Students, parents and faculty at Virginia Commonwealth University have been yearning for a moment of validation for their opinions on Greek life since the death of freshman student Adam Oakes in late February of 2021. Now that moment has finally come in the form of two academic reviews, one done internally by VCU, the other done externally by Dyad Strategies LLC.
Dyad did not respond to two requests for an interview. According to Courtney White, Oakes’ cousin and president of the Love Like Adam Foundation, she and her family “appreciate the review and recommendations identified by Dyad.”
“We only wish this was done sooner so Adam would be alive today,” White stated in an email.
Together, the reviews cover a wide-range of problems in the community, most of which can be reasonably traced back to VCU’s organizational approach to Greek life — as Dyad describes it, a “half-in” approach. Within Dyad’s review are testimonies from students and other members of the greater-VCU community, which altogether help to identify several administrative failures on behalf of VCU. However, also included is a rare look into the cultural and interpersonal problems within the Greek life community at VCU.
As consequence of everything that happened at VCU during the spring 2021 semester, there are many throbbing questions on everyone’s mind. Most of these questions go back to the historical conduct of Delta Chi at VCU. Readers will be disappointed to find that a definitive answer to Delta Chi’s reputation cannot be ascertained from the reviews, and that is because Delta Chi was excluded from participating. However, Dyad’s review did acknowledge this.
“Qualitative data gathered suggests that Delta Chi had a history of behavioral challenges and suggests that, while not an outlier, they were a group in the community perceived by other community members as having a problematic culture of hazing,” Dyad’s review states.
Nontheless, Dyad’s review of VCU Greek life includes 12 key findings, all of which were addressed by VCU in its own internal review. For the most part, the findings relate to issues of accountability, organization and training. Dyad’s 12 findings are as follows:
- VCU Not an Outlier, But Concerns About Hazing on Campus Abound
- Lack of Cohesive, Coherent Philosophy/Policy/Procedures Regarding Student Organization Misconduct
- History of “Total Resets” in FSL with Inconsistent Transitions Between FSL Administrations
- FSL Staff Feel Disempowered
- Poor Communication between FSL, Students, Advisors
- “A Lot of Paperwork” and Lack of Education/Training/Programming from FSL
- Governing Councils Lack Clarity of Purpose, Connection
- Lack of Consistent Policy Enforcement in Neighborhoods with Fraternity Houses
- Disjointed Social Event Policies/Registration Process
- For Most Fraternity/Sorority Chapters, Experience Revolves Primarily Around Social Aspects of Membership
- Perception that Fraternity/Sorority Community Lacks Diversity, Concerns About Racism
- MGC/NPHC Feel Lack of Support, Visibility on Campus
Because some of the findings reflect a similarly-natured problem, Dyad compounded some of its recommendations together with their appropriate findings. For ease of reading, the author has compiled Dyad’s 12 findings and subsequent recommendations, as well as some of VCU’s own unique findings and responses to Dyad’s recommendations, into five categories.
Finding #1: There is plenty of hazing going on at VCU, albeit not at a rate that is statistically significant. The main problem is that the judiciary process for accusations of hazing is completely dysfunctional.
As time has gone on, more and more research has found alcohol to be a driving force behind many of the commonplace issues unique to student organizations. Inarguably, the most routine concern found within Dyad’s review has to do with alcohol and its near-inherent relationship with hazing traditions and party culture at VCU.
“Students expressed that most fraternities and some sororities have their own issues related to hazing, and a group that was fully free of any hazing would actually be the outlier on VCU’s campus,” Dyad’s review states.
One of the major factors which Dyad found contributes to the problem of hazing at VCU is that there is little in the way of regulation for hazing, as it is “only listed as a prohibited behavior in the campus student code of conduct.” Moreover, a formal definition for hazing has not existed at VCU prior to Dyad’s review. However, this is not a problem unique to Greek life — it is a shortcoming that plagues all student organizations at VCU.
“There is no comprehensive policy that broadly defines hazing or outlines the University’s procedures regarding the investigation and adjudication of hazing with registered student organizations (RSO’s) and/or university-affiliated groups (UAG’s), including varsity athletic teams,” Dyad’s review states.
But what is arguably the most perplexing finding in Dyad’s review is that there is widespread confusion at VCU over how the judiciary process for accusations of hazing should be handled.
