largest "Greek" campuses
 

I am trying to compile a list of the 20 largest "Greek" campuses in the USA. Does anybody know a source for this?

Or, perhaps you could submit your nomination. But to make the list legit I need to know how many greeks are on the campus.

I don't know of any official list, but off the top of my head there's UCLA, U of Florida, (gainesville), and U of Southern California. Anyone else out there?

I've always heard the University of Illinois had the (or one of the)largest membership.

[This message has been edited by BFulton (edited June 13, 2000).]

I think Indiana U and Ohio State also have huge systems.

Percentage-wise, DePauw would have to be one of the top 5. Something like 80% of the students are Greek.

There are several ways to measure how "Greek" a school is, such as number of chapters on campus or highest percentage of student body that is Greek. But I assume we're talking about sheer numbers of Greek students. In that case, I believe BFulton is correct about the University of Illinois.

Penn State has the largest Greek system in the country. 21 out of 26 NPC sororities, 54 fraternities (including multicultural), one 'alternative lifestyle' sorority, one 'alternative lifestyle' fraternity, 8 NPHC fraternities/sororities, one associate HBGLO fraternity, at least one Asian-American sorority, several Latino/a fraternites and sororities and several honorary and service organizations. In addtion, GLO's at the extension campus (Behrend) comprise another 3 NPC sororities, 5 NIC fraternities and one local fraternity.

Barb

Indiana...(considered "the headquarters of the greek community" because so many have their nationals located there)

Miami University (Oxford, Ohio)...EVERYONE is greek

U of Georgia DEFINETLY

If you can get your hands on a copy of "From Here to Fraternity" by Robert Egan, he has some stats in there (they might be about 10 years old, though).

I seem to recall that U of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana was the biggest.

When you say the biggest, do you mean no of people or no. of chapters?

I don't have stats, but Ohio State has a huge greek system (and since the student population is SO big, it's big wheter you're measuring by percentage or by actual numbers).

Also, as someone mentioned, DePauw University (in Greencastle, Indiana) has unbelievable high percentages of greeks. I had a friend who attend there her 1st year, and i think 80% greek sounds about right.

And sort of unrelated...


michelle_azd posted What's up with this book being so hard to get ahold of? It is no longer published, but everyone tells me how good it is, etc. I've had it ordered on Amazon.com for months (if they can find a copy).


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SilverTurtle@greekchat.com
Phi Beta Fraternity
Phi chapter

This probably won't mean anything to you, but to expand your horizons a bit here's a little info from north of the 49th parallel. I believe the University of Western Ontario (UWO) has the largest Greek System in Canada. http://www.greekchat.com/forums/ubb/tongue.gif

Thanks for all your suggestions.

I am putting the list together based upon your comments and here is how it looks now.

These are not ranked.

10 larges "Greek Communities" in N. America

U. of Illinois
U. of Western Ontario
U. of Georgia
U. of Washington
U. of So. California
Ohio State
Penn State
Florida State
Indiana U.
UCLA

And a special honorable mention to DePauw University. It probably is the highest percentage greek.

Also, I have owned (and lost) a copy of From Here to Fraternity and it is a great book. If you find it buy it. Has anyone checked E-bay?

I have spoken to a few friends and they have mentioned some other schools. Does anybody have info on the Greek Systems at the following schools?

Ole Miss, LSU, Texas, Texas Tech, Arizona, Arizona State, U. of Maryland, Rutgers, Syracuse, Wisconsin, Purdue, Clemson, Michigan, and Tennessee

Can anybody get me actual numbers so I can rank these schools?

I'm from Florida, so I guess I'm biased in thinking that FSU and Florida State's Greek systems are large, when they're really not--they simply dominate the social scene. Were you referring to numbers or percentages? I know that Auburn's Greek system is large, along with Dartmouth's (but not for much longer), Birmingham-Southern's (80% of the population, although it's a small school), Rutgers, Penn State, Clemson, Texas, Texas A&M, University of Alabama, Baylor, Miami (in Oxford, Ohio) and Penn State's. During the 1950's, there was an interesting social observation regarding the Penn State Greek system...does anyone else know about it? What about the HBCU's with large or historic Greek systems, like Howard's?

DePauw and Miami's Greek systems definitely deserve a standing ovation...Miami is known as the "home of the fraternity" (or something like that), because so many of the frats were founded there. DePauw, of course, because of the fact that Kappa Alpha Theta was founded there. I think there's another school in Georgia, Illinois, or Arkansa that spawned a lot of the major sororities...I can't recall the name, nor do I want to misplace the founding places of sororities.

Let me say this very plainly.

My intention is to compile a list of the largest Greek Campuses in terms of total number of people.

DePauw and Miami of Ohio are fun to talk about but they are probably too small to make the top 10. Maybe the top 20.

"The Farmville Four" are Kappa Delta, Sigma Sigma Sigma, Zeta Tau Alpha and Alpha Sigma Alpha. They were all founded within 4 years at Longwood College in Farmville, Virginia.

Alpha Chi Omega and Kappa Alpha Theta were founded at DePauw and a couple of other schools were the site of 2 sorority foundings.

Now, does anyone have any hard numbers for any of the schools on the 10 largest greek campus list?

UCLA has I believe 2,000 students in fraternities and sororities. The 11 PHC sororities have an average size of 100 members. The 18 IFC fraternities have an average size of 60 members. I'm just estimating. This does not count the Asian Greek Council or the NPHC.

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andrew watters
Theta Chi –*ucla

Have you tried the student activities web pages for those top 10 or so schools yet? It seems they'd have those sorts of statistics for their own student bodies (though they may not have detail on how that compares to other universities). Also, are you looking for total GLO populations? I'd think those numbers would be harder to come by than the IFC/NPC/NPHC numbers.