Marriage Pact is the backup plan buzzing around campus, with 661 Occidental student participants. Marriage Pact is an organization that was brought to campus by Grace Adler (junior) and Sophie Weil (junior).
“They match you up with whoever you think is the most compatible,” Adler said. “It’s sort of just your backup plan. College is where you’re around the most people that you’re similar to, so there’s bound to be somebody that you might get married to or just got it in the bag as a backup plan.”
According to Adler, the Marriage Pact is a survey where students are able to answer questions about themselves and what they want in a partner. These questions span a wide range of topics, including religion, sexuality, substance use and many more. Based on students’ answers, they then get matched with another student who is compatible with them.
Stanford students Sophia Sterling-Angus and Liam McGregor created the algorithm for the Marriage Pact, which received over a thousand responses during its first implementation at Stanford in 2017, using a mix of psychology, sociology and linear algebra. According to Marriage Pact’s website, it has been integrated into 88 different schools so far.
“’My Best Friend’s Wedding’ is where the marriage pact term was coined and it’s this movie where there’s these two best friends and they had a marriage pact so by the time they’re 40, if they weren’t married, they would just get married to each other,” Adler said.
Adler and Weil say that bringing the Marriage Pact to Occidental was just a fun “side quest” for them, but hopefully they will be able to continue to bring it back every year as a sort of campus tradition.
“There’s a lot of success stories,” Adler said. “I think there’s about, like, four people that have actually gotten married through this. I think a lot of people do end up at least going on a date. But sometimes it’s just like you get coffee. It’s funny or a lot of the time you get paired up with a friend you already have, so they are maybe friend zoned already. But I do think some people might end up going on a date. It says you’re really compatible, so you probably have a lot in common.”
However, an email to students who participated from Marriage Pact stated that the app has been having a hard time at Occidental with getting everyone a romantic match. Because of this, they have been making friend matches.
“There is a bit of a gender gap happening right now and that there are more women,” Adler said. “It’s just harder to get men to participate just for a multitude of reasons.”
According to Alder, the gender breakdown of Occidental Students who have filled out the survey includes 62.33% women, 30.26% men, 5.6% non-binary and 1.82% other.
One person who received a friend match is Gisela Roberts (sophomore). She said that she filled out the Marriage Pact because her friends were doing it, but she really had no expectations going in.
“It created the right amount of drama that wasn’t too stressful, but it was just fun.” Roberts said.
“I think a lot of people got kind of freaked out by it and they’re like, ‘Oh my God’, I’m not looking for a relationship right now or something, but, it’s just a funny thing to know, like, oh, I know who my most compatible person is on this campus,” Weil said.
Despite Weil’s reassurance that you do not have to reach out to your match, many people did. According to Roberts, she felt a little bit pressured at the thought of a romantic match reaching out. Because of this, Roberts says that she was happy with her friend match.
“I feel like I was relieved that I got a friend match because it kind of took the pressure off of actually doing anything,” Roberts said. “I know some of my friends actually had people reaching out to them and they just were not in the place to do anything about it right now.”
Roberts said that she is not committed to the idea of it actually being a marriage pact, however, she had an enjoyable and fun experience and says that she would do it again.
“There’s definitely something awesome about doing the Marriage Pact at a school like Oxy, just because it’s so small and intimate,” Alder said. “It’s really easy to figure out who the people are, which is just fun.”
According to Adler and Weil, while the Marriage Pact can end in a successful romantic relationship, it is really just a fun thing to do.
“We don’t want anyone to think that you’re doing it because you’re, like, down bad,” Adler said. “You’re just doing it because it’s a funny little thing.”
Contact Marley Smith msmith5@oxy.edu.
