Wesleyan orders residential fraternities to become coeducational

Wesleyan University has ordered its residential fraternities to become coeducational within three years, a move designed to make the liberal arts school in Middletown, Conn., more gender-equal, officials said on Monday.

The decision follows calls last year by some students and faculty members to change the policy because of the feeling that fraternities contributed to an atmosphere that could lead to sexual assaults. There have been several highly publicized incidents of sexual violence at the school in recent years.

In a letter to the college community, President Michael Roth and Joshua Boger, chairman of the board of trustees, said they had decided to act after many years of study.

“With equity and inclusion in mind, we have decided that residential fraternities must become fully coeducational over the next three years. If the organizations are to continue to be recognized as offering housing and social spaces for Wesleyan students, women as well as men must be full members and well-represented in the body and leadership of the organization,” they wrote.

The policy requires Greek organizations with houses on campus to have both male and female members and to have both men and women “well represented” among the leaders.

“Our residential Greek organizations inspire loyalty, community and independence. That’s why all our students should be eligible to join them. Although this change does not affect nonresidential organizations, we are hopeful that groups across the university will continue to work together to create a more inclusive, equitable and safer campus,” they said.

The new policy means that the two remaining residential fraternities, Delta Kappa Epsilon and Psi Upsilon, will have to integrate. Neither have commented.

A third fraternity, Beta Theta Pi, closed after an accident in which a woman fell from a third-story window.

The school also has several nonresidential fraternities and one off-campus sorority, Rho Epsilon, said spokeswoman Kate Carlisle. There are no residential sororities on campus.

“For us, this is really a step to a more complete gender equity,” she said. “We are coed in other areas already and Wesleyan has a history of progressive leadership.”

Another fraternity, Alpha Delta Phi, has been coeducational for several decades, Carlisle said. Roth was the president of that organization when he was a student at Wesleyan in the 1970s, she said.

Wesleyan, with about 2,900 undergraduate and 200 graduate students, is the second school in Connecticut to institute a coeducational policy for Greek organizations. Trinity College in Hartford began the transition in 2012 after a campus report found alcohol and drug-related problems.

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