New bicker class mostly male

The University’s overall undergraduate enrollment was 51 percent male and 49 percent female last academic year, according to the University’s latest official enrollment statistics.

According to the review, the sophomore memberships of Cannon Dial Elm Club, Cap & Gown Club, Ivy Club and Tiger Inn were majority male, while Cottage Club and Tower Club had more female than male members in the Class of 2015.

TI accepted 48 male sophomores and 26 female sophomores. Including upperclassmen, the club accepted 55 male students and 33 female students. Of the overall 24 students who were hosed by the club, including upperclassmen, 17 were female and seven were male.

“It does seem to be suspicious,” former TI president Ben Barron ’13 said. “It’s an unconscious thing and my instinct is that we consider each individual equally. We consider each bickeree individually and gender does not enter into the question.”

Barron, who confirmed the ‘Prince’ figures, said that more female students bickered last year and that the admitted gender ratio that year was nearly 50:50.

TI was the last eating club to accept female members, remaining all male until 1991. TI, Cottage and Ivy had been sued by Sally Frank ’80 over their policy against admitting women. Cottage settled and went coed in 1986, Ivy began admitting women in 1990 after the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled in Frank’s favor, and TI held coed bicker in spring 1991 after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case.

“I think it’s largely coincidental and that’s shown by our numbers from last year,” Barron said.

Barron acknowledged that the history may have something to do with the skewed numbers.

“Yes, TI has had more men, but every year there has been an increase in how many female bickerees we get,” he said. “Anyone who comes to TI knows that it’s a welcoming environment and that we do not discriminate based on gender.”

Cottage admitted three more female members than male members in the sophomore class this year. Meanwhile, Ivy accepted 39 males and 32 females.

Former Cottage president William Minshew ’13 and current president John McGee ’14 did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Former Ivy president Jason Ramirez ’13 declined to comment, but said the numbers obtained by the ‘Prince’ were inaccurate. Ivy disclosed acceptance of 73 new members, and the membership list reviewed by the ‘Prince’ had 71 members, all sophomores.

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Cap, which in 1972 became the first club to open its doors to women, accepted 54 sophomore male members and 39 sophomore female members. Cap was also the most bickered and most selective club this spring.

“They’re an amazing, fantastic group of kids,” former Cap and Interclub Council president Alec Egan ’13 said while discussing the new class of members immediately following the release of bicker decisions two weeks ago. “It was a lot of tough decisions — the kids we couldn’t accept were amazing too.”

Egan and current Cap president Justin Perez ’14 did not respond to requests for comment for this article.

Tower accepted 48 male sophomore bickerees and 54 female sophomore bickerees this year.

“Tower is a very accepting place, we welcome all kinds of people from all parts of the country and all parts of the world,” current president Doug Stuart ’14 said. “That’s what makes Tower, Tower.”

Stuart said that Tower does not have demographic data on its members and mentioned that the information discussed about bickerees during discussions is kept private in order to protect members.

“I wouldn’t want to pigeonhole or stereotype our members since our members come from such a diverse background,” he said.

Cannon Dial Elm Club accepted 32 sophomore male members and 27 sophomore female members. Cannon president Connor Clegg ’14 confirmed that the numbers were correct but declined to comment further.

Associate News Editor for Enterprise Marcelo Rochabrun and Managing Editor Emily Tseng contributed research for this article.