There is a phenomenon that is observed in statistics known
as regression to the mean. In research,
if a data point is an extreme outlier on its first measurement, it will tend to be closer
to the average on its second and subsequent measures. This is one of the most universal
laws in all of statistics.
Regression to the mean doesn’t just happen in statistics. In
happens in real life.
It is the single biggest challenge facing fraternity communities
on college campuses today.
It’s a familiar story – a fraternity finally screws up badly
enough for its national headquarters and/or the host university to close the
chapter, with all of the usual weeping and gnashing of teeth. After a hiatus of
a few years, the fraternity comes back to the campus and recolonizes that
chapter.
Most of the time, the national headquarters does a great job
recruiting the right guys for the right reasons into the newly recolonized group. They are the “maybe joiners”
or “never joiners” we love to talk about – those guys not interested in the
stereotypical fraternity experience, but who are interested in a value-added
experience that helps enrich their college experience in a meaningful way. And
so it goes for a few years – the chapter is high performing, recruiting other
good guys interested in joining for the right reasons. Maybe they have the best
grades on campus. They may even win a few national awards.
But you know how this story ends.
After a few years, after all of the founding members have graduated and
the notion of offering an experience that is “different” becomes less salient
in the minds of current members, the inevitable happens.
Regression to the mean.
The chapter members start looking around, comparing
themselves to other groups on campus who have a more prominent position in the
social hierarchy. As they look around, they begin to ask themselves “Hey – how
can we be more like those groups? How can we increase our social capital? How
can we stop being the dorky fraternity and be more like the cool groups?” And,
over time, they become less of an outlier and begin looking more and more like
the other fraternities on campus.
They become, for lack of a better term,
average.
This is not the result of some phenomenon unique to the
college fraternity. Rather, it is the result of a widely observed statistical
law. We can’t change it. Regression to the mean is inevitable.
The only way to offset the effects of regression to the mean
is to elevate the mean.
In other words, we have to redefine what it means to be an “average
fraternity” on a campus. The average fraternity needs to be much higher
performing that today’s average fraternity. If we are able to elevate the mean,
then the results of regression to the mean will be less disastrous than they
currently are on a majority of college campuses.
But how do we do that? How do we artificially and positively
adjust the mean on a particular campus?
Here is my idea:
Every year, the executive directors of all of the
fraternities and sororities should get together and hold a secret ballot
vote. The question put to them should be
“what is the campus that gives you the most headaches.” Each executive director
gets one vote. An independent arbiter would tally the votes and announce the 10
campuses who received the highest number of votes. Whether or not other
campuses can volunteer as tribute is a matter I am open to discussing.
Those 10 campuses would then get their worlds rocked.
If a campus makes the “Top 10” list, the campus
administration would be notified and representatives from the national groups
would make a trip to that campus to work on a plan of action on that
campus. Each group represented on that
campus would volunteer to undertake an exhaustive membership review, getting rid
of every single bad apple in the barrel. They would institute models of shared
governance. They would mandate alcohol free housing. Guys only there for the
party? Gone. Guys only interested in drinking and hazing pledges? Gone. Guys
who underperform academically and don’t give a darn for community service?
Gone. You get the idea.
In exchange for this cleanse, every campus selected should
agree to increase its staffing and support of the fraternity/sorority advising
office. Commit resources to hiring additional staff – seasoned staff with the
ability to align the fraternity/sorority program with the goals and mission of
the host institution. Commit to recruiting, training and providing support to
additional chapter advisors. Invest in meaningful educational programming.
Spend serious time and resources building an infrastructure capable of
sustaining a thriving and successful Greek community.
Will this approach fix all of our problems? Of course not.
18-22 year old college students are always going to be 18-22 year old college
students. They will continue to experiment with boundaries and make mistakes.
And we can all be there to help them learn and grow from those mistakes.
But if this type of system were actually implemented,
imagine the impact it could have. In a period of five years, 50 campus
fraternity communities would be completely transformed. It would institute a “new
normal” of what it means to be in a fraternity on those campuses. And as new groups come to campus and “regress
to the mean,” the mean to which they are regressing will be shifted upward in a
significant and meaningful way.
We can’t stop regression to the mean, but we can change the
mean to which organizations regress. And doing so may be our best chance at
fixing our broken fraternity system.