One of the benefits of coming to college is being in a community of adults. A place where everyone treats everyone else like an equal, and for the most part the cliques and “cool kids” of high school disappear. Yet, with the start of another pledging year some of the disturbing parts of high school social hierarchy are making a debut on ACU’s campus. On Wednesday, Sept. 28 in chapel the pledges of one women’s social club went from sitting together to actually reserving a section of chapel. Complete with a printed sign these pledges were literally saying, “No, you may not sit here” in a way that was oddly reminiscent of the high school lunchroom.

While it was one thing for clubs to require pledges to sit together during chapel, creating a visual distraction in itself, it is quite another for them to block off seats to ensure non-pledges don’t sit in a designated area. Especially considering the purpose of chapel is to unite as an ACU community, this kind of behavior creates division and increases the tension some students feel towards the exclusive and exclusionary nature of ACU social clubs.

As a community of educated adults, I think it’s time we all started acting like one and leave the activities of pledging for more appropriate venues.

Jared Perkins,
Senior Political Science Major