Housing, to go Greek or not?

[CyGuy1]

Hey everybody, I have a few questions concerning your personal opinions on the advantages and disadvantages of dorm life and Greek life, but first let me introduce myself. I am a high school senior in Peoria, Illinois. I plan to attend ISU in fall of 2008. My dad is an alumni, and was a dormie, but I have Greek ties through my uncles. I have been a cyclone fan since grade school and am super stoked about going to Ames, but one question has always nagged at me: Frat or Dorm?
I am social, but do enjoy some quiet time to myself, and I do enjoy to party-hardy:biggrin:, but getting good grades is very important to me, as I am going to major in engineering.
Please post what you lived in or are living in, and tell me the good and the bad of your experience. This is not an opportunity to attack one system or the other. I only want to hear about your own experience, so don't post any rumors or hearsay you have picked up.
Thanks for your cooperation, and go 'Clones!

 

[BryceC]

I lived in a frat my freshman year and enjoyed it, but I moved off campus my sophomore year. It wasn't a bad experience, it just wasn't for me.

I think you'll find that living in the dorms and living in a frat are pretty similar, even though a lot of people love pointing out the differences.

 

[IcSyU]

Hey everybody, I have a few questions concerning your personal opinions on the advantages and disadvantages of dorm life and Greek life, but first let me introduce myself. I am a high school senior in Peoria, Illinois. I plan to attend ISU in fall of 2008. My dad is an alumni, and was a dormie, but I have Greek ties through my uncles. I have been a cyclone fan since grade school and am super stoked about going to Ames, but one question has always nagged at me: Frat or Dorm?
I am social, but do enjoy some quiet time to myself, and I do enjoy to party-hardy:biggrin:, but getting good grades is very important to me, as I am going to major in engineering.
Please post what you lived in or are living in, and tell me the good and the bad of your experience. This is not an opportunity to attack one system or the other. I only want to hear about your own experience, so don't post any rumors or hearsay you have picked up.
Thanks for your cooperation, and go 'Clones!

A lot of Greeks won't let you in first semester so you're pretty much forced to do dorms. The dorms for me have been a once in a lifetime opportunity. Yes some stupid things happen and some of the rules just plain suck, but I wouldn't trade this year for anything. Just some of the stuff you get to see makes living in dorms worth it. I'm sure there are people out there who hate the dorms, but I can honestly say I'm going to miss them next year, but having an apartment is going to be sweet. :yes:

 

[isucyfan]

Completely biased, but I think dorm life offers more freedom, which was the draw for me. I didn't like the idea that the frat would tell me when to eat, when to study, when to clean my room, etc. Maybe they are not all like that, but that's what I remember what turned me off.

Dorm life probably doesn't offer the automatic social life that frats do, but if you are industrious, a social life will find you!

There's more, but this is the meat of the issue for me...I'm sure you will hear from many others!

Also, a shout out to Peoria! I lived there for 4 years...what high school are you graduating from?

 

[cstrunk]

I briefly thought about joining one (took one visit) and decided it wasn't for me. I would say that it is probably a good way to get some opportunities for resume building material (leadership, volunteer, scholastic, etc.), but I didn't want any of the extra baggage that goes along with it. A lot of that probably ends up depending on what house you join. I never joined one so I can't give a truly fair assessment.

 

[cyclonedave25]

I lived in the dorms for my first two years.
Some of the rules (alcohol policy) sucked, but you meet a lot of people.
Most of whom you will probably be friends with throughout your time at ISU.

 

[agcy68]

I don't know of any fraternities that require off site living the first year. I was in a fraternity and enjoyed it even though I was low key. The thing that I noticed about fraternities is that they are more structured in requirements and their support of you and that they offer more inroads to on campus organizations if you are interested in leadership experience. I wish that I would have done more of that...

 

[mojo]

I'm a supporter of the Greek system a member of Sigma Phi Epsilon I never lived in the dorms while at ISU so i honestly can't say what the differences are but i enjoyed being a member of a fraternity a lot. Some people like to point out you get more involved in things when your in a fraternity or sorority, but I think that has more to do with the type of person you are, you can be as involved in things as you want regardless of being in a frat or not. Sometimes the connections you make through a fraternity can be very beneficial throughout your college career and on into life. Most fraternities and Sororities require you to maintain a certain GPA to even stay a part of their organization, so if grades worry you they are very important when being a part of the fraternity, its not just about partying and having a good time. There are a lot of responsibilities as well but again being in a fraternity also gives you access to many resources and people that can help you with your schooling and responsibilities as well.

 

[isucyfan]

I agree that frats offer volunteer opportunities, but if you really want to volunteer, you can find somewhere to volunteer.

I was a volunteer for ISU Volunteers (ironic, huh?) when I was there long ago. I don't know if it even exists anymore, but we hooked potential volunteers up with opportunities.

