Alicia Brown, a member of the SAGE House, said she was concerned that not having the lift in the first place could discourage students with handicaps from even applying to live in the house.
Senior Meredith Harrison, also a member of SAGE, added that she wouldnât want to live in a house where one could never go upstairs.
âI canât imagine not being able to ever get upstairs,â she said. âYouâre missing half the house.â
At the end of the meeting, Carlson-Reddig asked how everyone liked the new designs and the students responded with snaps and nods.
Junior Margot Reed, a member of Peace and Justice House, expressed her thanks for the architects being receptive to the needs and suggestions of the students.
A three percent increase in next yearâs tuition recently made an impact on Ohio Wesleyan students, and their bank accounts.
Total tuition will be approximately $55,000 next year. This is comparative to the rates of DePauw University and Denison University, but less than both Oberlin College and Kenyon College, which are around $61,000.
âNo one likes to see costs for students increase year after year,â said Director of Residential Life Wendy Piper. âEspecially when so many of our students already find it challenging to fund their education.â
A portion of the increase is due to the cost of living. For individuals living in a standard room, room and board costs $11,540. Residency in Stuyvesant Hall, 35 Williams Dr., 23 Williams Dr., 4 Williams Dr. and 123 Oak Hill Ave. will cost extra. These facilities are seeing a 10% increase in fees.
The extra revenue created will be reinvested into the buildings for further improvements.
âThis is not something that has historically been done at OWU,â said Piper. âWe recognize that our residential facilities need that revenue stream for improvements.â
Piper also said the increase in price had not affected the choices students are making when it comes to next yearâs housing selection. As usual, 4 Williams Drive and Stuyvesant Hall were still almost completely full after the first round of senior selections.
âIt didnât matter when I picked to live in Stuy that it cost more because I know that it has nicer conditions than some of the other places to live,â said junior Michael McDermott. âEspecially if you know OWU will be putting the money back into the building, it kind of makes sense.â
Other students were not as optimistic as McDermott. For sophomore Isabella Flibotte, a visible change would be appreciated for next year.
âFor me, if Iâm able to see improvements to the buildings and living conditions, Iâll feel a lot better about it,â Flibotte said.
The sign at Relay for Life. Photo courtesy of Kera Bussey Sims.
Participants at Relay for Life walked to remember those with cancer while dressed as comic book superheroes.
The annual overnight event sponsored by Colleges Against Cancer, was held on March 20 to March 21. Teams are formed and the members participate in different events throughout the night. The participants stay up all night, or as long as they can, taking laps around the track and doing different activities.
Sophomore Shaaref A. Shah, one of the presidents of Colleges Against Cancer, stated âweeks before Relay for Life, Colleges Against Cancer began promoting the event through social media.â The members of CAC sent out emails to teachers, alumni, and everyone else affiliated with Ohio Wesleyan that might want to participate.
One thing that made this yearâs Relay for Life event different from yearâs past is the theme. After the teams were established, CAC held meetings with the team captains to think of fundraising ideas, which was where the superhero theme was established.
Students walk for a cure in the Gordon Field House. Photo courtesy of Kera Bussey Sims.
The goal this year was to raise a minimum of $15,000 to donate to American Cancer Society. The proceeds have not been counted in its entirety yet, but as of publication, OWU raised $14,000.
âMy mom had cancer so I wanted to be here to support her,â sophomore Rick Gordon said. âThat is my main reason.â
Fellow sophomore Claire OâKeeffe added âRelay for Life is important to me because I have lost family members to cancer in the past years and recently. Also, I thought it would be fun to come and walk around with my friendsâ.
Colleges Against Cancer meets every Wednesday at 5:00 pm in Hamilton-Williams Campus Center.
R. Blake Michael, professor of religion at OWU since 1978. Photo courtesy of owu.edu.
Extreme interpretations of Islam are to blame for the conflicts in the Middle East, said R. Blake Michael, professor of religion at Ohio Wesleyan University.
He opened his Great Decisions presentation Friday with a Sunni phrase about Shiâas.
âOh Sunni of Bahrain, we know nothing of what they do is in any way related to Islam and is full of superstitions and empty turbans. There is no Islamic basis to their actions,â Michael said.
