Macye Farrar, News Editor
What are the first words that jump to mind when thinking about fraternity bathrooms? Abhorrent? Revolting? Loathsome? For the party-goers at Sewanee, it can mean all of these descriptions and more. Having a safe and clean place to use the bathroom is important to have when having a fun night on the Domain.
So The Sewanee Purple has created an infallible ranking of all the Sewanee fraternity bathrooms for fellow Sewanee students to use when they are on the hunt for a clean and usable bathroom.
The bathrooms were chosen based on where I was directed by pledges or by other party-goers. I only went to the bathrooms once over the course of a randomly selected night, but all bathrooms were ranked during or after a party.
The criteria for the rankings are as follows: cleanliness, accessibility, privacy, and materials (toilet, soap, cleaning supplies, etc). The scale on which each category is ranked is from one to five. The score for each category will be added up and averaged out to get the score for each frat. The frat with the highest score will be the best bathroom, while the lowest score will be the worst.
Without further ado, here are the official rankings for the Sewanee fraternity bathrooms.
Sewanee students were asked about their own thoughts on the fraternity bathrooms around campus. Hallie Revell (C ’28) has attended many Sewanee parties but pointed out one particular fraternity bathroom that was notorious for its poor quality. She said, “SNU’s [Sigma Nu] bathrooms should be considered a circle of Hell.”
Sigma Nu has tied with Sigma Alpha Epsilon for the second to worst fraternity bathroom experience. Both bathrooms were covered in discarded cans and used paper towels, and smelled heavily of cigarettes and tobacco. In regards to the Sigma Alpha Epsilon bathroom, the Purple was informed by an anonymous party-goer that “this is the bathroom when it’s clean.”
The lowest of the low ultimately goes to Kappa Alpha Order. The smell was described by Alison Heimsness (C ‘28) as smelling like “dead fish.” After visiting their bathroom, she went on to say, “I walked out and physically gagged and spat up.”
The floor was also covered in mud and water, despite there being no rain at all that day. The toilet seat was completely broken off of one toilet. The stall doors were also ripped off, leaving anyone completely exposed. There were also no cleaning supplies within reach.
On the other end of the scale, a leading spotless bathroom is Lambda Chi Alpha. Evander Purdy (C ’28) is a Lambda Chi Alpha who takes pride in his fraternity’s clean bathroom. He said, “The Lambda bathroom provides me with a clean area where I do not feel like I will contract any diseases.”
Lambda Chi Alpha’s bathroom had an excellent selection of toilet paper, soap, and paper towels. It lacked the typical smell of alcohol and tobacco that characterized other fraternities. It felt like a bathroom one would find in a normal home, not a fraternity house where a party was currently raging outside.
Lambda Chi Alpha and Chi Psi also provided menstrual products in their bathrooms. Lambda Chi Alpha even went so far as to create a guide to their selection.
Cleanliness (or lack thereof) is a vital part of the Sewanee fraternity experience. Though many fraternities were lacking in quality bathrooms, we are encouraged by the small number of usable bathrooms.