Love this discussion since I’ve always advocated for UH to take a strong role in promoting Greek life. I’ve always felt that the transitioning neighborhood bounded by the freeway, Cullen, Elgin and Scott would be ideal for fraternity housing. The dynamic at UH doesn’t demand the huge mansions that you find at Georgia Tech, but they can be built to house 6 to 10 members and afford all the requirements for a membership’s lodge.
My joining way back when was the best decision that I made while at UH. It was my entire collegiate social life and made me an avid Cougar sports fan for life. We had members who were cheer leaders, band members and twirlers who were little sisters of the fraternity. A lot of school spirit.
Through the years, 3 of my jobs were fraternally connected, season tickets with frat brothers, many of whom are major Cougar Pride donors. I’m in the camp of supporting, promoting and growing the UH Greeks.
I’d expect that opinion from someone like you.
SMU bough their way in because they come from a fraternity heavy school so their alums old high paying jobs and can easily afford it.
UH resisting to become a Traditional University will keep it stick in the mud.
We are known as a “working bee” school. Yes, there a re a few outliers but the vast majority are “working bees”.
SigEpCoog2005
(SHAUN - Bill Yeoman needs to be honored with a BOBBLEHEAD!)
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I had a cousin I tried to get to rush my fraternity about the time I graduated, but he thought it was dumb. He told me 5 years later he wish he had because when he went to law school at NYU, which is a little competitive, he said the fraternity guys stuck together and helped each other out, and they were not even the same fraternity.
Greek Life is not for everyone. I never held it for or against someone that was in a fraternity or not.
You can join a club, fraternity or not at all. However, someone who has joined an organization and gone on to be a leader does show something. There are no absolutes. I know a number of fraternity brothers who were not chapter officers because of various circumstances and are still very successful. But with all other things being equal, someone who is in an organization or not, an officer or not, I believe the officer in an organization is going to get a second look more often than someone who was not.
In school you establish connections, be it taking classes together, studying together or other things. In a social or business setting once you’re out of school, it can be an icebreaker. Just like saying you went to UH.
But it should be bigger at UH than it currently is.
I know my fraternity chapter definitely had first time college students, persons of color, etc and that was at a private university. Hell, I had one fraternity brother that was the son of a UPS driver from rural PA. I think that it is certainly for more people than just rich whites, which seems to be an ignorantly incorrect widespread BS opinion on this board.
No reason at all why a larger segment of the UH undergrad student body couldn’t be involved in Greek Life.
It was my experience while in the Navy, that the officers that commanded high regard from fellow officers, as well as enlisted men, were what was called “mustangs.” These were officers that worked their way up from being enlisted men. These guys were usually Limited Duty Officers (LDOs) that were limited to their field of expertise as an enlisted men, but I don’t know if all were.
I have no clue about other branches.
As for knowing what officers thought of other officers that graduated from the academy as to the ones that took the OCS route, I wouldn’t know.
I can see where you might think people who join a fraternity are “buying friends,” but that was not my experience at all. I was in a large fraternity at the age of 18 at my first University, and it ended up being one of the best decisions i ever made. I have friendships that started then that continue today, over 25 plus years later. Of course we partied our butts off, but i also learned leadership skills, public speaking, and have a core of brothers I can call on anytime day or night. I never intended to join a fraternity, and didn’t do so until my 2nd semester on campus, but I would do it again in a heartbeat.
I agree with the sentiment here, but wouldn’t relegate it solely to Greek orgs. I am always amazed when I interview young people and they say they had no involvement in college. They will often say they were focused on school and had high grades. I’d rather have someone with a solid 3.0 and was heavily involved in school, organizations, and work than somebody who had a 3.8 and that’s all they did.
Greek life is definitely not paying for friends. The way I viewed the payment was that it was going towards my share in throwing parties and events just like any normal non fraternity members would.
If you go out to eat with your buddies, you all split a check and pay for your share. Fraternity payments are often the same, just a bigger scale.
At least during the ‘Golden Era’ (2013-2019), and my time in the back half of it, there wasn’t really a ‘paying for friends’ stigma around Greek lol. You were in it or you weren’t. You’d see members of CFSL all around campus, orgs at the time, they were a part of you, not the other way around. Campus really was a ‘everyone is here’ vibe.
When I made CV3, using it as a social outlet for myself as a transfer who lived at home, we had people from all walks of campus show up. It was just a common spot for people who wanted to be spirited and rowdy to hang together. That was… Really it. No dues, no other obligations, just show up. We’d have some people from Greek spill in after the rest of their chapter left the game early, among other orgs on campus.
From the undergraduates (and young grad students) that I talk to, it feels to them that campus hash become more pocketed and cliquey than what the golden era kids used to see. I don’t know whether or not orgs are trying to feel as if they’re above anyone else here, though.
With the benefits I’ve seen Greek offer over and over again, your payment is a buy-in to the benefits after College. Wouldn’t other orgs that you join have dues for the same reason? Heck, I’ve paid dues to orgs that never did anything when they had ‘members-only’ events.
Shouldn’t the different colleges try and promote some of the things the traditional greek houses do? I bet they do to a lesser extent. That’s why UH doesn’t have big participation is my guess. My college, Hines (architecture) was like a frat. We all hung out together and some even lived in the architecture building. We also have an academic fraternity.
It currently costs about $6,000, per semester to attend the University of Houston and people are complaining about paying a couple of hundred dollars a month to join an organization that will provide you with life long benefits.
There aren’t as many “can’t miss investments” in your life as genuinely being involved in a Greek Organization, an especially holding an officer’s position during that 18-22 age period.
1,000 Greeks out of a school of 50,000 students is WAY too low and if we don’t make these changes to become a more Traditional Campus we will continue to be viewed as a school that churns out only “worker bees”
And to add insult to injury, “worker bees” that send there now second/ third generation college age children to OTHER SCHOOLS to take advantage of the college environment elements we continously supress
My dryness didn’t read well, I was in a fraternity in my time at UH. I certainly enjoyed the social aspect of it in college and the majority of my friend group now are fraternity brothers. It also helped me get my first job out of school. Those friends truly were worth every penny.