Braden Rucinski: Source 2

What are the positive outcomes of being a part of a sorority or fraternity?

Walker, Kenneth, et. all. "Greek Organization Membership and Collegiate Outcomes at an Elite, Private University". Research in Higher Education, 2014. Web. 3 Mar. 2016.

Greek life has negative aspects: it can be a large time investment that distracts students from coursework, and it can be a homogeneous experience, which may mean that Greek students receive limited opportunities to engage with students from different backgrounds or to benefit from diverse learning environments. However, being involved with Greek life has many untold benefits. Membership in Greek organizations can provide students with access to supportive social networks, personal contacts, information and other resources and campus officials routinely monitor the academic performance of individual fraternities or sororities, providing incentives for Greek members to maintain high grades. Also, fraternity or sorority membership predicts higher levels of involvement in campus life, which is linked to higher grades and greater satisfaction with the college experience.

It appears that sorority and fraternity members are usually highly involved on campus, and that they individually benefit from the social networking opportunities they receive; later on this helps them acquire better-paying jobs. It also seems that sorority and fraternity members enjoy college more than other students on campus. Greek life members also may have better grades, because their academic performance is more closely monitored. It seems that Greek life members individually benefit a lot from being a part of these organizations, but I think this benefit is limited in scope. I think that Greek Life culture damages college culture-- they poison the rest of campus with their party culture and misogynistic views, and then benefit career-wise while the rest of the campus is provided fewer opportunities. It seems like Greek Life members get a sweet deal, at the expense of everyone else on campus. 

This source responds to source 1 because it covers a lot of the same material, but this source focuses a lot more on the positive aspects of Greek Life. It directly contests the negative aspects of source 1, but it provides a lot of additional information of the subject matter of the benefits of Greek Life in elite universities.

This source has made me wonder about the privileges of Greek Life. Do Greek Life members learn elitist, privileged attitudes in college, and then go on to corporate life or government life where they expect and get privileged positions? I personally think that there is a strong link between elitism and Greek Life, but the question is where do students and adults learn these attitudes? Do they learn them from their parents, who pay for their children to join fraternities? Do these students have these attitudes before they enter college, and then they continue on this path? It is already common knowledge that most of the American elite were in fraternities and sororities when they were in college, but what is the connection here? Is it a specific kind of attitude (superiority), or is it family money, or is it some other unknown factor?