It is a problem on multiple fronts; VCU administration doesn’t claim to know what to do, the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life (FSL) doesn’t claim to know what to do, and the students don’t claim to know what to do. Overall, the nature of the process goes beyond how Dyad describes it as “contradictory” — it doesn’t even exist, it would seem.
“Multiple contradictory policies make reference to student organization conduct (the Student Code of Conduct and the Student Organization Conduct Procedures Manual, in particular), and there is a wide range of opinions on campus regarding who owns, manages and oversees this process,” Dyad’s review states.
The main problem here is one of chain o’command. Nobody involved in the process seems to know when or how to begin an investigation, nor where it should begin, nor for what reasons.
Allow Dyad to explain:
“In general, the conduct process for fraternities and sororities begins with the FSL office, as they are part of the University Commons and Student Activities (UCSA) as outlined in the Student Organization Conduct Procedures Manual (SOCPM). However, the policies are unclear on what protocol should be followed if, for example, the report comes into the Office of Student Conduct instead of USCA. According to the staff in the Office of Student Conduct, the general approach has been that cases begin with a preliminary inquiry in FSL, and then FSL will ‘organize a handoff’ to the student conduct office in those cases that they feel need to be investigated ‘at a higher level.’ There are no clear protocols on what types or levels of offenses should be investigated by the FSL unit, or when or under what circumstances a case should be ‘handed off’ to the Office of Student Conduct. But, according to multiple staff members in both FSL and Student Conduct, there is no clarity regarding who will investigate any particular case or why.” (Dyad, pg.6)
All in all, the issue of hazing at VCU seems to be one that is greater than the sum of its parts. Typically, systemic problems require systemic solutions, and Dyad’s review believes that it is “generally considered a best practice that colleges and universities be either ‘all in’ or ‘all out’ in terms of their relationship with fraternities and sororities.”
“In other words, it is preferable that a campus be either fully invested in their relationship with fraternities or sororities, or to completely sever their relationship with fraternities and sororities,” Dyad’s review states.
The subsequent recommendations Dyad provided for findings related to hazing are fairly boilerplate. They include:
- Updating and expanding VCU’s policy for hazing that would include a comprehensive definition for hazing, as well as a process for reporting instances of hazing. Dyad’s report includes a policy model for hazing attached as Appendix 2.
- Appointing a “Campus Hazing Prevention Coordinator” to oversee a dedicated committee tasked with addressing allegations of hazing, as well as conduct regular audits of hazing behavior on campus.
- Development and implementation of a “Campus-Wide Hazing Prevention Plan” that would target “at-risk student groups” and increase interoperability across student organizations, campus stakeholders and VCU administration.
- Working with the fraternity community to reimagine Big Brother Programs with the goal of deemphasizing the involvement of alcohol and establishing concrete objectives for the programs.
Dyad gave two seperate recommendations for findings related to the misconduct process:
- Development and implementation of a separate Organizational Misconduct Policy. Dyad did not specify how this should be treated, however, their report does include a model policy structure attached as Appendix 3.
- Investing more resources into hazing investigation training, most notably, the creation of a hazing investigation team that should consist of a “cross-disciplinary group representing a diverse collection of University faculty and staff,” as well as campus police.
White says she believes that creating a hazing coordinator’s position is especially important because it can potentially help to create an “anti-hazing action plan” that would utilize the findings from Dyad’s review.
“They can’t just talk about doing it, they have to be held accountable for executing a research based comprehensive hazing framework that will support prevention policy, procedures, and program to ensure the safety of all students,” White stated. “The hazing coordinator can oversee the fraternities and sororities with frequent check-ins to make sure all rules, regulations, and expectations are followed.”
One of Dyad’s recommendations that White and her family does not support however is the reimagining of Big Brother programs. Instead they would prefer to see the process be abolished.
White says this is because research has shown that “many of the deaths and incidents due to hazing occurred during the big brother reveal night.”
Since 2016, at least four students, including Oakes, Andrew Coffey of Florida State University, Ryan Abele of University of Nevada Reno, and Sam Martinez of Washington State University, have died at a big brother reveal event.
“All relied on their big brothers to be a mentor, surrogate family, and look out for their wellbeing, but their big brothers failed their first night fulfilling the role so why have them?” White stated.
Finding #2: FSL is a complete administrative mess; faculty express dissatisfaction with their resources and training. Students broadly report frustration towards their relationship with FSL, however, students also report frustration with having to do the mandatory work that is required of them.