Bahrain, located in the Persian Gulf, is divided between two major denominations of Islam, the Sunni and the Shiâas. In Bahrain, the ruling family is Sunni and the population is mostly Shiâa. The quote Michael used demonstrates one of the conflicts that makes the Middle East violent because of the variety of ethno-linguistic groups and religions that reside there. Sectarianism, discrimination or hatred arising from attaching importance to perceived differences between subdivisions within a group is often the result.
To demonstrate the problem, Michael compared two maps, one depicted ethno-linguistic groups and the other depicted religions in the area. He over-laid the two maps to demonstrate how the various ethno-linguistic groups and the religions bleed into one another. This is considered problematic because the groups disagree on how their religions are interpreted.
âIn Islam, the prescriptive use is the prevalent use,â Michael said. âThey tend to identify their way of being Islamic as true Islam and other ways as un-Islamic.â
Like al-Qaida, ISIS pushes for a strict application of the Quran. However, while al-Qaida focused on terrorism abroad, until recently, ISIS wanted authority over territory in the Middle East because it would give its caliphate power. Now, ISIS wants recognition for off-site events. This week, it claimed responsibility for the Yemen mosque bombings and Tunisia museum attack.
With regard to those attacks, Michael recommended not forming a prejudice.
âDonât blame that on the Muslim living down the street from you,â Michael said.
When Delaware resident Helmut Kremling asked why young people are joining ISIS, Michael explained that the appeal lies with the groupsâ identification with a goal.
âItâs the same reason our military recruits are 18 years old,â Michael said. âYouâre young; youâre looking for a meaning, self-definition or purpose.â
Michael said ISIS recruits identify with a radical eschatological vision that promises paradise to devotees after Armageddon.
âBetter that the battle be fought and lost, than the battle not be fought,â Michael said.
As for U.S. involvement, Michael said he is no political expert, but it would be unwise for the U.S. to engage in direct conflict with ISIS.
âIt would be playing right into their hands,â he said.
A survey of those attending the presentation found 84 percent opposed sending ground troops to fight ISIS if air strikes are not enough to stop the group. And 90 percent said Muslims are like people everywhere and common ground can be found. The vast majority said they believed violent conflict between civilizations is not inevitable.
âThe only hope for the Middle East is that the fanaticism wears down,â Michael said.
The final session of the eight-part Great Decisions series occurs on March 27 at noon when Irfan Nooruddin, a professor in the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, will talk about India.
Associate Professor John Durst, left, talks to students while visiting Freedom Corner in Pittsburgh where civil rights advocates gathered in 1963 to begin their march on Washington, D.C. Photo courtesy of Olivia Lease.
John Durst limped slowly through snow, slush and rain determined that nothing was going to interrupt a trip to hilly Pittsburgh with students and faculty studying social justice issues.
At one point, Durst, associate professor of sociology at Ohio Wesleyan University, ignored doctorâs orders not to walk without the plastic, open-toe boot supporting his fractured left ankle because he wanted to keep up and, frankly, he got tired of having a wet, cold foot.
The Feb. 20-22 trip was part of the Poverty, Equity and Social Justice (PESJ) Course Connection program. Seven students and three faculty members, across a variety of disciplines including sociology, psychology, journalism, and womenâs and gender studies, ventured to the traditional Rust Belt city to examine issues of racial conflict, gentrification and entrepreneurship.
OWU professors John Durst (right) and Paul Dean, both of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, listen to area speakers during a lunch in the Slopes neighborhood of Pittsburgh. Photo courtesy of Paul E. Kostyu.
âWe wanted to offer students an opportunity to go see something,â said Durst, who is the coordinator for the PESJ course connection.
Durst also said part of the course connectionâs strong suit is that it gives different faculty members a chance to get to know each other and explore difficult issues from various viewpoints.
Celeta Hickman, a co-founder of the cooperative Ujamaa Ujamaa, seemed to have the most impact on the group as she explained how her neighborhood has changed as wealthy people move in, putting pressure on rent and housing costs.
Google Inc. recently announced it was building a 200,000 square foot, six-story office building near by. And while the expansion project has been touted as an economic boost for Pittsburgh, residents and businesses at the neighborhood level worry about both the short- and long-term impact for them.
âYou have to understand that we have billionaires moving here, and we donât know what to do about that,â said Hickman, who recently found out her shopâs rent will be raised $300 a month.
