TI, Cottage, Ivy, Cap see spike in numbers while Tower sees fall

The five bicker clubs admitted roughly 430 students in total.

Outgoing Tiger Inn president Phil Rosenberg ’09 said that his club accepted 90 of 140 of its bickerees. This represents the largest percentage increase in bickerees from last year for any eating club.

Though this year’s TI acceptance rate of 64 percent is considerably lower than last year’s rate of 85 percent, the new class of TI members will still be larger than last year’s.

Rosenberg said that the lack of legal trouble for TI this year is one explanation for the increased numbers.

In October 2007, Princeton Borough charged the presidents of TI, Cottage Club and Cloister Inn with serving alcohol to minors and maintaining a nuisance; the charges against all three club presidents have since been withdrawn. Rosenberg said that incident might explain last year’s dip in bickerees: In 2008, TI accepted 68 of 80 bickerees, while in 2007, the club saw 92 bickerees, of which they accepted 77.

“We had an incident with Princeton Borough, so TI was off tap for a while in January [2008] and in December [2007] … and I think that affected the numbers,” Rosenberg said. “We haven’t gone off tap this year, which is good.”

Tower Club has the largest Bicker class on the Street this year with 159 bickerees, and it accepted 99 new members. The club’s 62 percent acceptance rate rose significantly from 48 percent in 2008.

Though the size of the newly accepted Tower class is consistent with the sizes of past classes, fewer students bickered Tower this year than did last year, as 217 students bickered Tower in 2008. In 2007, 181 bickered. The club accepted 104 and 97 new members in each of those years, respectively.

Tower president Steve Marcus ’10 said this decrease in bickerees is the result of both “a backlash from the amount of people that bickered last year and the residential college program.”

Ivy Club accepted 65 new members from the 126 who bickered, outgoing club president Kyle Johnston ’09 said. The 52 percent acceptance rate was the lowest for any club this year and is lower than Ivy’s acceptance rate of 59 percent last year.

Ivy, the smallest bicker club, consistently welcomes between 60 and 70 new members each spring, Johnston said. “We haven’t gone out of our way to change the size of the classes,” he added.

Cottage Club accepted 91 new members of the 128 who bickered, Interclub Council adviser Tim Prugar ’06 said in an interview. This year’s 71 percent acceptance rate is down from the 80 percent acceptance rate from last year, when the club accepted 94 new members of 118 bickerees.

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Cap & Gown Club accepted roughly 90 new members from an estimated 130 students who bickered, several members of the club told The Daily Princetonian. Outgoing Cap president Rob Finley ’09 did not respond to repeated requests for comment. The acceptance rate of roughly 69 percent for the club this year is down from last year’s 76 percent.