Beyond Academics: Exploring the Relationship Between Neurodivergent Belonging and Greek Life Through an Intersectional Lens

• In Event: Intersectionality Within the Field of Inclusive and Special Education

Abstract

Neurodivergent college students often have unmet social and emotional needs due to a focus on academic success. This approach is inherently extractive, as it ignores how senses of belonging are predecessors to academic success. At large universities, neurodivergent scholars also find themselves at odds with the privileging of Greek life and its meritocratic ways of determining who belongs (Gillon et al., 2019). This interview-based study explores how neurodivergent bodyminds (Price, 2015; Schalk, 2018) view Greek life and the higher education spaces that privilege this institution. With a focus on the multiple, contradicting experiences that neurodivergent students have across intersections of identity, we propose suggestions for how universities might use understandings of Greek Life to become more affirming in their practices.

Authors

• Nathan Hughes, Syracuse University

• Meaghan Krazinski, Syracuse University