Shawn Collins' Blog

Affiliate marketing and other stuff from Shawn Collins, co-founder of Affiliate Summit.

I Started a Greek Life Newspaper in College

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I always enjoyed writing, and the first time I saw my name in print was for my elementary school newspaper. It was just a photocopied publication of maybe six pages, but I loved being a part of it.

When middle school came around, we didn’t have a paper, but we did in high school, and I spent two years writing for the high school newspaper. My articles were mostly about music in high school. I remember one of the articles was all about how outraged I was that the band New Model Army could not tour in the US, because the government thought they were too subversive or something.

Also, during high school, I published a zine called A Silver Lining. It started out as a U2 fanzine, but over time it evolved to cover local punk shows, reviews of records that were sent to me, and cartoons from the guitarist of the Dead Milkmen (we were pen pals).

I also had some features in there. My two favorite items in A Silver Lining were a rambling multi-page letter from Charles Manson and Mad Libs from Evel Knievel. I’d asked Manson what he thought of U2, and he went on about government conspiracies and Abbie Hoffman. The Mad Libs from the legendary daredevil were typical answers, but it was awesome that he sent them back.

Pre-Journalism and College Newspapers

Anyhow, by the time I went to college, I still wanted to write. I started with a major in Pre-Journalism (my first of three majors I sampled), and I headed up to the Diamondback newspaper office at the University of Maryland. I was ready to be the guy writing about music. But they told me they wanted an article about the marching band to see my style, and I walked out and never returned.

A year or so later, I got involved with a newspaper called the Greek Insider and wrote a handful of articles. But that paper closed down after some key people graduated.

That door closing gave me an idea. Maybe I could start up my own newspaper on Greek life at the University of Maryland. So, I pitched it to the Interfraternity Council (IFC) and the Panhellenic Association (PHA) that if they covered the printing costs, I’d handle everything else.

They said yes, and the Greek Times was born.

Birth of the Greek Times

That was the easy part. After the yes, I had to figure out how to put together a newspaper. To that point, all of my college papers had been written on a non-electric typewriter that I’d had from my zine days. I had to figure out how to use a Macintosh SE in the campus computer lab.

Someone told me about a program called PageMaker for laying out the newspaper, but the software was not installed on the computers in the lab. So, I had to use MacWrite II and set the column width to a couple of inches so the pages would have four columns across.

After I entered the content, I’d have to cut each headline and column with an X-acto knife and then paste them onto these big boards. It was a painstaking, imperfect process, but I enjoyed it.

While I liked writing for the Greek Insider, I wanted to do something different. I was interested in a more lifestyle-focused publication. It had fraternity and sorority news, but also a healthy share of fun content.

My first issue of the Greek Times

The first issue featured some typical items like a Greek Week preview, coverage of rush, new Order of Omega members, and Greeks who were recently lavaliered, pinned, and engaged.

But I also added in the results of a student survey on opinions of Greeks from non-Greeks on campus, an advice column, my interview with Joe Jack Talcum of the Dead Milkmen, and a think piece on Cisco (aka Liquid Crack). Plus, there were as many ads as I could fit in there, since I got to keep the ad revenue.

The students liked it, but the IFC and PHA weren’t as keen on the content. They wanted more serious coverage of Greek life.

My second issue of the Greek Times

With issue two, I got more serious by running the results of a sex survey, a hype article on the upcoming IFC Ball, an expanded advice column (all questions were fake and made up by me and given to the advice columnist, Kendra, to answer), “vox populi” (voice of the people) with the question, “What was your worst Spring Break experience,” and coverage of going to the Vous to get drunk on a snow day.

I also reprinted an article to bring awareness to students about date rape.

My third issue of the Greek Times

The second issue had another warm reception by students, and again I was asked to focus more on positive PR for the Greek system.

I said yes, and then put a photo of one of my naked brothers (it was censored) on the cover after he’d been honored as the Silver Sweetheart of Alpha Phi. There was also an article about an acoustic duo called Sean & Dave (my fraternity brother Sean Pelan and Dave Peter, who was in SAE), a full page for the ridiculous advice column, some letters to the editor, a goofy cartoon from a fraternity brother, and an article about Smurfing (writing all over someone when they have passed out).

I did include some serious content… a reprinted article about the legal bias against rape victims.

My fourth issue of the Greek Times

I was getting great feedback from fraternity and sorority members, and again, I got an earful from the Interfraternity Council and the Panhellenic Association.

It seemed like they were losing their patience with me, so I went serious for the next cover and ran an interview with Terry Zacker, the University Director of Greek Life, as well as schedules for fraternity and sorority rush.

But also went random again with advice on killing roaches, a threatening letter from a lawyer about a previous advice column answer, a new advice columnist (my fraternity brother, Aaron Falcione), a breakdown of different types of beer, and another cartoon.

At that point, the plug was pulled on the Greek Times. The IFC and PHA decided to go in a different, more serious direction, and I was pushed out after four glorious issues.

Originally published at https://shawncollins512.substack.com.

My Most Compromising Gen X Photo

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I don’t think I had a camera in college. If I did, it was rarely used, because I didn’t have the money to get film processed. So, most of the pictures I have from those five years are the fraternity and sorority event photos.

Hank and I at the fall 1988 Pi Kappa Alpha Christmas/Graduation Formal

I have a whole photo album of these types of pictures, but just a handful of non-event snapshots from 1988-93.

Gen Xers like to reminisce about not having cameras around all the time when we were growing up, so we wouldn’t have embarrassing images or even ones that could be a liability in our personal lives.