This set of findings clearly lays out the vastness of inadequacies within VCU administration — a factor that inarguably plays into the other cultural issues within VCU Greek life as well.
The first and likely most significant factor in FSL’s inability to lead students is a recurring problem of turnover. According to Dyad’s review, FSL has seen two “total resets” in the past five years “during which the entire FSL staff turned over within a six-month period.”
Dyad’s review states that, in comparison to other universities, “VCU is not alone in having a high turnover rate in its FSL Office,” however, “VCU is unique in that this turnover has come in waves, with many staff members departing within months of one another.”
Several FSL employees expressed in Dyad’s review that turnover has stifled the office’s ability to follow through on projects. In addition to this, Dyad’s review found that FSL employees routinely express a feeling of disempowerment brought on from shortcomings in the onboarding and training process for new FSL employees.
“These frustrations included a lack of information about existing programs/structures, a lack of training, having to from their own network with limited support, and a feeling of ‘always starting from scratch,’” Dyad’s review states. “Staff explained that they are often placed into a position to make critical decisions on behalf of the University but have not been provided training, guidelines, or expectations surrounding that decision-making process.”
The effects of this turnover have also trickled down to the student level. According to Dyad’s review, chapter leaders and advisors claim to receive inadequate resources from VCU, and that “once successful or popular educational programs or initiatives are no longer offered.” As a result, “chapter leaders do not see value in their relationship with FSL.”
“This feeling was best expressed by a chapter president who shared ‘I’m always filling out lots of documents, but they don’t do anything to make our lives easier,’” Dyad’s review states. “Students and advisors feel the expectations surrounding required paperwork are not clear and change too frequently.”
VCU’s internal report mandates that FSL improve its record keeping to create a “more effective process for FSL to prepare, maintain, and retrieve documentation of its activities, decisions, and responsibilities.” This was not directly mentioned in Dyad’s review.
White says she believes consistency and longevity in FSL “is crucial in implementing an effective and efficient team,” and that FSL “should always be looking for opportunities to enhance their practices for the safety of all students.”
Given that FSL’s mismanagement feeds into most of the problems with Greek life, VCU’s response is quite dense — lots of expectable restructuring and repositioning. VCU’s response is arguably the most significant set of changes to come of the reviews in terms of its efficacy because it is situationally-based and yet to be proven.
VCU has decided to take Dyad up on its recommendation to conduct a national search for a Director of FSL that would be considered a “Greek Life Expert”. Prior to the review, the job of FSL Director was done by the Associate Director for Civic Engagement and Fraternity & Sorority Life — in other words, one person was doing two jobs.
According to VCU’s internal report, a position for a new FSL director was created in late May and “should allow the division to attract and retain a fraternity and sorority life professional with greater experience and expertise.”
In addition to the responsibilities of the position that were listed in VCU’s internal report, the new Director of FSL will also be responsible for a lot of the changes yet to occur.
For example, VCU stated that the school will evaluate FSL positions and compensations, and make changes to FSL staff responsibilities accordingly. These evaluations and subsequent changes will be carried out by either one of five workgroups that VCU established within FSL following the review, or the new FSL director, or a joint effort of the two.
White says there is one gleaming recommendation of her own which cannot be found in Dyad’s review: advisor training, the reason being that it has the potential to set a course for many of Dyad’s other recommendations.
All advisors are responsible for the boys in their fraternities. They act as a role model, mentor, leader, and father/mother figure to the boys or girls in the fraternity or sorority they are advising. They are responsible for building a communicative, collaborative, and cohesive organization within the fraternity and ultimately responsible for all those involved in the organization. They need to have adequate training to support the leadership development, ensure best practices during all fraternal events, and be present to supervise these events. The advisor should not be a VCU affiliate, alumni, or former brother or sister of that fraternity or sorority. In fact, recruit two advisors that share responsibility for the fraternity and have no previous connection with the university or fraternity thus bringing in a neutral personnel. (White, via email)
Finding #3: The current model used for fraternity/sorority housing plays a significant factor in the problems associated with Greek life. VCU exercises little-to-no oversight on the behavior of students living within and visiting Greek life residencies. This problem is compounded with a disjointed event registration process, which is seldom enforced, and requires students to register events with alcohol.
Many researchers have documented the ways in which housing has acted as possibly the single most important thing to have shaped the history of Greek life in America. So it should come as little of a surprise to learn that housing and the way it is enforced at VCU plays a significant factor in the problems associated with Greek life.