âPeople are fighting for their opportunity to shine in the sun,â she said. âAfrican-American women [are] banding together to make it.â
The cooperative, which is in the cityâs Hill District, sells pottery, body care items, clothing, jewelry and an assortment of other items. Most vendors are of African descent.
âIt was really awesome,â senior Rizz Dickson said of the trip. âI liked seeing those parts of Pittsburgh because Iâve been to Pittsburgh a lot but Iâve never had a tour of it. I liked hearing from the local people.â
Heather Fry, ’99, tells course connection students about how neighborhoods, including hers, have changed, sometimes not for the good, in the last 15 years. Photo by Paul E. Kostyu.
The group also met with Heather Fry, â99, who recommended places worth visiting to Durst. She led a discussion at the Carson Street Deli in the Slopes neighborhood, within sight of downtown, but across one of the three rivers that weave through the city.
âI thought it was interesting to gain from her perspective because she went [to OWU] and she has been living in Pittsburgh for a long time,â said senior Ava Fiddle.
The group left its tracks in the snow at Freedom Corner, where âevery meaningful march that has ever beenâ started there, Hickman said. On August 28, 1963, 2,000 people left for the March on Washington.
Celeta Hickman, co-founder of the Pittsburgh cooperative Ujamaa Ujamaa, told OWU students she worries about how small businesses like hers will survive in the Hill District as billionaires move in causing housing and rent prices to increase sharply. Photo by Paul E. Kostyu.
Other stops included the James Street Gastropub and Speakeasy, the Homewood-Brushton Center of the Community College of Allegheny County, Senator John Heinz History Center and The Andy Warhol Museum.
According to The Weather Channel, Pittsburgh received no more than one-half inch of snow while the OWU group was there, still, some places Durst planned visiting were closed.
âI think if anybody learned, I did,â said Durst in regards to the weather. He said he plans to have the trip in October next year.
âI wish we wouldâve spent more time talking about solutions,â said senior Meredith Harrison. âI just felt like we saw a lot of the problems and a lot of people didnât have answers when we were asking them about solutions.â
A grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation funded the trip. The foundation, though based in New York City, was started in part by the accumulated wealth of the Mellon family of Pittsburgh.
Durst said the PESJ Course Connection will do its annual trip to Detroit in March to discuss similar issues.
House parents, live-in moderators for fraternities and sororities are not common at Ohio Wesleyan. But a remaining few still hold the title.
A house parent is similar to a Residential Advisor (RA). They deal with managing property, handling conflicts and sometimes assisting in academic advising.
Chi Phi is one fraternity that retains the position.
âTo the best of my knowledge, the house father is a title and job that was grandfathered in after the university acquired our houses with the Memorandum of Understanding,â said junior Conor Golden, a member of Chi Phi. âTo the school, the house father is the liaison between the university and the chapter representing their interests and relaying back our interests to them.â
Chi Phiâs house father, Peter Chew, was unavailable for comment.
Fraternities are not the only ones that currently have, or have had, house parents.
Delta Gamma parted ways with their house parent five years ago, but they still have someone they consider to be an honorary house mother.
âThe closest thing to a mother we have is Marilyn Haas, who is our house corporation president,â said senior Mariah Bockbrader, a member of Delta Gamma. âShe is in charge of all of the remodeling and decorating of our house, and helps us out with so much more than just that.â
Haas visits the sorority once a month during the school year depending on weather conditions. In the summer she stops by twice a week if there are any renovations being done to the chapter lodge.
âI absolutely love my Alpha Rho (chapter) sisters. I moved back to Ohio almost five years ago, got involved with the chapter and have never been disappointed,â Haas said.
She went on to say that she doesnât think Delta Gamma will have a house mother in the near future.
âWhile each of us has different personalities, we have worked well together and the chapter members are very grateful for the improvements to the physical house,â Haas said. âThey are respectful of the alumnae, love celebrating Delta Gamma traditions such as Foundersâ Day and parent/alumnae weekends and have been gracious hostesses.â
The Wesleyan Council on Student Affairs (WCSA) considered the benefits of increasing the student activity fee at their March 16 full senate meeting.
