I've just read this whole thread in one sitting, so I have a lot of random things to say.

First of all, PLEASE tell me you've already contact the AST NPC Delegate assigned to your chapter. Not the NPC Area Advisor, but the AST Delegate. I think you can find the listing of which delegates are assigned to each chapter on the secure side of our website. She will know who to ask "behind the scenes" to find out if the other National Organizations know whats going on. Our delegates are good people...I know them all.

Secondly, are you SURE this actually happened, or is someone just thinking it happened? Is this a rumor going around? Someone ought to be able to produce Panhellenic meeting minutes that show the vote being taken. I am a Greek Advisor, and I have plenty of examples where I'm meeting with a student and make a suggestion to them, and the next thing you know I've closed every chapter on campus according to the rumor mill. Then it takes them a week to get up the courage to actually ask ME what the true story is :rolleyes:. Things get blown out of proportion quickly and suddenly no one has the correct information.

Thirdly, 33girl is right. On my previous campus I really encouraged the chapters to lower total one year (only by 5, but still) simply because no one had maintained the magical number of "50" for longer than one semester (and they were only at 51) for about 10 years. All of my chapters were under CONSTANT pressure from their HQ to reach total, so much so that they were doing a COR event every week and didn't have time to do the other things that sorority is all about. They were stressed, tired, and NOT enjoying their experience, and it was showing. I was tired of seeing them this way, so I really encouraged the discussion, but did not make the decision for them. So we lowered total, knowing that we could always increase it when it was time. The chapters are much closer (a couple are going over) to total and don't have to worry about weekly CORs anymore. They are doing other events on campus and it shows. They aren't complaining about "mandatory sorority events" nearly as much, which makes joining these organizations more attractive.

The process for changing total (according to NPC) is that once it starts being talked about in Panhellenic, each chapter should contact their NPC Delegate. Those delegates then talk to each other, look at the campus numbers and their chapter performances over the years, and then figure out what would be the best thing for the campus to do. Then they tell the chapters whether they would be for or against it (that's what happened in our situation at least). The National Organizations saw our point and was comfortable with our proposal. Once again, we could have raised total the next year if we really wanted to (but it takes longer than that to build and maintain numbers).

If your chapter is really confused (or other chapters are saying they're really confused), you might want to have someone in your chapter gently suggest to the Greek Advisor that the women are really confused and giving each other conflicting information. You might want to see if the Greek Advisor could either come to your meeting to explain what is going on, send out a mass email so that everyone hears the same message (provided they actually read it), or encourage everyone to come to the next Panhellenic meeting and plan to review exactly what's happening. It sounds like something about your structure is changing, and it may not all be decided yet, but people are just getting the bits and pieces of it. Have you contacted the Greek Advisor and asked her what is going on? Don't give your opinion on the matter, just send her an email saying that your women are giving you information that isn't making sense, and you wanted to get the correct info from someone who knows what's going on to help clear up the confusion.

PsychTau

Due to many complications, complaints, and misunderstandings last semester regarding the change in total, it was decided that it would be better to be left at 40 for the time being.

This semester, all three chapters did very well with recruitment. My chapter in particular had over 20 PNMs to choose from, and I know that the other two chapters enjoyed a luxury similar to this. One of the other two chapters was originally going to decide on 7 additional PNMs, but because of a rule that you need more than 13.1 credits to receive a bid (why it’s 13.1, I don’t know), they were unable to invite any of these girls to join, and they were left with a new member class of 9 (which is still very good). My chapter just had a visit with our District President this past weekend, and I had talked to her extensively about the direction that recruitment was taking on campus. One of the things she had said to me was that the Greek Advisor is still planning to discuss lowering total. This time, however, she talked about bringing it down from 40 to 35. The one chapter I mentioned is at 35 members right now with their recent new member class, and they only have 3 sisters graduating this semester. My chapter also has only 3 members graduating, and all three chapters already have more PNMs who are interested in joining for next semester.
With interest in Greek life here seemingly on the rise, and with all of the chapters becoming closer in numbers, do you think it would still make sense to lower total to 35 right now?

