SigEp breaks ground (Photo by Michelle Wigianto,
The Daily Campus)
The youngest and fastest growing fraternity on campus is about to get a new addition. The Texas Upsilon chapter of Sigma Phi Epsilon will be expanding and renovating its house for $1.3 million in a partnership between the SMU administration and the national SigEp organization.
As it stands, the house can only fit nine of the 70 members; with the renovations it will be able to accommodate 22 members.
The $1.3 million will be a loan from the university, which will be paid back in room rent over the next 30 years. The national chapter will be contributing $150,000 to the project.
Junior Garrett Farwell, vice president of standards for the fraternity, said the reason SMU decided to pay for it was that the university wanted to maintain most of the ownership of the house.
“Personally I don’t think it’s a bad thing,” he said. “It will be a ‘dry’ facility, and the school wants to be able to control that.”
Vice President of Student Affairs Jim Caswell said the facility had been under-housed and the university wanted to help make it more cost effective, as well as promote the residential learning community.
“We wanted to take the focus of fraternity house life away from it being a bar or a dorm,” he said. “We see this as a beacon for positive fraternity life which will have a positive affect on the students’ life.”
National Housing Corporation Trustee Jay Hurt made the trek from Houston for Saturday’s groundbreaking ceremony at the SigEp house. He explained that, as a residential learning community, there will be faculty members from the university who will hold office hours in the new house.
Caswell estimates that the house will be completed in the fall of 2005, though the projected date is the end of the upcoming spring semester.
The process for the project getting started took 15 months, and, according to Farwell, was supposed to happen sooner. Due to University Park regulations, however, the start date kept being postponed.
Despite the obstacles thrown their way, many within the fraternity are excited about what the new house will bring, such as senior Richard Schklair.
“A lot of the times fraternities are judged by the size of their house,” he said. “It shouldn’t be that way but it is and this will really help SigEp’s recruitment.”