The fee is a component of the Ohio Wesleyan tuition statement. It has not been increased since 2011.
Citing OWUâs current deficit, WCSA president Jerry Lherisson, a junior, told the senators that the administration âneeds to make $4 million in cuts in order to have the exact same quality of things we have now.â
In an effort to decrease the financial burden on faculty and staff, whose salaries, health benefits and retirement plans are at stake, WCSA is proposing to cost share with the student affairs division.
This division includes the community service office, the office of multicultural student affairs, Residential Life, the student involvement office, Public Safety, Counseling Services and Health Services.
According to junior Emma Drongowski, vice president of WCSA, âif WCSA were to give some funds to student affairs less cuts would have to be madeâ across the board.
The money for cost sharing would come from WCSAâs budget, funded by the student activity fee. The options presented on March 16 were to raise the $130 student activity fee to $160 or to $170. The senators could also vote to keep it as is.
According to Lherisson, if the activity fee were increased and money was allocated to the student affairs offices, it would âsoften the blowâ to the people that make âintegral, day to day campus life what it is.â Without an increase, this wonât happen.
Because the budget for the 2015-2016 year will not be finalized until class of 2019 enrollment is set, neither the administration nor WCSA knows how dire the financial picture will be. âOur top four officers are just as frustrated that we canât give exact numbers and say what is going to be cut,â said Drongowski. But Dean of Students Kimberlie Goldsberry reinforced the point that âwhether student government will be able to assist student activity or not…there are going to be cuts.â
WCSA leadership emphasized that these options are being discussed, and that nothing will be decided without the full consent of the senate.
Also mentioned at the full senate meeting were the Golden Bishop winners for the categories of friend of WCSA, best new member and best overall member. Craig Ullom, vice president for student affairs, sophomore Sam Schurer and sophomore Jess Choate won the titles respectively.
Jay Martin. Photo courtesy of battlingbishops.com.
Many great things come from athletics, but hazing is not one of them. Ohio Wesleyan menâs soccer coach and health and human kinetics professor Jay Martin is looking to address this problem.
âHazing has always been an interest to me,â Martin said. âWhen I first got to Ohio Wesleyan I was the soccer and lacrosse coach and both teams were really into hazing.â
Simon Clements of the Chicago-based EXACT Sports research group will be working alongside Martin on his project.
The two sent a grant proposal to the NCAA Innovations in Research and Practice Grant Program stating that âhazing prevalence is as high as 79 percentâ and that âa more recent study of 53 colleges involving 11,000 students indicate that over 50 percent have experienced hazing.â
Martin and his research team received a $10,000 grant and will use the money to conduct studies that will attempt to identify teams and players who suffer from hazing tendencies.
Martin and his team will begin their research by identifying 10 coaches throughout all NCAA divisions to send a questionnaire on hazing to.
Then they will do the same thing, but anonymously, with 300 freshman student athletes. This sample will consist of 150 males and 150 females.
âWhat we are eventually trying to do is to identify teams, players and coaches that have a tendency to haze,â Martin said.
Martin continued by saying they will develop another questionnaire that will be put online so coaches and athletic directors can identify potential hazing situations at their institutions.
All of this will be done by January of 2016.
âWe want to be done with part one – thatâs identification of the coaches – by April 30, we want to do part two by Aug. 15 and then get the entire study put together to be presented at the NCAA convention next January in San Antonio,â Martin said.
Martin specified that ultimately they are trying to develop an online tool the NCAA can use to pick out hazing teams, coaches, and players.
âWe believe that there are certain behaviors exhibited by coaches and players who haze,â Martin said. âSo we are trying to identify those behaviors so we can stop hazing and make a more positive environment.â
The current gender population of the SLU community, including Greek affiliation. Graph courtesy of Spenser Hickey.
At the start of each spring semester, OWUâs Small Living Units seek new members â but theyâre running into increased competition with fraternities, most often for male candidates.
âI think that the fraternity system here at OWU, the fact that itâs residential, is why the gender ratios are so skewed in the SLUs,â said Citizens of the World (COW) House moderator Kerrigan Boyd, a senior.
â…In some ways itâs kind of cool that the SLU community is primarily driven by women, just because I feel like there are so…few things in society that are, but I feel like we strive for a community thatâs inclusive of a variety of diverse backgrounds, including gender diversity.â
In terms of gender, OWUâs student body as a whole is 54 percent female and 46 percent male, according to the OWU website; data on non-binary students was not available and is not recorded by the University.
