Greek life is a significant part of the Creighton community that impacts students both on and off campus.
Of the 12 Greek organizations at Creighton (seven sororities and five fraternities), only three have houses off campus where members can stay during their junior and senior years of school. Any time you have over a dozen college-aged students together under one roof, horseplay, pranks and various other shenanigans can
be expected.
Sunday, members of Sigma Phi Epsilon, Phi Kappa Psi and inhabitants of the house at 3100 Chicago St. woke up to find their respective homes covered in toilet paper.
Business senior and former resident of the house at 3100 Chicago St., Kelbey Heider suspects that this minor act of vandalism could be the result of a prank from members of a sorority or fraternity or even from a non-Greek Creighton organization. Although this is not the first time an act of this nature has been committed upon the house at 3100 Chicago St., Heider is convinced that there was no harm intended by this action.
“Houses that have a significant amount of Creighton students in them (even non-fraternity related ones, just off-campus residences in general) have things like this happen to them all the time, and it is generally not meant maliciously or to cause harm,” Heider said. “Kids being kids.”
Upon discovering the large amount of toilet paper covering their property, residents of the house at 3100 Chicago St. immediately began working together to clean up the mess and were able to clear the property within a matter of hours.
Although Business junior and Phi Kappa Psi fraternity member Michael Trombello does not live in the Phi Psi fraternity house, he was informed about the minor act of vandalism that occurred on this home earlier this week by his fellow fraternity brothers. Seeing the house covered in toilet paper filled Trombello with more of a sense of nostalgia and amusement than irritation at this act.
“When I first saw it, I laughed,” Trombello said. “It brought back memories of typical middle and high school antics. We [Phi Psi house] luckily really don’t have any trees on our property, so it [the damage] couldn’t have
been much.”
Trombello also noted a pattern in the times that the Phi Psi house gets doused in toilet paper from an unknown culprit, as it usually occurs around the middle of the spring semester and usually at the same time that the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity house and the house at 3100 Chicago St. are targeted.
While Trombello has no idea who could be behind this reoccurring act of toilet papering, he suggests that it would not be unlikely that one of Creighton’s Greek organizations could
be responsible.
“Since it’s around the same time every year and always done to the fraternity houses, maybe it is Greek initiated,” Trombello said. “Again, I have no clue.”
However, despite the correlation suggesting that this act of minor vandalism was committed by another sorority or fraternity, Trombello feels that the most important thing to remember is that this act is “harmless.”