And yes, it’s a good thing those pictures don’t exist, because we were getting naked a lot in college. I can remember at least half a dozen times when I was in public without clothes on during my college days.

While I was pledging, we were nude a few times, including when we took a bonding photo of my pledge class on and around the University of Maryland Testudo statue (our Terrapin mascot) in front of McKeldin Library. While we posed, some brothers disappeared with our clothes, so we had to make our way across campus completely naked – 30 or so naked guys sprinting in the cold.

And another time, we did a “Love Run” at the Sigma Kappa (?K) sorority. Again, my pledge class ran around naked, but this time in a house full of sorority girls. Brothers stole our clothes as we made our way through the sorority, and we had to run home naked.

As a brother, I ended up getting lavaliered twice and pinned once to girlfriends, and each time I’d be grabbed off the street by pledges and tied naked to the anchor in front of the Delta Gamma (??) sorority. Then the girlfriend would have to come and untie me.

There are no photos of any of these events, as far as I know, but another time, when I was in my birthday suit, I was captured on film, and I didn’t find out until months later.

Shawn Collins fall 1992 after pledge skipout

I was elected President of Pi Kappa Alpha (?KA) at the University of Maryland for the fall 1992 semester. We had a tradition where pledges would kidnap the new president, get them very drunk, and deliver them back to their room many hours later.

After lots and lots of drinks, I guess I passed out along the way. That’s when the pledges “smurfed” me. I think this must have gotten the name in the past because passed-out guys were painted blue. But when I was in college, “smurfing” meant someone was passed out and had stuff written all over them in marker.

Anyhow, I guess I needed to pee after getting back to the fraternity house, so I wandered into the bathroom and dropped my boxers, since I couldn’t stand up straight. Someone snapped a picture and gave it to me months later, when they developed their film. I don’t even remember who took the photo.

Late that night/morning, naked, covered in marker, and having a couple of scraped knees, my phone rang. Some townies had parked in our house parking lot, and we had a tow company that would come by and give a heads up that they were towing cars parked illegally.

I went out to see the tow truck driver, still oblivious to the ink on my body and face, and the driver laughed and asked what the hell I was up to. I looked in his sideview mirror, and my head pounded as I squinted at my messed-up reflection.

It took many showers to get all of the marker off my skin. I think I skipped class the next day, due to my jacked-up appearance and torturous hangover. But I got a cool picture out of it.

Originally published at https://shawncollins512.substack.com.

I Was a Sorority Busboy During College

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Bundy and Shawn grilling at Theta

I paid my way through college with a combination of a Stafford Loan and working menial jobs. But often, there were shortfalls, and I couldn’t afford some expenses that would come up, like food.

Fortunately, when I was a fraternity pledge in the first semester of my freshman year, I was sent to cover for one of the brothers as a busboy for a sorority. I went there and worked for about an hour and a half, setting up tables, serving food, bussing tables, and cleaning dishes, pots, and pans, in exchange for a hot meal.

After my first semester, I moved into an apartment and no longer had a meal plan, so I had to figure out a way to eat. In addition to being cash poor, there were no grocery stores near campus, and I didn’t have a car.

So, I headed over to the Alpha Chi Omega (AX?) sorority house and asked about being a busboy, and my “will work for food” side hustle got started. Some sororities paid the busboys money in addition to food, but I was just getting food, and that was fine because I was working at my girlfriend’s sorority.

My fraternity house didn’t have a dining option. The story I was told as a pledge was that there was once a kitchen that burned down, and they turned the area into another bar. Whatever the reason, we didn’t have a kitchen, so many of the sorority busboys were my brothers. That was a good time.

That also led to some hijinks, as we would sometimes try to finish early so we could sneak off with some eggs, tomatoes, and stuff from the kitchen and ambush our brothers at other sororities as they left their busboy jobs.

When we weren’t grabbing food from the kitchen to throw at our brothers, we’d also put good food in garbage bags and put the bags outside to take home after we got off. It was a nice, if disreputable, way to get some staples to bring home, since we only had the option to work on weekdays, at lunch, and dinner.

Sometimes, when there was a rush event or something, we’d be put into service as cooks, too. Well, not in the kitchen. We’d be outside grilling hot dogs and hamburgers. It was a lot of fun meeting everyone in the sorority and eating real food, because ramen or mac and cheese without milk or butter got really old.

During my time at AX?, I was voted as the “sweetheart” and got to be on their composite.

Alpha Chi Omega at University of Maryland 1991

The guy who was picked the year before had his name listed with his first initial, and then his middle and last name. That seemed cheesy and pretentious to me, so I figured I’d follow suit and have my name listed as “S. Brendan Collins.” It was a dopey inside joke that only made sense to me, but I enjoyed it.

S. Brendan Collins is a real sweetheart

There were times when the girls would forget we were there, as we worked in the background, and we’d hear some spicy gossip. When dated parties and formals came along, available busboys were default dates for girls who didn’t have one at the last minute.

After a breakup with my girlfriend, it was awkward to continue bussing at her sorority, so I bounced around at some other houses before ending up at Kappa Alpha Theta (KA?) for the rest of college.

The menus were pretty similar at each sorority, and I remember one in particular that I didn’t like was veggie lasagna. It tasted fine, though not as good as lasagna with meat. Without that protein, I would feel hungry again hours later.

Before I started working as a busboy, I was pissed off that I had to work for food in addition to my regular jobs at school, but in the end, I made some of my best memories during those lunches and dinners.

Originally published at https://shawncollins512.substack.com.