Non-binary, as described by sophomore Womenâs House (WoHo) resident Rowan Hannan, refers to a gender identity that is different from the one assigned at birth; this includes a wide variety of genders beyond assigned and self-identified male or female.
A survey of SLU gender demographics finds that there are more than four times more women in SLUs than men and at least three non-binary students, including Hannan, who live in WoHo.
These statistics were provided by SLU moderators and some residents; there may be additional non-binary SLU residents whose identities arenât fully known or realized, and were not counted accurately as a result.
Senior Meredith Harrison, WoHo moderator, said the SLU community tends to be fairly homogenous as a whole.
âWe have a lot of cisgender, heterosexual white people; itâs predominantly female,â she said.
Low male participation – and a new exception
âThere are absolutely less men who go through that (SLUsh) process, but I think at the end of the day that is a choice that our male students have to make (between fraternities or SLUs),â said Levi Harrel, residential life coordinator for the SLU community.
Percentage of men who completed the SLUsh process at each SLU. Graph courtesy of Spenser Hickey.
The Memorandums of Understanding (MOUs) between Ohio Wesleyan and the seven residential fraternities currently on campus require all fraternity members to live in their houses, unless they work for Residential Life or the houses are above capacity.
âI can understand why the university wants to fill all the (fraternity) houses, because itâs more efficient that way,â said senior Brian Cook, president of the Inter-Fraternity Council (IFC).
âAt the same time, I think I can understand why SLUs might be frustrated with that process.â
The MoUs make it rare for active fraternity members to live in SLUs, although there are some ways they can do both at the same time.
The most likely way for active fraternity members to live in a SLU would be if their organization is non-residential â such as Phi Gamma Delta (FIJI) or one of the National Pan-Hellenic Council groups, nine traditionally African-American Greek organizations. Currently, no one is using this option, however there will be a member of FIJI in the House of Spiritual Athletes next year.
While FIJI will be a residential fraternity again starting next semester, the chapter will be above occupancy due to increased recruiting in the past. Itâs not known yet whether HSA will have a house or if itâs members will be living in other housing, though.
With ten members, HSAâs residents will make up half the male population of next yearâs SLU community, but they plan to recruit women in the future.
âWe had interest from some women, but there were a lot more guys interested and we didnât want to have an awkward guy to girl ratio,â said freshman Conner Brown, one of two candidates to be HSA moderator.
âWe do plan to offer and integrate women into the SLU in the future but we knew we may not even have a house this next year.â
The second most likely exception is if they are the moderator â equivalent to a resident assistant for dormitory life, thus exempting them from the Greek residency requirement.
There is one actively Greek male moderator, senior Noah Manskar, whoâs also the only male moderator this year. To do this, he had to join his SLU, become moderator and then go Greek â then be selected as moderator again to remain in the house.
The structure of this yearâs fraternity rush and SLU rush (SLUsh) processes also required potential new fraternity members to make a decision on their bids before receiving SLU interview results, leading several male students to opt out of SLUsh entirely.
Challenges with fraternity recruitment
New fraternity members sign their bids on February 2. Photo courtesy of Alex Gross.
âIâve heard of a lot of men who drop out – they do start slushing and then they drop out because they get bids,â said senior Meredith Harrison, moderator of the Womenâs House.
The House of Peace and Justice (P&J) was hit particularly hard by this â originally four men signed up for interviews, but three received fraternity bids and withdrew from the SLUsh process to accept them.
âWe had one (man), out of 21 people (who applied),â said Manskar, P&Jâs moderator.
âI think we have definitely noticed a decrease in the amount of men who have applied to houses this year,â said junior Reilly Reynolds. âI think all the members of the SLUs have.â
Reynolds is moderator of Tree House, which had 17 students apply during this SLUsh season. None of them were men.
âI really donât think itâs fair to the guys, because they have to make a decision on Greek life before they make a decision about SLU life,â she said.
Sophomore Cindy Hastings, also a Tree House resident, added that the low gender ratios can also deter some non-Greek men from the SLUsh process, as they may not be as comfortable applying and interviewing at an all or mostly-female house.
