Beta Is Back With Brotherhood And a 92 Inch Flat-Screen TV!
Five years ago, Beta Theta Pi was shut down on charges of drug abuse and bad behavior. Now, this same frat boasts a new set of member standards and, at 92 inches, the biggest flat screen television of any frat in the nation.
After its disbanding in 2000, the future of Beta’s chapter at Columbia, Alpha Alpha, was in question. But members of CC ’06 came together in 2002 to recreate a Beta with new standards for membership and more than a million dollars for improvements to their brownstone on 114th St.
The students who took on the challenge of rebuilding Beta nearly from scratch based their new frat on a grounding principle of brotherhood. Without older brothers to guide them, new Beta brothers have created their own rules and traditions. They initially required that all brothers maintain a minimum grade point average of 2.75 and stipulated that the house be a dry one.
“In short, it’s a shifting of focus from drinking to more intellectual endeavors,” said David Caldwell, CC ’06, vice president of Beta. He added that the fraternity is currently building a library in its house that will house sets of Literature Humanities books for common use.
Beta, formerly a wrestling frat, is now “a different kind of fraternity experience,” said Wayne Ting, CC ’06, a new brother. “It was a very different Beta that was disbanded.”
Current Betas feel they have exceeded expectations originally set out for them. This year, according to Ting, Beta brothers have the highest GPA in the fraternity system, and they now require that every pledge do community service.
Columbia Spectator Online - Beta Is Back With Brotherhood And a 92 Inch Flat-Screen TV!
