The Interfraternity Council has just made a move toward diversity.
Pi Kappa Phi became the only nonresidential member of the IFC when the council voted unanimously to recognize the fraternity's Mu chapter on April 27.
Trinity senior Lex Wolf, president of the IFC, said that Pi Kappa Phi would bring more variety to the council. "The more fraternity opportunities we can offer to students, the better," Wolf said.
The IFC recognition has come just in time to help boost the fraternity's shrinking membership, said Trinity senior Brian Thomas, president of Pi Kappa Phi. This past year, the fraternity had 16 members, well below the national average of 54.
"Official recognition will help us become more visible at rush," said Frank Wrenn, Trinity '92 and national chapter adviser to Pi Kappa Phi. "It will now be much easier to recruit students... We didn't feel it was appropriate for the national organization to recruit on campus without recognition."
The fraternity will develop a formalized rush system, a listing in the publication "The Greek Way" and a seat on the council itself.
"We plan, as a national organization, to increase our involvement on campus next year," Wrenn said.
As an IFC-recognized fraternity, Pi Kappa Phi will now have to abide by all IFC rules and regulations, which include the new spring rush policy. "To a certain extent, it is going to be constraining," Thomas said. "In the past we could rush and recruit when we wanted."
Thomas said, however, that the benefits of IFC recognition would outweigh any sacrifices they would have to make. "Now we can have some say as to what happens to fraternities on campus," he said. "And in the end, [IFC recognition] won't cause us to lose the individual values of our group".
The fraternity joins IFC at a time when the policies of the two groups are beginning to converge, Wrenn said.
"Risk management in IFC and on campus is catching up to where Pi Kappa Phi is now," Wrenn said. "Now is a perfect time to join IFC because there are new ground rules for everyone."
Trinity junior Brian Arakelian, a member of Pi Kappa Phi, said that the fraternity would not have trouble adapting to the changes in IFC alcohol policy. "We've actually been abiding by more of the IFC's regulations than we thought--we never had keg parties anyway," he said.
Pi Kappa Phi has been applying for recognition for the past several years, but has been repeatedly rejected. "IFC recognition actually came out of the blue," said Thomas. "The IFC had rejected us because we were not residential, but we couldn't become residential without IFC recognition," he said. "It was a catch-22 situation."
Wolf said that Pi Kappa Phi was not recognized before this time simply due to numbers. "When they wanted to be recognized we were already at the limit and they were squeezed out," he said.
The fraternity received its charter from Trinity College in 1915 and retained its nationally recognized status until September of 1971, when it voted to sever all ties with its national office as part of the popular Vietnam-era anti-establishment movement, Wrenn said. Pi Kappa Phi then changed its name to Beta Phi Zeta, but still retained University recognition and housing.
In 1982, Beta Phi Zeta's housing and recognition were revoked by the University after an alleged gang rape occurred in the fraternity's section in Brown.
In 1983, Mu chapter of Pi Kappa Phi was reactivated by a group of students who lived in the same freshman dorm, and has been nonresidential since then. Along with seven other fraternities, the group then reapplied for recognition in February 1983. Only one fraternity, Delta Kappa Epsilon, was chosen at that time.
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