The Womenâs House encounters this in more than most; Harrison said the current name may discourage some men from applying. This year they had two men apply, which she said is âreally good for us.â
While itâs rare for men to be involved in SLU and fraternity life simultaneously, students can do both over their four years at Ohio Wesleyan, and several have. In most cases, though, they leave their SLU to go Greek, rather than the other way around.
Senior Kyle Simon is one of those whoâve done both â he lived in the Womenâs House (WoHo) his sophomore year before moving into Chi Phi last year.
âIt was really, really wonderful,â Simon said about his time in WoHo.
While he enjoyed the experience, he found Greek life offered a different type of community that appealed more; close personal friendships with future fellow members also led him to Chi Phi.
Simon remains active in some SLU programs, and credits his dual experience of SLU and Greek perspectives as being really helpful.
âI think theyâre really good options for people, but theyâre completely different types of structures,â he said.
âEvery SLU and every Greek organizationâs so different that itâs not really the same decision (to join one or the other.)â
Harrison said Simonâs done a lot to connect her house and his fraternity after leaving, though the two organizations already had a strong connection.
During Take Back the Night, an annual Womenâs House event, members of Chi Phi will guard WoHo in its residentsâ absence. This safety measure is due to a 1984 incident where two male students threw a smoke bomb into the house and nearly burned it down.
âI feel like, as far as fraternities go, weâve always had a really good relationship with Chi Phi,â Harrison said.
Benefits of Greek and SLU overlap
Total number of SLU residents in each sorority or fraternity, excluding the Greek organizations with no SLU representation. Graph courtesy of Spenser Hickey.
Alpha Sigma Phi also has a former SLU resident, junior Scott Woodward, and current SLU resident Noah Manskar.
Woodward lived in the House of Thought (HoT) last year and moved into Alpha Sig this year after accepting a bid.
âDeciding to slush and live at (HoT) was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made in college,â Woodward said.
He decided to rush to learn more about the Greek community, something he hadnât considered joining before coming to college.
âLeaving House of Thought for Alpha Sig was the definition of bittersweet,â he said, but the commitments of both would have been too much to handle on top of academics and clubs.
Brian Cook, president of the Inter-Fraternity Council, is also a member of Alpha Sig and he described the benefits the chapter has received from having SLU members.
âThe people that tend to join SLUs, at least in our example, (have) a different way of thinking about things than people who may be prone to join a fraternity so itâs good to have that kind of diversity of thought flowing around,â Cook said.
In particular, he discussed how Manskar has integrated one of his Peace and Justice house projects into Alpha Sigâs OWU chapter community.
Two years ago, Manskar hosted a V-Men workshop for the campus, but had a small turnout of 15 participants.
V-Men is a program created by the V-Day organization, which also created the Vagina Monologues, to bring men together around the issue of violence against women and girls.
After joining Alpha Sig last spring, partly to integrate SLU ideals into the fraternity community, Manskar held the workshop within his new chapter.
âAll of our guys loved it and we really appreciate him doing that,â Cook said; the chapter is now making it part of their new member education process.
âAt least in our example those guys (Manskar and Woodward) were willing to take the charge on that, because of their experience with holding those kinds of programs in their own SLUs,â he added.
While Meredith Harrison said she hopes for more fraternity-SLU outreach, she sees a lot of positives in the relationship between SLUs and OWUâs sororities.
âFor Womenâs Week, a lot of sororities support it and I think that is because we have so much Greek representation in our house,â she said.
This year, the Womenâs House has had one member from Kappa Alpha Theta, one from Kappa Kappa Gamma and two from Delta Zeta, though one of them withdrew from the university after the fall semester.
â(SLU membership) does impact (the sorority community), but in a natural way because theyâre living with different people, so they get to share those things that theyâre learning with different people,â said sophomore Jocelyne Muñoz.
âThey get to get other perspectives, so (itâs) definitely a positive.â
Muñoz is community development director of OWUâs Panhellenic Council, the sorority equivalent of IFC, and a member of Delta Gamma.
Strong bonds between SLUs and sororities
Rowan Hannan (left) and Meredith Harrison celebrate after winning a tug of war match at Delta Zeta’s fall philanthropy event, while fellow Women’s House residents clap in the background. Photo courtesy of Spenser Hickey.
