There is a growing issue in the United States that doesn’t involve race, gender or ethnicity; the issue is that Greek life is still on campus and they are ruining the children. Everyone knows the stereotypes for Greek students, one that states that all they do is party, mess around with each other and ruin their futures. There is also the very obvious issue of hazing, and people losing their lives because of it. It is evident that there is hazing going on and people are being harmed and losing their lives which can be seen in examples from major schools like Penn State, FSU and other colleges across the nation. It is events and stereotypes like this that make people want to maintain or even ban Greek life from their campus as a whole. The issue is that this is simply the wrong action to be taken for the failures that Greek life has produced. Just like anything else in life, there are bad instances and bad organizations that ruin the name for everyone else.
These horrible stories are always publicized and shown on the news; however, all the good that Greeks do, not only for their local school but other organizations as a whole is never shown. Again, one thing everyone loves to talk about are Greeks and their partying, however, no one likes to talk about their grades. Most college campuses have reported that the students in Greek organizations indeed have higher GPA’s than the average undergraduate student. In the past year, 227 campuses reported data to the North-American Interfraternity conference about their grades; 117 of those fraternities had an average GPA higher than all of their males on campus that are not in a Greek organization. The main reason is that schools set standards that people need to meet for their GPA to not only get into a Greek organization but to also stay in one.
Another reason why Greek life is important to a college campus is that of the presence it has on local and national charities. All Greek organization have their own philanthropy that they raise money for whether it be as small as a local animal shelter or as big as Saint Jude’s Research. It is calculated that over seven million dollars are raised for these organizations yearly through fundraisers and other events. The Greek presence is also not just felt by raising money, but also through volunteer work as well. Almost all Greek organizations are mandated by their schools to do community service hours which gives the national estimate of over 850,000 hours of community service completed by Greeks on all campuses in America.
The final reason why Greek life cannot be banned on campuses is that they produce leaders. Most of the leaders or figureheads on campuses are Greeks; this is because Greek life teaches a person organizational skills, time management and to multitask. It is no wonder with all of these lessons learned that Greeks not only make up a majority of the leaders on their campus but in the nation too. Of the 50 largest corporations in the country 43 are run by fraternity men, 85 percent of the Fortune 500 executives belong to a Greek organization and 40 of the 47 U.S Supreme Court Justices since 1910 were fraternity men. 76 percent of all congressmen and senators belong to a Greek organization and every President and Vice President besides two since the start of Greek organizations in 1825 have been fraternity men as well. A U.S government study shows that over 70 percent of all those who join Greek organizations graduate while it is under 50 percent for those who don’t join. It is obvious that Greek life can cause some problems, however, it isn’t because they are Greek, it is because they are people with their own issues just like anyone in this country. To ban Greek life would hurt the local campuses and the nation as a whole.