“One of the significant challenges associated with fraternity/sorority social culture at VCU is the prevalence of unofficial, unrecognized fraternity houses spread throughout the neighborhoods surrounding campus,” Dyad’s review states.
In essence, VCU has a system that allows the school to reject liability for any misconduct that happens within these houses, and this is because most Greek life residencies are not owned by the school. As Dyad’s report explains it, “generally, houses are rented by upperclassmen and ‘passed down’ within chapters from year to year.”
This is only possible because fraternities and sororities at VCU “exist as separately incorporated private legal entities,” because they are classified as “Affiliated Organizations,” according to VCU’s internal review. While they are required to register themselves with VCU, registration does not imply that VCU approves of the organization or its goals. The only thing registration does is allow fraternities and sosorities to have access to campus resources and facilities, as well as use “at VCU” in the organization’s name.
There are many obvious flaws associated with this system. According to Dyad’s review, there is “a lack of structured alumni house corporations, difficulties establishing positive relationships with landlords, and an inability to get students to update their local addresses from year to year.” All told, this stiffles VCU’s ability to maintain accountability for what happens within these residencies.
But another critical part of VCU’s ability to reject liability for misconduct is the fact that FSL requires fraternities and sororities to register events with alcohol — thus giving the school legal deniability in the case of misconduct. However, Dyad’s report finds that while students “have some level of awareness” that they are required to register events that have alcohol, “the FSL staff shares that very few events are registered.”
“The existing process to register social events is rarely utilized by organizations and students and staff alike are unclear on the purpose of registering events,” Dyad’s review states. “Even when events are registered, the University exercises little oversight in the locations where these social events take place.”
According to FSL’s Recruitment Guidelines, Procedures, and Intent Form, alcohol is not permitted at any recruitment event. However, Dyad’s review finds that this rule is frequently broken — as chiefly demonstrated by Oakes’ death.
“Students shared that some organizations strive to follow the guidelines set forth by their inter/national headquarters but other groups see events as ‘unofficial’ as they are not registered with the FSL office and therefore do not feel the need to follow their national policies for events with alcohol,” Dyad’s review states.
Dyad’s recommendations for this set of findings arguably remain the most controversial. One recommendation is a “strict prohibition on alcohol being present or served at any recruitment event, with clear and established outcomes for chapters who violate this policy.”
VCU stated in its internal review that the Division of Student Affairs issued guidance in early August that prohibits “alcohol at all activities, events, or gatherings of recognized student organizations with undergraduate student membership for the 2021–2022 academic year.”
White says she believes that alcohol-free events should be a “permanent enforcement” at VCU.
In addition to those recommendations, Dyad has also suggested that VCU Police expand its memorandum of understanding with Richmond Police, as well as increase VCUPD patrols in the area of “the identified campus fringe”. According to VCU’s internal review, the recommendation has been sent to VCUPD for further evaluation and consideration.
According to Dyad’s review, the current MOU between VCUPD and RPD “is narrowly tailored as a mutual aid agreement and information-sharing agreement and provides VCU Police with expanded jurisdiction to respond to issues in off-campus areas.”
“As such, it fails to fully capture the need for a proactive police presence in the neighborhoods where the majority of student social events are taking place,” Dyad’s review states.
This all comes hot off the heels of several controversial moves made by Richmond Police and City Council, most of which boil down to the hot button issue of predictive and proactive policing.
In January of 2019, the council voted 7–2 in favor of expanding VCUPD’s jurisdiction to include the neighborhoods of Carver and Jackson Ward — nearly doubling VCUPD’s scope of influence. Despite this, the expansion did not prevent the murder of student Cody Woodson, who was killed in Carver just weeks after Oakes’ death.
In February of this year, city council approved the renewal and expansion of a records-management agreement between VCUPD and RPD, which allows both institutions to bypass certain legal statutes, including FERPA, FOIA and HIPAA.
In August of this year, RPD announced a proposed plan to install license plate readers around the city, almost all of which were corralled to neighborhoods with higher rates of people of color living in them.
Critics of predictive policing say it is invasive and infringes on the rights of citizens, particularly non-whites and other marginalized groups. According to the Brennan Center for Justice, predictive analytics tools can “make it easier for police to claim that individuals meet the reasonable suspicion standard, ultimately justifying more stops.”
