I think there are positive benefits associated having new members wearing the letters-- it promotes your group to the outside world and gives them a sense that they belong-- which translates to personal pride and investment in the group, wanting to be involved and learn the ways of the group.

Members are educated on the importance of respect for the letters and public perception of those who wear the letters.

I'm not jumping on any org or person who thinks differently-- that's their belief. If a group is going against what their HQ has decided, I agree-- they should follow the inter/national protocol.

But from a PR and acclimation perspective it makes sense. And new members can be given an "open meaning" for the letters-- the same as you give them an open motto.

ADPi's open motto "We Live For Each Other"-- great promotion of our sisterhood! :) My chapter tells non members and new members that the letters stand thus:
Alpha: the first letter of the greek alphabet. We were the first secret society for collegiate women

Delta: Like a river delta, we are ever flowing, growing and changing.

Pi: This is also a mathematical symbol for an infinite number. ADPi is eternal.

Based on the line of reasoning that a new member shouldn't wear letters until they know what they mean, does this mean they should be able to call themselves a new member at all or participate in any activities with the sorority?

ETA: I had a long-winded example in another context, and then realized "Who cares?"

When I was a pledge (they still called us pledges back then), I was a completely clueless pledge. I didn't know that 'A' 'G' and 'D' (in addition to other Alpha Gam symbols) had a secret meaning.

We had Pledge Ceremonies and such, but none really indicated what was yet to come in Initiation.

We didn't have GreekChat back then, so I didn't really know the whole extent of Ritual. :)

I can imagine it being that way for other NMs....they wear letters not knowing the meaning, but at the same time THEY DON'T KNOW there's another meaning. :p

Hm, that actually makes sense. :)

Alpha Epsilon Phi does not allow anyone to wear the letters, other than initiated sisters. New members can wear items that say "AEPhi" or "Alpha Epsilon Phi", but not the Greek letters. So the new members wouldn't be allowed to wear the event t-shirts. Neither should anyone else - although you can't exactly go up to people and say, "Hey, you're not an AEPhi, hand over the shirt!" :p I could see a chapter making a big stink after the fact, though; the event planners should contact each group ahead of time, and ask if they can use that group's letters.

At Auburn, the Greek Week shirts had the letters of all the fraternities and sororities on it. What would AEPhi do about that?

That happened at Tech. A shirt was made with all the sororities on it, including the NPHC sororities, without checking with them first. Its against protocol for non-members to wear our letters.

Goodness gracious -- this gets to be ridiculous! It's too cumbersome. If I was in charge of Greek Week -- I'd just announce we're putting everyone's letters on the shirts. (PERIOD) Wear them if you like!

We'd request that they use "AEPhi" instead of the Greek letters. "AEPhi" is still reasonably compact and wouldn't look too out of place among a bunch of Greek letters. If they refused, and insisted on using the Greek letters... we'd live with it. *shrug*

One year when I was an active, someone at Panhel goofed when designing the PNMs' name tags for formal recruitment. The name tags had the Greek letters of all five sororities across the bottom. We were less than thrilled, as were the Thetas, but it was too late to reprint all those name tags, so we dealt with it... no sense in getting upset. But the next year, the tags were redesigned.

But what about orgs that have protocols that say non-members can't wear their letters? You're willing to piss off an entire organization for the sake of your t-shirt?

No...for "our" T-shirt. I just think we're "majoring in the minors" here. Sure, Chi Omega used to have that tradition, but I doubt our entire organization would have been upset with 1" Greek letters on the back of a shirt. Geez.

I'm confused, first you say:

And then you say:
So this "everyone" that you used earlier, I'm assuming you mean every Greek org that's participating in Greek Week. I can tell you right now that if Sigma Gamma Rho was participating in Greek Week and our letters were on a shirt, the sorors on that campus and in the area would be upset, because its against our protocol. And it would probably end up on our members-only listservs and message board. I've never met a soror who DIDN'T hold their letters sacred and patrol where it went. Maybe you're sorority is different, but we hold our protocol in high esteem, and any violations would be important.

Just because your org wouldn't have been doesn't mean that if other orgs aren't the same way, they're somehow wrong to be upset ...

Yeah, I see, what you are saying. We don't allow our SAE pledges to wear the letters before initiation, but their pledge pins have Phi Alpha on it...so its kind of a double edge sword I guess.

No letters pre initiation for our new ladies. They can wear the letters typed out as words if they wish.

The only exception we've made is if we decide to create a uniform for a sporting event, philanthropy event or intramural and it had letters on it. Then new members can wear that if they are participating in the event/sport/team etc.

The joys of being in a local.