Studies Show Fraternity and Sorority Members Have Better Grades

A recent study conducted by Washington State University supports an 11-year-old study by the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, both concluding that members of fraternities and sororities have better grades.

Researchers at WSU followed the college careers of nearly 6,000 freshmen who enrolled in 2002 and 2003. Roughly one-third of them failed to graduate in a timely fashion. However, the WSU study showed that students involved in Greek life were nearly three times as likely to graduate in a timely fashion as students who were not involved in Greek life, all else being equal.

This new information supports a 1999 study by UNC-CH that examined students who joined fraternities and sororities in fall 1998. It found that those who joined a Greek organization had higher average grade point averages than students who did not join a Greek organization. The average GPA of Greek students in this study was 3.1 on a scale of 4.0, compared to 2.9 for non-Greek students.