News Scrapbook 1986

isters a big family

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But are they pals or slaves to fraternity b brothers? By Sarah Pattee Tribune Staff K r,/er L I D\ MCCR.\CKI:N stud1e at Grossmont College in El Caion But when classes end bd she's looking for fun, she doe n t tick around campus. lnstead, she heads 30 miles north for the Umvers1ty of Cal1forni at San Diego. There he knows she has 65 wo n she can call friends. She also ha 65 male buddies one of th~ i:i her special friend, her "big brother," chosen for her by tie fraternity both of them belong to. 'I need a S-OC1al outlet to Jet off earn. Here, it's really nice because the guys at the fraternity ar 't scammers, always after you,' she said. McCracken's social outlet shar by hundreds of local col· lege women is her "little sister" up. As a little sister, she supports a fraternity, m this case Ta Kappa Epsllon, with her money (dues are $25 a emester) and r decorating, fund-raising and social skills. In an era of womens rights and hanging roles, the little isters seem an anachroni m They a uxiliaries with almost no power. The men m the fraternities ch the members, help run the meeting and can choose at any ti to change or d1Sband the group. Som little sister groups pay d and are required to go through the selccllon process or ·rush' every semester no matter ho\li long they have been members. The group are a controversial 1SSue for fraternities and soror- 1ti , which are enjoying their biggest m m membership rn 20 years. During the 1970s the traditionally conservative Greek ystem uffered dra tic drops in membe hip; and there were no lines of little s1 ters pounding on !rater y house doors. Times have changed. ow fraternity r en can pick and choose from dozens of young women, eager o support the all-male group . Durmg the recent little-si ter rush week at San Diego tale Umvers1ty, scores of women showed up at Pi Kappa Alpha The fraternity was expelled by the university earlier this year after a former student claimed she was sexually assaulted by three men at a fraternity p2rt) The sorority for which she was a freshman pledge was plac on probation. . "It depend on how the fraternity treats the program, but there 1 pote~t1al for a lot of abuse,' said Randy Woodard, ' CSD's fraternity adviser. College offic1als and women's groups er 1c1ze the groups as pandermg to male egos within a rigid, pa riarcbial system. Oth- ers fear that young women face pressure from their fraternity ~brothers" to perform tasks - rangmg from housecleaning to dating to sex." ot surprismgl}, the little sister groups find little favor with the 'at,onal Panhellenic Conference the umbrella group com- posed of 26 mem~r rarities. The group 1s based in Ind1anapo- h · it:; pres1den ,Mney Allen hvcs m hreveport La. "I'm 65 years old and I'm no women's libber, but I don't thmk

being a little sister does anything at esteem of women," Allen said in a telepr ne mte view. A local aMiser to SOSU's soronties agrees. "The men assume women want to meet men; the potentials there are not flattering to the Greek image It's not growth- producing for the women mvolved,'' said Kim Padulo. In fact. many school officials fear such group are potentially dangerous to those women involved. Earlier this year a national report on campi: gang rapes f nd that man} occur m fraterm- P/ease see LITTLE SISTERS, -4 to improve tre self•

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San 01 go, CA (San Diego Co.) San Diego Union (Cir. D. 217,089) (Cir. S. 341,840) OV9

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Wayne Lockwood

''But those guys are going to be important to us down the road. "I was playing this game two ways - trying to win and trying to check people out at the same time. You're going to kick yourself in the butt either way in a game like this. "You're either going to say, 'What a dummy you are. You had a chance to look at yourself in a game situation, and you didn't do it.' Or, 'What a dummy you are. You put all those guys in and lost the game."' Egan did the proper thing. It is, after all, nearly three weeks until USO officially opens its season against Utah. To come within three points of a big, experienced, talented team at this point in the preseason would seem to indicate USD may be in for an interesting year. AIA already knows what it's in for. But, for a change, life on the road doesn't look much worse than life at home.

real competitive," Nichols said. "Hank (Coach Hank Egan) does a nice job with them." So it would seem. AIA, a team that normally shoots the lights out, had 10 field goals in the first half. "I think we only had 20 shots or something (24) in the first half," Nichols said. ·'They know how to play defense. USD's offense wasn't so bad, either. "That 32 (Mark Manor) is a real nice player," said Nichols of a senior outside shooter who rang up 22 points. "No. 10 (Paul Leonard) was really hot in the first half. With the big kid (Thompson) in the middle, who's tough, they have nice balance. "If there's one thing they need to be working on, it's developing their bench. I don't think I need to tell Hank that." Indeed. Egan concentrated on his bench to the point that it probably cost him the game - which was, after all, an exhibition played for

challenging as much of what's scheduled to follow. College basketba 11 in San Diego is looking up, it seems. No sooner had AIA succeeded in taking two of three from the Soviets - a team with three ]';BA-drafted players - than it returned to San Olego and lost to Point Loma Nazarene. 79-72. This was followed by a skin-of- the-teeth 82-79 escape from the Univ~si!) at Sao ~go, whose best player, 7-footer Scott Thompson missed more than half the game with foul problems. Whoa, whatever happened to laid- back San Diego, where college basketball ranked omewhere behind sailboarding on the scale of local athletic accomplishments? AIA might as well be on the road playing Memphis U1te, Clem. on. Alabama, Marquette, Florida, Tulsa un,P and Maryland - which it soon will be. What's gomg on here? "These team· are playing good

much t1m on 1t as Charles Kuralt. Nichols is coach of the San Dlego- ba ·ed thlete rn Action basketball team, a nomadic band to whom the horn -court advantage 1 a rumor. AIA 111 play upward of 40 ames a amst the world' ·mo l ac omphshed mateur teams this a on, and th clo ·c t any of them ,ill t"om to bein decided on a 'home' court wa. probably AJA s 92-90 victory over the Soviet national team a week ago at the Sport rena In every other game, Nichols' player will be the fir t introduced. To pollte pplau~e During the coming months, AIA will pl11y m 13 talc and five foreign countnes Mexico, Canada, Franc , Spam and England It is <•h(•duled to m<•et al least a half- dozen c-oll gc team ranked m varwu pre ca on top 2~. mcludmg d fending CAA champion Lou1 ville It' u gnnd, no qu t10n. But 11

purpose we do. "And you have to give them credit. They played very, very well for their team. They did a nice job." If the Crusaders caught AIA napping, USO did not. The Toreros are coming off a 19-9 season, the best in school history, and have been rated a preseason favorite in the competitive West Coast Athletic Conference. As if lo remind AIA of this fact, USO ran off to a quick 10-1 advantage. held a 39-34 halftime lead and was still in front when Thompson and 6-8 Nils Madden - two-thirds of a veteran front line - fouled out. Even thus handicapped, USO had two three-point shots to tie the game

basketball." ]';ichols said. That's what's going on. To be sure. there were extenuating circumstances against Point Loma azarene. the scenic school where Ben Foster yearly produces unappreciated coaching miracles. AIA played Foster's team the day after concluding its grueling and emotional series with the Soviets. "You don't like to look at circumstances. but ... ," said • ichols, who employed his bench the entire first half. "I reallv would rather we didn·t play that game. Bu't we run our camps there. We want to cooperate with them in every way we can. They serve the same (religious)