Unlike fraternity members, sorority members cannot live in their houses at Ohio Wesleyan, and so a sizeable percentage of the female SLU community are also sorority members.
Of the six female SLU moderators this year, for example, four are in sororities.
“(SLU life) encourages more active members in the OWU community,â said junior Natalie Geer, president of OWUâs Panhellenic Council.
Muñoz added that living in the same SLU âabsolutelyâ connects members of different sororities, and that the presence of sorority members in SLUs âdefinitelyâ brings their non-SLU members to events.
âThere is (an) impact from having your sisters in (SLUs) so more of those sisters will attend those events because theyâre involved,â she said. âBut I donât think it should stop others from attending those events, just because theyâre getting that (sorority) support anyways.â
At the Citizens of the World (COW) House around half the female residents are in sororities but this doesnât have a significant impact on the House culture, according to moderator Kerrigan Boyd.
âI think that people who are involved in SLUs and Greek life a lot of times are leaders and people that really strive to be deeply involved in the OWU community,â said Boyd, also a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma.
â…I think that having people who are leaders in multiple settings, not just SLUs, doesnât isolate us; I think that thatâs been a strength.â
âI think my experience with all the Greek women Iâve lived with is they are fully part of both,â said Noah Manskar, Peace & Justice House moderator.
âThey hold officer positions in the sororities and they put on great house projects here. I think itâs good that the SLUs are kind of integrated with the sororitiesâŠ(they) seem to mesh very well.â
In P&J thereâs an even split this year: six affiliated women, six unaffiliated women, and five men. Among the sorority women of P&J, there is one Kappa, two Tri-Deltas and three Kappa Alpha Thetas.
Kappa Alpha Theta has the highest number of sorority SLU residents, with eleven.
A safe space for other gender minorities
The current gender population of the SLU community this year and next year, compared to the overall student body. Graph courtesy of Spenser Hickey.
Each year, SLUs must go through a renewal process; this year the Womenâs House requested to change their name to the Sexual and Gender Equality (SAGE) House after lengthy discussion among current and potential new members.
The change was part of a deliberate strategy by moderator Meredith Harrison to make the house more queer-inclusive. Queer, used as a positive term by Harrison, refers to non-heterosexual sexual and romantic orientations and non-binary gender identities.
âThis year, we started having conversations about the house name and how it could be really alienating to our non-binary housemates or trans men on this campus,â she said. â…Iâm really proud of my community for wanting to become more inclusive.â
Hannan, who joined the house at the start of this year, said theyâve been able to better understand their gender identity because of their time in the house and the supportive environment itâs residents provide.
âBecause we continually work to create a safe space, it has allowed me to explore my gender as well as the way I perceive others,â Hannan said.
âI often forget that when leaving the SLU bubble that people will not ask for my pronouns, will assume my gender based on the way I present, and will often not acknowledge the existence of non-binary genders.â
While they could only speak from their own experience, Hannan said they thought the SLU community can be more comfortable than Greek life for non-binary students.
âFraternities and sororities literally represent the gender binary,â they said. â…However there are trans and non-binary people who are happy in fraternities, and I think it isn’t something to necessarily be generalized.â
The number of non-binary SLU residents for next year will increase from at least three to at least five, and not all of them will live in the SAGE House.
âI have only experienced one slush with the house so I can’t speak to a trend, but there were several non-binary applicants this year, and I know there have been in the past,â Hannan said.
âI wouldn’t say there is more, but I feel that PRIDE and SAGE have both done very well this year in creating an atmosphere of acceptance and safety, and allowed people to explore and come out in their identities.â
Harrison added that the houseâs name change reflects a growing trend in the feminist movements that SAGE reflects.
âWomen are not the only gender minorities – the trans community, non binary people, you canât ignore that and you canât ignore that in feminism, you canât ignore that in the queer movement,â she said. âSo I think changing the name and the mission statement is absolutely necessary for how gender politics are going.â
Hannan said they want to create more safe spaces for non-binary students, but also âbrave spacesâ where students can âchallenge what people say and try to educate others and create a genuine dialogue.â
âThe best way to be an ally to people of other identities is to listen, and to use your privileges to challenge ignorance, and empower others,â they said.
