thank you ole miss glitter
 

for considering florida part of the south!! i am a true southern girl and an 8th generation floridian. i eat grits, not cream of wheat, swamp cabbage, not hearts of palm and mustard greens, not endive. while florida has many "transplants", there are plenty of us whose families go back hundreds of years in the state. and anyone who thinks tallahassee and gainesville are not true southern towns has never visited there!

HottyToddy, I was told they did redo it for ya'll! Anyway, good to know, I've been there a few times to eat lunch last semester with some co-workers, good food those Hospitality Management majors make!


Anyway, I guess any sorority would be great at Ole Miss. I think at this point they need to figure out why those who did not join a sorority didn't join a sorority. If it was because of the high dues, perhaps a sorority without a house would be sufficient. I will say this we do have Omega Phi Alpha here now and they are doing great. I would say they probably have at least 65-75 members. They are doing great and I know they appeal to women who do not want the expenses of a sorority with a house, staff, house mother, etc...

Anyway, does anyone know what's happens if no sorority is interested in starting up here?

Re: thank you ole miss glitter
 

Absolutely true...I normally tell people that I'm fron NORTH Florida, and that south of say, Ocala, we're two different states. Pensacola, Jacksonville, and St Augustine are as Southern as little towns can be! My family has been in North Florida for at least 8 generations, and I challenge anyone who says I'm not from the South to come to North Florida and see how it really is. :p

I like the idea of AXO at Ole Miss, if only because the chapters in surrounding states are strong, and I know a lot of alumnae from Mississippi and Tennessee.

/hijack

On the Florida issue: if you really want to get nit-picky, you could kinda' split Florida up longways instead of horizontally (the coasts, and then the middle section). The middle section (which does include Gainesville - the only thing there really is the college) is the section that 301 runs through. That area is definitely more Southern than the rest of FL, but I don't really consider it "Southern" like I would consider Mississippi or Georgia Southern. And then of course the Panhandle is a little more Southern too, but again, not hard-core Southern. I don't really see Tally as a small Southern town though; it's not completely in the middle of nowhere like G-town is. I definitely don't consider St. Augustine Southern. Its competition is Charleston, SC and Savannah, GA and I don't really see that connection at all. But that's just my $0.02.

/end hijack

OleMissGlitter, do you know what the Greek percentage is on campus? I can't remember if that's been mentioned.

ETA: What about some of the sororities in the smaller schools around Mississippi that aren't at Ole Miss?

[hijack]
Florida is weird in the sense that you could have what seems like a "Northern" town only a few miles from a town that is "Southern". I'll use South Florida as an example. Fort Lauderdale is not at all considered a Southern town but Davie is not too far away and I'd consider that to be more "Southern" (although not Southern like Mobile or Jackson). I've always felt that North Florida and some parts of Central Florida were very Southern. Tallahassee, Jacksonville, and Pensacola are rich in Southern tradition. But, let's just all agree to disagree about FL because this thread is about Ole Miss and not about FL being Southern. :) [/hijack]

Anyways, AXO is VERY strong in Florida. Like OleMissGlitter said, they have a lot of chapters in FL. I think there are either 6 or 7 chapters here. They're up there with ZTA, TriDelta, DG, ADPi, and KD in having the most chapters in the state. Having such a strong alum base not too far away would definitely help if AXO were to colonize at Ole Miss.

edited for a typo

OleMissGlitter, do you know what the Greek percentage is on campus? I can't remember if that's been mentioned.

ETA: What about some of the sororities in the smaller schools around Mississippi that aren't at Ole Miss?

-----------------------------
About 35% of undergraduate women and 25% of undergraduate men are active in the Greek system as members of social fraternities and sororities.--From Ole Miss Admissions Website

-------------------------------
Other University's in MS with Greek Life:

Mississippi State University-Starkville, MS--> CW, DDD, DG, ZTA, FM, KD, DXF(local I believe)

University of Southern Mississippi--Hattiesburg, MS--> CW, DDD, DG, ADP, FM, KAQ, KD, PBF

Delta State University--Cleveland, MS--> DDD, FM, KD I'm not 100% sure about Delta State, I couldn't find it on their website...

Millsaps College--Jackson, MS--> CW, DDD, KD, FM

I grew up in Brooklyn, and when I visited South Florida as a kid, I always felt right at home. When I was a freshman at FSU, in Tallahassee, I experienced severe culture shock. This was the deep, deep south. Complete with Spanish Moss slowly dancing in the wind, on great oak trees.

Culturally, Tallahassee is very similar to South Georgia, and I don't read anyone calling South Georgia "un-Southern." Also, Tallahassee is by no means more Southern than the rest of North Florida and the Panhandle.

