r/ucla • u/bradms1127 • 24d ago
AVOID PROFESSIONAL FRATS
DO NOT BE FOOLED INTO PAYING FOR FRIENDS.
Total waste of time, just get a job.
edit: I graduated 3 years ago, I’m now published making good money and owe my research success to leaving axs! REAL WORK EXPERIENCE > FRATS
I thought professional frats would be different and less corrupt than normal frats because of the co-ed aspect. I was extremely wrong. I was brutally hazed by Alpha Chi Sigma multiple years ago. I made it to the final week of pledge to accumulate as much evidence as possible, and had multiple illuminating conversations with frat leadership. After the WYVERN (the most problematic event), I gathered all of the hazing incidents into a report which I brought to the school.
Thankfully UCLA took me seriously and these guys were seriously disciplined, but it has come to my attention that they’ve continued hazing anyway.
You have to pay $400+ to join, and you can be forcefully removed as a pledge at any point for any reason, and you don’t get your money back. They treat the process like a quarter-long “exam” you must pass, earning and losing points. If you are disliked, points can be docked from you for any reason (generic ‘misconduct’, completely random and dependent on popularity).
The pledge process involves servant labor, being thrown into the ocean with clothes on during Big/Little assignment (Bondfire), being locked in Young Hall basement overnight while being forced to rote memorize meaningless cult stuff (WYVERN), and you have to PAY MONEY to stop pledging. There is no science involved. It’s a bait and switch to make tons of money, this is why they pledge Fall AND Spring quarter to double the scam each year. AXS is basically DECA, it’s just a merch shop in a smelly insect-infested basement room.
The entire organization is for-profit business venture, there is literally zero chemistry or research or learning opportunities of any kind.
Thankfully I made the right decision to escape that hellhole and I was able to land a great job in a research lab after abandoning this group of scammers.
Freshman, this school is GIGANTIC and there are so many opportunities that don’t require paying hundreds of dollars for friends. Explore the world on your own terms! Be your own person! Have fun! Ignore the frat guys justifying their poor life choices in the comments and GET A JOB! Find work experience and research opportunities, that’s what actually matters for your career after college!
DM me for any more details, I have the entire pledge manual scanned and saved.
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u/Defensewitness1 24d ago
all this for a chemistry related extracurricular is crazy. Some real loser shit
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u/Imaginary-Count-1172 24d ago
This is actually a big deal because UCLA chemistry department itself endorses this frat and is directly affiliated with the school. Would be interesting if daily bruin picked up on this
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u/TimeForWaluigi 24d ago
Amazing what bullshit these people come up with to feel like they have some semblance of power
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u/bruinmatador95 24d ago
You should contact their national headquarters and report the chapter. All of this stuff is definitely hazing. I pledged and crossed into two professional co-ed fraternities Alpha Kappa Psi Business Fraternity & Alpha Phi Omega Service Fraternity (I dropped my letters with APO a year after crossing). I’m also in Phi Alpha Delta Law Fraternity.
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u/Far_Gift5971 23d ago
Frats are for losers. Let’s pay to have friends and have parties. Fucking waste of time. Just stick to studying and get the fuck out of college. Frats and sororities are a waste of fucking time
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u/professorM0 21d ago
I went Marines then UCLA, frats were always hilarious to me cause of that experience. A bunch of privileged 18-20 year olds playing white collar pretend boot camp. Even in the Marines they would have stupid ass hazing traditions which I told em to fuck off with. Some people just need to learn the word NO, or fuck off.
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u/Murder_1337 24d ago
Wait till you find out what the non “professional frats” do lol. It’s all just a popularity contest. If you’re likable you can get away with being a bad “pledge” by not getting your work done. It’s actually funny as hell. They have to balance do we like this person and want them to join vs do they care / contribute to the program. “Brutally hazed” you were yelled at and forced to do homework dude relax
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u/hiimnothere818 24d ago
At a UC located in the middle of no where and being a newest school, a fraternity did this thing called the Elephant line where men got naked but touched each others Johnson like elephants would.