“Relying on historical crime data can replicate biased police practices and reinforce over-policing of communities of color, while manipulating crime numbers to meet quotas or produce ambitious crime reduction results can give rise to more policing in the neighborhoods in which those statistics are concentrated,” Tim Lau stated in a 2020 article for the Brennan Center.
Finding #4: There is a widely-held belief across VCU Greek life that students do not receive an experience that goes beyond the stereotypical aspects of Greek life. In particular, Greek life offers little more than an opportunity to attend parties with alcohol.
Popular culture has helped to do its part in solidifying the link between college party culture and Greek letter organizations. This makes it easy to forget that many fraternities and sororities across the country also offer community service projects and philanthropic exploits. However, it seems that cannot be said for VCU because students broadly report dissatisfaction with Greek life’s offer of experiences that go beyond social ones.
“Multiple stakeholders mentioned how the promotion of the fraternity and sorority experience lacks any depth or dynamic outreach to high-achieving students,” Dyad’s review states. “The experience is not being highlighted as one that is developmentally valuable or transformative, merely a social outlet.”
According to the quantitative portion of Dyad’s review, days binge drinking per week at VCU are significantly higher with sorority members than with fraternity members. However, results for Dyad’s Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) shows that fraternity members at VCU (7.31) score significantly lower than the national average (9.19). Meanwhile, AUDIT results for sororities at VCU (9.04) are significantly higher than the national average (6.70).
While most events are not registered with FSL, Dyad’s review found that many students believe that alcohol has increasingly become a central part of the recruitment process. This sentiment is echoed by parents of students as well.
“The reviewers heard from parents who are themselves passionate alumni of fraternities/sororities whose students did not join organizations at VCU because the organizations ‘don’t provide anything other than parties, and my kid gets a way better experience elsewhere on campus,’” Dyad’s review states.
Dyad’s review also finds that students lament “the percentage of ‘always joiners’ going through the recruitment process — young men who are primarily interested in the social aspects of fraternity membership.”
“A fraternity rush chair shared ‘everyone drinks…the kids going through recruitment want to drink and chapters want to show them a good time,’” Dyad’s review states. “A student shared his perception that the best way to join a fraternity was to ‘go to a few parties…hang out…get to know the guys.’”
In order to fix this, Dyad provided a number of recommendations for VCU, one of which is to extend the recruitment process for prospective fraternity and sorority members to “allow fraternities to seek out and recruit those students who may not otherwise be interested in joining a stereotypical fraternity experience.”
However, White says she and her family “would prefer to see the elimination” of the recruitment process because of how easily it lends itself to misconduct, particularly hazing.
“These traditions are outdated, destructive, and make a tremendous impact on the safety and health of students,” White stated. “What good comes from the recruitment process? They select people based on judging them by what is on the surface not what’s in their heart.”
Dyad also recommended that VCU should encourage the establishment of chapters for national Greek letter organizations with substance-free housing programs, including Delta Upsilon, Beta Theta Pi and Phi Delta Theta. Dyad did not recommend that VCU adopt a substance-free housing program for all its active chapters.
However, some researchers have found that substance-free housing policies solve little in the way of reducing rates of binge drinking for college students. A 2006 study for the Journal of Primary Prevention examined one such policy belonging to a national fraternity. The results of the study found that alcohol use in chapters with substance-free fraternity houses “did not vary over time as a function of residing in fraternity housing.”
“In other words, members living in and out of fraternity housing had equivalently high levels of alcohol use at baseline and after the policy was implemented,” the study states.
The study also suggests that such a policy only seems to encourage students into “shifting” the locations of where they drink. Consequently, this creates a heightened risk for student DUIs — a form of tragedy that VCU and its Greek life community is not a stranger to.
“If the theory failure interpretation is correct, reducing risky drinking practices may require thoughtfully combining broader restrictions on alcohol use — beyond the confines of fraternity housing — and the use of individually-focused prevention approaches (many of which have been shown to reduce risk among fraternity members) in ways that minimize conflicts between prohibitory messages and risk reduction messages,” the study states.
It is possible that substance-free housing programs would result in some sort of a positive effect on binge drinking within Greek life at VCU. It is also possible that because VCU is an urban campus and is relatively pedestrian-friendly, increased student DUIs may not be a consequence of substance-free housing. But in consideration of Dyad’s findings for how Greek life housing works at VCU, skepticism is not outlandish.