Out of state colleges bordering near Mississippi

** = Chapter currently not at Ole Miss

University of Memphis

Alpha Delta Pi **
Alpha Gamma Delta **
Delta Gamma
Kappa Delta
Phi Mu
Pi Beta Phi
Sigma Kappa **

University of Arkansas

Alpha Delta Pi **
Chi Omega
Delta Delta Delta
Kappa Delta
Kappa Kappa Gamma
Pi Beta Phi
Zeta Tau Alpha **

University of Alabama

Alpha Chi Omega **
Alpha Delta Pi **
Alpha Gamma Delta **
Alpha Omicron Pi
Chi Omega
Delta Delta Delta
Delta Zeta **
Gamma Phi Beta **
Kappa Alpha Theta
Kappa Delta
Kappa Kappa Gamma
Phi Mu
Pi Beta Phi
Sigma Delta Tau **
Zeta Tau Alpha **

Auburn University

Alpha Chi Omega **
Alpha Delta Pi **
Alpha Gamma Delta **
Alpha Omicron Pi
Alpha Xi Delta **
Chi Omega
Delta Delta Delta
Delta Gamma
Delta Zeta **
Gamma Phi Beta **
Kappa Delta
Kappa Kappa Gamma
Phi Mu
Pi Beta Phi
Sigma Kappa **
Zeta Tau Alpha **

Louisiana State University

Chi Omega
Delta Delta Delta
Delta Gamma
Delta Zeta **
Kappa Alpha Theta
Kappa Delta
Kappa Kappa Gamma
Phi Mu
Pi Beta Phi
Zeta Tau Alpha **

Great post TSteven!

Also, like TSteven pointed out U of Memphis has several sororities that we do not have and Memphis is just about an hour from Oxford. So, U of Memphis could help out with a colony down here. Also, Tuscaloosa, is about 3 1/2 hours away and that is where Bama is located.

Your chapters get larger and larger like at LSU. Expansion was tried 3 times there in the last 10 years and nothing took. The sororites have all made huge additions and renovations to their houses to accomodate the larger chapter sizes. This really hurts any new group who may want to come because the capitol investment of a house goes up with each new feature. Think in the $1.5 - $2 million price range and that doesn't include the normal expansion costs. A sorority needs to look hard at the bottom line and determine if a campus is really worth that outlay.

There was also mention about an NPC group colonizing without a house. That is very unrealistic especially if there is no house in the immediate future. All NPC groups need to be on the same field regarding housing. If not, the unhoused group will suffer tremendously. I am speaking specifically about campuses like Ole Miss and LSU.

Omega Phi Alpha does well without a house because it is not in direct competition with the NPCs.

See....people have posted which sororities are at nearby colleges and which would be good choices but those of us who've been around for awhile know which sororities have been at those colleges and left. And many, many Southern women know this and very likely would not join these groups if they tried to go to Ole Miss because their chapter at a nearby school failed--take my word. If ABC left State or Arkansas, dyed-in-the-wool Greek families remember that.

Not making a value judgment on this, just pointing out what I've observed over the years.

the fact that people in Mississippi know this or CARES absolutely boggles my mind. Maybe its because im from the North (New York born and Jersey bred) but it amazes me how much people there care about this. A "reputation" of a group that failed at completely different school ACTUALLY makes a difference? wow. I understand not bringing back ZTA, but not bringing ABC that happened to fail at a nearby school that was never a chapter at Ole Miss? I dont mean to offend anyone, but it seems so silly in my mind.

On that note, as an Alpha Chi, i would love to see a chapter at Ole Miss. Our national would work hard to make it suceed- they worked tirelessly with our chapter, spent a ton of money and resources (national visitors, etc) to bring it up to speed. It seems to be working, as we got quota plus this semester. I dont know about money wise, but I think National could expend the manpower.

One thing I've observed about the state of Mississippi is that practically everyone knows everyone else in the state! My perception is that this occurs because basically the state is made up of a bunch of small towns. Jackson is the largest city and they have a population of only 185,000. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but statistically, I don't think there's a large influx of people moving to Mississippi, so most of the population is from there & stays there.

Yes, we all do know each other, I mean I was born and raised in New Orleans, LA but now I reside in Oxford, MS and I did attend Ole Miss here. Anyway, it is a "small world," down here.

I think Alpha Chi Omega would do awesome here. But that's just my view.

Please no one take offense... I am from Mississippi myself and I am not hesitant to say so. I just don't think folks from other places really understand the Mississippi mindset & environment because it is SO different from anyplace else.

NutBrnHair got it right. Mississippi is a relatively isolated place, practically a fence around the state. Few people move out, fewer people move in. That is why everyone there knows each other! I am telling you, there is NO 7 degrees of separation between any 2 people in the state ;-)

There are a lot of reasons that Mississippi is like this. I won't go into them, some of them are not very flattering. Just acknowleging that this IS the environment there and has been for a very long time.

And an awful lot of the people there like it just the way it is. For many people, Mississippi feels very safe, kind of one big "small town", without a lot of the major problems of big cities. A good place to raise a family, a sense of community in an age where most of us don't know neighbors more than 3 houses away. Yes, people are born there, live there, go to college there, marry & settle down to raise a family all in Mississippi. Nothing wrong with this, if that's your cup of tea! It does make for very very long memories and tight knit groups.