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“I left because I’m not participating in a system like that,” said former chapter president Kristen Reeves. “I refuse to take part in it, and by staying, for me, it would be allowing it to happen.”
When the Alpha Omicron Pi sorority at Tufts University decided that they wanted to offer a spot to a trans pledge, the national organization tried to stop them from extending a bid. Now, over half of the chapter's members--including the president--have left.
The trans student has since been admitted, but those members who walked away from the organization say that it's too late.
According to the former president, Kristen Reeves, it was the sorority's Title IX (a federal law that restricts single-sex educational organizations) exemption that the national governing group was trying to protect.
"They were like, 'well, we're not saying you never could, we're just saying right now you can't.' I was really mad about this, as was the rest of the chapter, so we unanimously decided to give her a bid anyway."
AOII's national organization eventually reached the decision that anyone who identified as female was allowed to join, but by that point, 46 of the sororities' members (including Reeves) had decided that their values no longer lined up with their parent organizations'.
"I left because I'm not participating in a system like that," said Reeves. "I refuse to take part in it, and by staying, for me, it would be allowing it to happen."
