My daughters know a lot about Delta Zeta and what it means to me and they have had their share of "DZ Legacy" items! But I also have a sister in another sorority and several good friends in yet other sororities so they have many good role models to look up to and that makes me happy :)

If they want to join Delta Zeta, that's great. If they want to join another sorority, that's great, too! Either way, they'll still get tons of letter goodies and a big bouquet with the appropriate flowers sent to their dorm rooms on bid day. The only difference, I guess, is that if one or both goes DZ I could conceivably be there for their initiation (mom gets all mushy and pauses to wipe away a tear)

My 6 year old did tell my husband and me a few weeks ago that she couldn't decide if she wanted to go to the Naval Academy like Daddy or if she wanted to be a Pitt DZ like mommy. Oh well, she has lots of time :)

Ahhh! My future daughters are definitely going to have as one of their first outfits "Tri-Delta Legacy" shirts or jumpers of some sort. A girl from my chapter who's parents are UCLA alum came home from the hospital in a "Future Bruin" outfit. Now that she actually goes there, she has the picture on her door...I want my daughters to have a picture like that if and when they go Tri-Delt! No...honestly I will be happy if any of my future children decide to go Greek since I has such a positive experience.

Never a big deal in this house where "legacy" was concerned.
Everyone KNOWS I love that my kids did decide to persue Greek Life.

One thing that kind of worries me about nudging kids to their legacy is this-

If your child is a legacy to a strong, highly regarded GLO on the campus of their choice, I think MOST of us would like to play the legacy card. Yet, if their legacy is small or struggling, we probably wouldn't expect or push our kids to "take" THEM!
We don't like it when our child falls victim to their legacy deciding our child isn't right for THEM- double edged sword!
Eventually, the legacy factor may become rather meaningless, especially on the larger Greek campuses.
For that very reason, I never did talk up AXO (not on campus anyway) or SX too much. It always fell within the realm of going Greek.

One of my wonderful Kappa sisters had one of her earliest memories of her mother singing "I want to go ADPi, boom boom..." to her in the bathtub.

When she went through rush, the ADPi chapter at our campus released her before prefs. She was actually a bit relieved that this happened, since she didn't really feel that the chapter was a good fit for her. Her mom, on the other hand, had a really hard time that her legacy hadn't had the opportunity to pledge.

Although I don't have kids, if I ever have a daughter she will be dressed in blue with lots of blue bows. And I will try really hard to remind myself that my choice shouldn't have to be hers too. What's of value is the experience of being Greek, regardless of the letters.

Very true.

Although I knew there was very little chance our son would rush, I visited the Delt House when I took him to the campus at the beginning of his freshman year.

Being a division officer, I knew that the chapter was having some problems with the Central Office -- even though it was/is one of our bigger chapters.

While I had a very pleasant chat with one of the brothers who happened to be at the house, and while the facility itself is very impressive, my talk and a look at the shelter, composites and other factors pretty well convinced me that our son probably wouldn't fit in well -- even if he were interested.

As we all know, different chapters of the same fraternity can vary greatly from school to school.

This comment is NOT meant to be an indictment of that particular chapter -- I simply mean to point out that one particular kid would probably have been out of place there.

I never sang Sinfonian songs to my son as lullabies, although we did sing fraternity and school fight songs in the bathtub. Now my daughter, however -- I often sang the Phi Mu Alpha sweetheart song to her as a lullaby. Still do, in fact.

Ms. MysticCat and I are both Greek, and it has meant a lot to both of us. We certainly are and will be positive on Greek life in general and our own groups (and those of others in our families) in particular. I'm sure my wife would love to see our daughter be a Kappa, and I would travel hundreds of miles to be there if my son were ever to be initiated into Phi Mu Alpha. But most importantly, we wouldn't want them to go Greek unless it was the right fit for them. Same is true of being a legacy, especially for my son. No point pledging a special interest GLO just because you're a legacy.

I definitely don't want my daughter to feel pressured to go DZ or end up heartbroken if she goes to a school where DZ cuts legacies heavily (I don't think that's a problem anywhere in Texas). Plus, if she ends up going to school where she says she is (yeah-she's 5...I know this could very well change), there is no DZ chapter for her to choose. I have not sung any DZ songs for her though....

Fortunately, there is an ADPi & a DG working for the after-school program she attends, and they wear their letters all the time. I think they were impressed when she recognized the Greek letters & told them she would be wearing some of those someday too....

Andi, that's adorable -- and for her to recognize the greek letters is impressive!

GC has definately convinced me that if my daughter pledges just about anywhere, it'll work out OK -- she'll have a great experience just like I did.

We should start a thread to see which parents were able to be present for their son/daughters initations, and what it meant to them.

Yeah, now if we can just get her to recognize the letters of the alphabet she will be using every day, we will be on a roll!

teke209sweetheart, did you ever think about trying Alum. Int??

Just check Alum thread!:D

While I have no kids of my own yet, I am a camp counselor in the summer, and tend to wear a lot of Kappa gear - as well as making Kappa-inspired arts and crafts (like fleur-de-lis out of clay, and light blue and dark blue gimp keychains...) and my campers definitely noticed - they had a bunch of questions about sororities (especially my oldest campers, they were 12 to 15 and really starting to get interested in college life) - it was really exciting talking about how wonderful sororities can be to a group of girls who haven't really heard all the negative stereotypes and stories yet - hopefully it will keep their minds open!

Also, one weekend when parents were dropping off their kids at camp, I saw two women wearing sorority shirts - they didn't know each other, but went up and hugged one another and talked about what schools they had gone to and their experiences - it was so cute!

my parent's only rule was that i had go through recruitment. i didn't have to pledge anywhere if i didn't thing it was right for me. they just wanted me to keep all my options open and find out what greek life was about on my campus. i come from a heavily greek family so i've known about the benefits of greek life from a very young age. i think that will be the rule if i have kids, "you have to go through recruitment to find out what it's all about, but you don't have to pledge"

I love that rule. I think I'll instigate it in my family, too.

The thing is, though, if you're going to mandate your kids rush, you have to be prepared to PAY for rush!

My son has a bib that says "an AGD loves me"

I've sung AGD songs to him since he was in utero

My grandmother is a Chi O, my mother is an AOPi, my Aunt is an AOPi and my uncle is a Pike.....there are some other various greeks in there as well. I'm not going to pressure him to go greek at all. He will however know that his mother is greek and PROUD!


of course now that I'm pregnant again, I'm *crossing my fingers* for a little legacy!!

congratulations!!!!!