Broken bonds: DePauw University breaks ties with Delta Zeta.

WHAT BEGAN AS AN EXERCISE IN SORORITY REORGANIZATION evolved into an incident with national ramifications and ended with the demise of a nearly 100-year relationship between a university and a sorority.

Robert Bottoms, president of DePauw University (Ind.), announced in early March that the university would no longer be home to Delta Zeta, which had established at DePauw one of its first chapters, in 1909. The move came after DZ's national leadership abruptly kicked out nearly two dozen members after questioning their "commitment to recruitment."

The members--as well as many other people within the university community--believed the decisions were based on looks and social status. National leaders of the sorority recognized that the DePauw chapter was Lagging and needed to rebuild. What threw up red flags was how they did it (evicted members received letters just before final exams, notifying them of their alumnae status).

"It has become clear that the values of DePauw University and those of the Delta Zeta National Sorority are incompatible," Bottoms wrote in a March 11 letter to alumni.

The campus maelstrom drew national attention when The New York Times covered the slimming down of the DePauw chapter. Within hours of the Times story hitting newsstands, calls were pouring in to DePauw administration offices, says Director of Media Relations Ken Owen. Some of the women who had been kicked out of the sorority then appeared on Good Morning America.

DePauw had already launched a "Greek Fact-Finding Commission" last year to draft recommendations on oversight of the Greek system, and the Delta Zeta incident intensified the spotlight. This month the university's board of trustees is considering recommendations that the university: develop new housing standards for Greek residences; enlist assistance in reducing alcohol abuse; review how new member recruitment and education are conducted; and add two staff positions in the Campus Life office. Fraternities and sororities will no longer be able to break housing agreements mid-year.

DePauw is one of the most Greek campuses in the country; more than 70 percent of its 2,326 students belong to a fraternity or sorority. Bottoms believes the Delta Zeta situation provides an opportunity to grapple with challenges inherent to the Greek system. "Based on our experience and learning out of this situation, we may seek to take a much more active role in support as well as rules and regulations," he says. "They are our students, after all, and our first loyalty is to them, not to their national organizations."

Alexandra Robbins, author of Pledged." The Secret Life of Sororities, expands on that notion. "I think DePauw's response was exactly what it should have done," she says.

"I think that too often sororities act like the universities are part of them, rather than the other way around. DePauw absolutely did the right thing in protecting its students and hopefully setting a standard and a model for other universities across the country," Robbins adds.