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Professional fraternities and sororities

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Professional fraternities, in the North American fraternity system, are organizations whose primary purpose is to promote the interests of a particular profession and whose membership is restricted to students and faculty members in that particular field of professional education or study. This may be contrasted with service fraternities and sororities, whose primary purpose is community service, and general or social fraternities and sororities, whose primary purposes are generally aimed towards some other aspect, such as the development of character, friendship, leadership, or literary ability.

Professional fraternities are often confused with honor societies because of their focus on a specific discipline. Professional fraternities are actually significantly different from honor societies in that honor societies are associations designed to provide recognition of the past achievement of those who are invited to membership. Honor society membership, in most cases, requires no period of pledging, and new candidates may be immediately inducted into membership after meeting predetermined academic criteria and paying a one-time membership fee. Because of their purpose of recognition, most honor societies will have much higher academic achievement requirements for membership. A few groups, such as Phi Sigma Pi, are considered to be both a fraternity and an honors organization. These honor fraternities require higher GPAs, like an honor society, but operate as a brotherhood, like a fraternity.

Professional fraternities, on the other hand, work to build brotherhood among members and cultivate the strengths of members in order to promote their profession and to provide assistance to one another in their mutual areas of professional study. Membership in a professional fraternity may be the result of a pledge process, much like a social fraternity, and members are expected to remain loyal and active in the organization for life. Within their professional field of study, their membership is exclusive; however, they may initiate members who belong to other types of fraternities.


History

The first professional fraternity was founded at Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky in 1819: the Kappa Lambda Society of Aesculapius, established for the purpose of bringing together students of the medical profession. The fraternity lasted until about 1858.

Of the professional fraternities still in existence, the oldest is Phi Delta Phi law fraternity, founded at the University of Michigan in 1869.

Title IX Applied to Professional Fraternities

Professional fraternities, in the United States fraternity system, are required to be co-educational by federal law under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (commonly referred to as "Title IX,"). This federal law prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any college or university receiving federal financial assistance.[1] However, the membership practices of social fraternities and sororities are exempt from Title IX in section (A)(6)(a). The Department of Education (DOE) regulations adopted pursuant to Title IX also allow such an exception for "the membership practices of social fraternities and sororities." (34 C.F.R. Sec. 106.14(a)). [2]

Professional fraternities, like service fraternities and honor societies, must be open to members of both genders since they do not have an exemption from Title IX similar to the one given for social fraternities and sororities. Because the primary goal of professional fraternities is to prepare students to be leaders in specific professions, and to advance the interests of those professions, under Title IX, it would be considered discrimination to limit such opportunities to one sex, and federal funding could be withheld from any institution that discriminates on the basis of sex.

A few social fraternities and sororities select their members from students enrolled in particular majors or areas of study, including Phi Mu Alpha, Phi Sigma Rho, Sigma Alpha Iota, and Triangle. Although these social organizations select members from students in a particular field of study, like a profesional fraternity, they are single sex and are allowed to be so because their primary purposes are toward the development of character, friendship, leadership, or literary ability, like other social fraternities and sororities. Examples of groups that have been been officially granted exemption from Title IX by the DOE to remain single sex because of their social focus and, therefore, are designated as a social, rather than professional, fraternal organizations include Sigma Alpha Iota in 1981 [3] and Phi Mu Alpha in 1983 [4].

Umbrella Organizations

Most major professional fraternities are members of the Professional Fraternity Association. This group resulted in 1978 from a merger of the Professional Interfraternity Conference (PIC) (for men's groups) and the Professional Panhellenic Association (PPA) (for women's groups).

List of professional fraternities

Agriculture

Architecture

Business

Engineering

Law

Medicine

Military, Government, & Foreign Service

Music

Service

Gamma Sigma Sigma - Community Service

Other

References

  1. ^ Title IX, United States Department of Justice
  2. ^ "[1] Code of Federal Regulations, PART 106: NONDISCRIMINATION ON THE BASIS OF SEX IN EDUCATION PROGRAMS OR ACTIVITIES RECEIVING FEDERAL FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE
  3. ^ "Sigma Alpha Iota" (PDF). Sigma Alpha Iota. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)
  4. ^ "Phi Mu Alpha". Phi Mu Alpha. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)
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