Fraternities were prominent in the late 19th century as well, until their initial expulsions and then eventual resurrection off Harvard's campus in the 1990s.
Beginning with the Spee Club in 2015, a number of formerly single-gender organizations began to admit new members regardless of gender.
[4] In 2016, Harvard announced sanctions on members of remaining single-gender clubs, aiming to push them to become coed.
[6] On June 30, 2020, Harvard announced that it would drop its social group sanctions as a result of a Supreme Court decision on sex discrimination.
[35] Nine of the historically all-male clubs own real estate in Harvard Square, with the clubhouses usually including dining areas, libraries, and game rooms.
[citation needed] Most are staffed with chefs, stewards, and other paid personnel, and serve lunch and dinner meals at regular schedules.
He left the house feeling "verbally abused" after he got into an argument with Harvard offensive tackle Sean Hansen and other club members regarding whether or not he had a big mouth and if his jacket was actually upstairs.
Burnham later pulled his application and the club operated under heavy restrictions for the rest of the academic year.
As part of an effort to marginalize organizations that "contribute to a social life and a student culture that for many on our campus is disempowering and exclusionary", a new policy provides[47] that students entering in the fall of 2017 or later who join unrecognized single-sex organizations (such as single-sex final clubs, fraternities, and sororities) will be barred from campus leadership positions such as team captaincies, and from receiving recommendation letters from Harvard requisite for scholarships and fellowships.
[50] As administrative officials endeavored to implement and rewrite the sanctions, Rather and Banks were drafted as hardliners against any gender discrimination between Final Clubs and the Harvard student body.
[53] In December 2017, the university's highest governing body, the Harvard Corporation, voted to approve the sanctions and confirm their permanence.
In June 2020, following the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits employment discrimination against LGBTQ workers, Harvard Corporation voted to rescind its approval of the sanctions.
[57] In July 2017, a Harvard committee pointed to Bowdoin College as a model for eradicating final clubs, sororities, and fraternities from campus social life.
By contrast, two other options—one suggesting a new committee to oversee the social groups, another proposing a ban of all organizations that discriminate on the basis of sex, race, or socioeconomic status—gained 12 and 11 votes, respectively.
[63] In 2016, The New York Times noted, "To many students, the clubs remain potent symbols of privilege, anachronistic and out of place on an increasingly diverse campus".
[64] In December 2018, separate suits were filed in federal and Massachusetts courts by national fraternities and sororities which alleged that Harvard's policies against single-sex clubs were discriminatory.