Writer’s note: The following article is a work of satire, please do not take any of it as truth. Any specific people mentioned in any of my articles were made aware of their inclusion in it prior to publishing. Please direct any complaints with the content of the article to Ben Cohen ’22.
Theme houses are a very important part of campus living at Wheaton, allowing students to live in a community of like-minded thinkers that value some important aspect of campus life. For the international crowd, one can find Davis House, for the future politicians the House of Reps; and from the hippies in ECCO House and the hippies in Outdoors House, to the hippies in Art Haus, there is likely a theme house for any interest one might have. However, there is one thing that almost all theme houses can agree upon, an interest not currently fulfilled by any theme house at Wheaton. This crucible of interest helped to forge a brand-new theme house: the Wheaton Partying Association (WPA). WPA was formed as a joint effort by many theme houses guided by an intangible “Party Spirit.” Reactions from the theme house community have been generally positive. Nearly everyone is happy to have another place to party, but some theme houses such as TWAP, Davis, and Farm are worried they will have to play second fiddle to WPA, party-wise, instead of having the disputed status of “best places to party on campus.”
However, not just anyone can be accepted into WPA. The leaders of the fledgling house have decided to forgo the traditional application method used by other theme houses of sending out an application through email with questions that are entirely too open-ended. WPA members use a method employed by college sports teams: scouting and recruiting. The WPA members attend parties at other locations around campus, with those who are partying the hardest being extended an invitation to join the house.
WPA has decided to embrace community service just as much as they have embraced the partying spirit. WPA has announced plans to integrate themselves into the First Year Experience course required by first-year students. WPA has announced that they plan to educate first-year students on topics such as how to properly hold back your drunk roommate’s hair so they can throw up in the toilet, shortcuts through the woods to allow for escape from Public Safety or the Norton Police, and how to correctly party crawl through the campus at 2 a.m. while making the most amount of noise possible. In conclusion, while it seems like the people at WPA are doing a good job of bringing the party spirit to Wheaton, only time will tell how this theme house will affect the culture here at Wheaton College.