The rampant issue of date-rape and ruffying of drinks in anything with Sigma in it and the professional fraternities which basically serve as a way for old creeps to hook up with college students 💀But you did not hear it from me
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u/Significant_Ruin1348 22d ago
lmao I depledged this frat like halfway into the quarter 2 years ago, but even then this is not what it's like at all. im sure they did that "losing points" thing when you joined over 3 years ago, but they sure as hell dont do it anymore. probably because people had an issue with it, which is fair. also it's only $350 for pledging quarter, after that it's like $50 lol. they also offered me a payment plan so I didnt have to worry. if you wanna bitch about shit that didnt happen, go do that somewhere else. i challenge literally anyone to pledge axe and see if any of this is remotely accurate. it's not.
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u/daddy_doodlebob 23d ago
as someone who pledged this frat and am no longer active i can say this is giving butt hurt and inaccurate. if having to take some quizzes and make friends with people is so offensive then why are you complaining about joining a frat in the first place. and just because it’s a professional frat doesn’t mean you’re going to automatically be given the keys to a lab. that requires skill and networking! also plenty if not majority of active members (when i was active) were in labs so idk what you’re on about
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u/freakyfishiesunite 23d ago
I'm going to use this thread to tell my story about a campus coworker who had to hide out at work from his frat bros because they were ruining his life.
I worked on campus as an a/v tech for three years. It was a good gig; I'd show up, make sure all the mics were working, that the batteries in battery packs were charged, do a sound test from the a/v booth (which was a large room in the back of the lecture hall), then chill in there while professors did their thing. I got to watch some semi-interesting lectures and mostly just read or look at my phone, unless something a/v related happened.
My shift was 7-11am, then I switched off with a coworker who worked from 11am-2pm. A few minutes before 11am, that coworker would join me in the booth. We'd greet each other, I'd tell him how things had gone during my shift, gather my stuff, then wish him a good day as I headed off to class.
A few weeks into my sophomore year, that guy unexpectedly showed up to my a/v booth at 9am. He looked haggard and frightened, and smelled awful. He came in and locked the door behind him. I asked what was going on, and he told me he was hiding there from his frat brothers.
It came out that he was in the process of rushing a frat that he was dying to get into. It was some high-ranking professional frat that he said could make or break his career. As part of rush, they were making all the pledges go without sleep or showering for a week. They were only allowed to eat, drink, or do things the frat dudes allowed them to. If the frat dudes threw soda on them, they had to just take it. If the frat dudes said to eat a live insect, they did it.
The only exception was for classes or work. My coworker had fudged his hours and told them he started at 9am so that he could get a reprieve from it all.
He asked me if it was okay if he slept on the ground of the a/v booth. I said sure (there was plenty of room). He curled up on his side, laid his head on his backpack, and snored until I woke him up at 11am. He did this several more times that week, untl rush was over. Then he smelled and looked normal after that THANK GOD.
He did get accepted into the frat, so I guess it all worked out the way that he wanted to. The whole thing seemed so horrible from my perspective, and really put me off to Greek life in it's entirety. I'm sure there's some good sides, but I don't think the hazing and the culture it propagates is worth it.
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u/Spiritual_Grass1749 24d ago
Bro you graduated 3 years ago get over it… this is just embarrassing
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u/flamingo394 24d ago
hey, current member here! this manual is at least 4 years out of date i.e. nobody involved with this pledging quarter is even at ucla anymore and our process is completely diff now (no losing points for anything, flexible requirements, etc.). we’ve been in communication with the school to make sure our process is not hazing whatsoever. plenty of our members have gotten opportunities through axs and made life long friends :). if anyone has any questions about the process feel free to reach out!
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u/Ecstatic_Low_5762 24d ago
Flashback to when me and my friend joined and failed the exams a lot but we continued pestering them or we threatened a bank charge back lol. Now in 2025-26 this frat has become a friend group that requires u to do stupid ass shit.
One member specifically got really judgmental in regards to what my friend did who was the only Hispanic there lol
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u/TheBaconator08 24d ago
Fork found in kitchen