Sigma Pi’s frat castle is now under new ownership of Sigma Nu.
Sigma Pi willingly left its mansion after reevaluating its budget and saw that keeping the house may eventually put the fraternity in debt, says Sigma Pi President Robert Mollusky.
Mollusky says 78 percent of the men’s dues were going to the house, and the chapter didn’t know if it could maintain those numbers for much longer. The chapter unanimously made the decision to become an unhoused fraternity in order to save money.
After the decision to leave the house was made, Mollusky says he immediately contacted former Sigma Nu president, Charlie Ekblad, to offer him the opportunity to become a housed fraternity.
Mollusky decided that Sigma Nu would be a perfect fit for the house because he knew its chapter had enough members to maintain the burdens of a house — especially one as big as Sigma Pi’s.
Since that time in January, Sigma Pi and Sigma Nu have been working together to make the transition of both chapters as easy as possible.
During week 10 of winter term, it was made official that Sigma Nu would be moving into the house.
Select members of Sigma Nu started moving into the house just days after they were officially confirmed for the house. The rest of the members to fill the house will move in this upcoming fall. In the meantime, the fraternity men are working diligently to furnish, clean and, most importantly, get Sigma Nu’s letters on the front of the house.
Being an unhoused fraternity on campus has its ups and downs, Sigma Nu President Patrick Poggi says, but the men of Sigma Nu are more than ready to officially transition to being a housed fraternity and reap all the benefits that come with it.
Poggi says that Sigma Nu and Sigma Pi have a great relationship and both fraternities are helping each other make the transition from housed to unhoused or vice versa.
“The entire time they (Sigma Pi) have been nothing but helpful. You know they’re excited about showing us different things about the house and how we can get accustomed to it, and different systems they have. We can’t thank them enough for striking that bond between the two houses,” Poggi said.
On the other hand, Sigma Pi is not getting nothing out of this deal. Mollusky says that Sigma Pi will be taking over some smaller live-out houses that members of Sigma Nu own. This will allow Sigma Pi to have a central place to meet.
Members of both houses will have to get accustomed to the new way of living, but with the help from each chapter, the transition should be virtually painless.
Sigma Nu is happy to finally have a house after being on campus since 2009-2010. Poggi says they are in the right place to take on a house and they couldn’t be more excited.
“A lot of things still need to happen,” Poggi says. It was the right fit, and it just worked out really well. We’re so lucky and so privileged that Sigma Pi was there to help us there through this.”