Finding #5: There are plenty of concerns over racism in VCU Greek life. This is best demonstrated by many accusations of discriminatory distributions of resources from FSL towards the National Pan-Hellenic Council (NPHC) and Multicultural Greek Council (MGC).
Intercollegiate fraternities and sororities have a long and sorted history with racism in America — in fact, some would argue that college fraternities were critical to the establishment of the first KKK. However, it is an extremely complicated and nuanced topic of debate that is mired in issues of interclass conflicts and socio-political perspective.
In comparison to many other colleges across America, VCU certainly boasts a far more diverse Greek life community. However, diversity is not the same as equality, and an acute “perception” of inequality is felt both outside and within the VCU Greek life community.
“Students in the MGC council reported feeling that their council is not seen as equal in the eyes of other students and administrators and they struggle to find ways to promote themselves and the experience offered within MGC,” Dyad’s review states.
At VCU, members of the NPHC (the overseeing body of historically-Black Greek letter organizations) report feeling misunderstood and ignored. This feeling was reverberated by members of the Multicultural Greek Council (MCG), which oversees 10 national fraternities and sororities that have historically emphasized diversity.
According to Dyad’s report, members of MGC and NPHC chapters also feel they are “under-supported” at VCU and do not receive equal resources from FSL as their traditionally-white counterparts in the National Panhellenic Council (NPC) and Interfraternity Council (IFC).
“Students and advisors in both MGC and NPHC also noted their perceptions of a disparity in resources provided to historically white fraternities and sororities and NPHC and MGC fraternities and sororities,” Dyad’s review states. “This disparity was noted not only as financial in nature but also in terms of the amount of FSL staff time spent working with and advising these councils in comparison to IFC and Panhellenic.”
The Greek life community at VCU also seems to have a noticeable problem with what can be reasonably interpreted as white fragility — a deeply-rooted feeling of insecurity and sensitivity held by white people that results in aversion to harsh truths about racism.
“One student leader reported that ‘racism in the community is swept under the rug…nobody wants to talk about it,’” Dyad’s review states.
For example, some students reported that “IFC and CPC chapters tend to tokenize members of marginalized identities,” according to Dyad’s report. “One student shared that IFC and CPC chapters ‘believe that having five members of color out of 60 makes them diverse’ and that members of color are tokenized when it benefits the chapter.”
Dyad’s review also briefly mentioned that some students shared their concern for “members of the IFC and CPC community have made openly racist remarks on social media and have not been held accountable by their organizations or the University.”
No recommendations were provided for this finding. This comes in the shadow of the fact that an active member of Delta Chi at the time of Oakes’ death has made numerous antisemitic and transphobic remarks on social media sites such as Parler and Gab. The individual in question also participated in the January 6th insurrection, and is a reporter for the National File — a right-wing disinformation site who’s editor-in-chief is Tom Pappert.
At its core, the most pervasive problem with racism in Greek life is a false or misguided perception from some members of chapters that there isn’t a problem with racism in Greek life — a “lack of visibility”, according to Dyad.
Dyad’s recommendation for this finding is for VCU to “establish a committee composed of students, faculty, staff and alumni and task that committee with the development of a comprehensive DEI plan for FSL.”
VCU’s internal report states that Dyad’s recommendation will be futher explored “in Fall 2022 by FSL staff in concert with the Offices of Multicultural Student Affairs and Institutional Equity, Effectiveness, and Success. Recommendations will be provided to the Associate Vice Provost.”
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programs are a common method companies use to promote diversity in the workplace. Typically, these programs consist of things such as bias-recognition training and contextualized education on the history of oppressed peoples. According to an article from McKinsey and Company, U.S. companies collectively spend more than $8 billion a year on DEI programs.
However, some experts argue that most DEI programs solve next to nothing, and in some cases exacerbate problems with racism in workspaces. According to an article from the Guardian, “research shows that companies using anti-bias training rarely see improvements in the diversity of their workforce afterward and that even when training has a positive effect, it is usually quickly forgotten. Sometimes, it can have even the opposite of the intended effect.”
While an argument could be made that Greek letter organizations do not function like most businesses and therefor might produce different results from DEI programs as businesses, it stands to reason that simple bias training would prove inadequate at solving VCU Greek life’s racism problem.
According to the 2021 Guardian article, Alexandra Kalev, a professor of social sciences at Princeton, says “a lot of our research shows training makes the dominant group — usually white men — feel threatened and fearful of being excluded. They fight back instead of internalizing [the training].”