 

[ajk4st8]

Dorms.. you can volunteer your time or be social without having to do the required waste of time crap.

 

[chadm]

I would suggest making visits to both. Make your own decision. I was in a fraternity multiple years ago and from a couple visits back they have changed so I can't tell you how it is now.

I personally wouldn't change the experiences I had.

 

[ajk4st8]

I HAVE heard that the Greek life at ISU is WAY different than at UNI. UNI is a joke.

 

[BryceC]

Completely biased, but I think dorm life offers more freedom, which was the draw for me. I didn't like the idea that the frat would tell me when to eat, when to study, when to clean my room, etc. Maybe they are not all like that, but that's what I remember what turned me off.

Mine was really low key, and didn't have anything like that.

 

[rhillary]

I think I can help you out. I too live in Peoria as I just graduated and work for CAT. I was also an engineer with a 3.4 and was President and VP of my fraternity.

I lived in the dorms the first year and then I lived in a fraternity house for 2 years, then spent the last 2 years in an apartment so I have lived in about every situation. They all have their ups and downs. Here goes:

Dorms:
Good stuff:
Good networking - you can meet people very easily
close to food/class - it was really nice to only have to walk 30 seconds to class, or walk down the hall to eat
Bad stuff:
small living area - dorms are tiny and usually shared
rules - dorms have the most rules and your experience will definately depend on your RA, if he is strict, you will hate it because you will not be able to drink or anything
not as many long term friends - of all the places I met people, dorms had the lease amount of long term friends. I only keep in contact with 1, the rest go their own way after you move out

Frat
Good:
Parties - WOW! they totally rock
Friends - it is super easy to meet people and you'll always have something to do
School help - being that the people are you actually care about what happens to you, you will find juniors and seniors that are actually willing to help you with a class if you need it
Girls - You have setups with totally hot sororities all the time. This is definately nice....
Bad:
focus - there is so much fun stuff going on in a frat that it can be hard to get hw done (I fixed this by making myself go to the library no matter what every night but friday and saturday)
different - I didn't know what else to call this. What I ment is that every single fraternity is different, so one might be the typical frat guys, the next is all about sports and intramurals, the next LOVES to party. They are all different, but you have to make sure you make the right choice because once your initiated, you can't go to another frat.
stereotypes - people will automaticlly lump you in as a "frat boy"....this gets old fast. I honestly hate typical "frat boys", yet I am called one all the time. This gets annoying

Apartment-
This is obvious. I am not going to go into this because you didn't say it was a option. I would NOT recommend this to a freshman...EVER. This is for juniors and seniors who already have a set group of friends and just want total freedom to cook, clean, come and go as they want, ect.

Anyway, sorry this is so long, I tried to sum up 5 year experiences in a few words! If you want to know more (about anything), just ask or post or whatever. Hope this helps!

 

[gocubs2118]

I moved into a Fraternity my Freshman year and loved it. It was the best thing for me. I still enjoy living in the house too. If you plan on joining a Fraternity next year as a freshman, I highly recommend you move in house. It gets you closer to the guys and if you don't like it you can always move out.

 

[isucyfan]

I had two awesome RA's in my two dorm years, so that definitely helped.

 

[mojo]

Completely biased, but I think dorm life offers more freedom, which was the draw for me. I didn't like the idea that the frat would tell me when to eat, when to study, when to clean my room, etc. Maybe they are not all like that, but that's what I remember what turned me off.

I just have to say that my experience was nothing like that, Im not sure which house you were a part of but I've never heard of that before where your told when to eat, clean, study.

 

[isucyfan]

I just have to say that my experience was nothing like that, Im not sure which house you were a part of but I've never heard of that before where your told when to eat, clean study.

I wasn't in one, but a friend who was talked about certain times the freshman had to study, that they had to keep rooms clean, etc.

Maybe exaggerated, but that's what turned me off initially. It seemed that there were a lot of scheduled things. I could be wrong.

 

[rhillary]

I had two awesome RA's in my two dorm years, so that definitely helped.

My RA totally rocked too. He literally caught us with booze in our rooms (me and roommate were 18-19) and just told us to "make sure no other RA got called so he didn't get in trouble". If you get a strict RA, the dorm experience would be much worse.

 

[mojo]

I wasn't in one, but a friend who was talked about certain times the freshman had to study, that they had to keep rooms clean, etc.

Maybe exaggerated, but that's what turned me off initially. It seemed that there were a lot of scheduled things. I could be wrong.

I would agree there a lot of scheduled things but it was more like there are all these things going on and you can choose to do this or that if you want to, you're time was your own and you chose how much you wanted to be involved in things, but i will say this time management is something you need to be aware of i think whether in a fraternity or not, its easy to not study or do this or that instead of what you "should" be doing.