What are the chapter numbers right now after recruitment?

35, 25, 24

Then yes, lowering total would allow those groups to still be at 80% of total or so which is probably a requirement of their national. Any chapter who falls below 80% of total (for us) is on standards review and if it is a campus situation, it gets reviewed, otherwise they'd get focus chapter status (lots of attention from recruitment folks)

NPC recommends a couple different ways to calculate Total for a campus. Average Chapter Size is one. Highest chapter size is another. I don't recall the other 2 or 3 offhand. They are also currently recommending that this be reviewed annually. Chapters may *always* take quota, even if it puts them over Chapter Total. While I would encourage a discussion with the NPC Area Advisor that oversees your campus, 35 seems fine to me for your campus. If recruitment numbers are high next year and everybody gets to 35, bump it up again.

I'm going to go off topic a bit, but...

In terms of National organizations, each sorority is different. While ours would obviously like us to do well with recruitment, as far as I can tell, AST chapters are generally very small. For as long as I’ve been a member, we’ve never received major pressure to get our numbers up. One chapter, on the other hand, from what I’ve observed, receives a lot of pressure from the higher-ups, but they’re the largest chapter. The third chapter, they want to be closer to total if for no other reason than to lower their dues. They are required to pay dues as if their chapter was at total. So even if they have 25 members, they have to pay as if there are 40.

But basically, the national organizations’ opinions don’t really matter (don’t take that too literally!). And this whole situation in itself makes things extremely difficult when discussions regarding total have come up.

Ok, back to the topic at hand...

I don't know if you were just saying this in general, or if you were actually applying it to our situation (and I don't know if I've mentioned this here yet), but we don't have a total/quota system. We have COB year-round and we can only bid to total.

anyone..? :D

I think lowering your total to 35 would be good. You guys are used to smaller pledge classes, and from what you've been saying your greek advisor would like your campus to start thinking about partially structured recruitment - basically working together more on your recruitment.

Don't quote me on that, though, because I haven't talked to her about it.

Ultimately, it's going to help your smaller chapter, your chapter will probably be in a similar position, and it's not necessarily going to hurt your largest chapter. They're graduating three, but how many a potential transfers/inactives/etc. I'm pretty sure with that GLO they can have "senior status" or "early alum" or at least that's what they did on my campus. They shouldn't encourage members to do that, but I don't think being at total will hurt them.

I don't think being at total will hurt them, either. It would, however, not be great for them to only be able to gain 3 new members total for Fall 09 and Spring 10.

And I'm not saying this is a reason to not lower total, but... I think that if it was lowered, it might create some hostility from the larger chapter. I'm not saying that they're "big and mean" or anything, but if the other two sororities vote to lower total, I can see them thinking that we want to limit their recruiting so that the smaller chapters can gain more members and play some catch up. If the chapters were always up and down in terms of who was on top in the numbers game, then it might not be that big of a problem. But they've always tried to increase total (why, I'm not really sure) and another chapter has always tried to lower it. We've basically been stuck in the middle because our numbers were so low that we basically "didn't care".

Again arises the problem of trying to make everyone think "go Greek" instead of "join ABC" and "join XYZ"

Well if they can't take any members then maybe they'll be forced to think "Go Greek" more than "Join ABC."

Hopefully.

The other part of this puzzle is that your NPC Area Advisor will also make a recommendation to the FSA about what she thinks. The NPC Delegates of the three groups will also let their chapter know what they think. So it may be out of the chapter's hands so to speak.

Some groups require that their chapter follows their recommendations while other groups give a recommendation and let the chapter vote how they would like.

In the MOI page MR 13 gives you a whole slew of questions that should be answered as part of the total review along with recommendations of how to make the decision. It is a process - that is for sure! :)

I definitely think that having a more structured form of recruitment in the spring would be better. However, that could be a long process to establish. Many people here don't even know what a structured recruitment system is. I know a lot about it from coming here, from reading recruitment rules and guidelines from other campuses, and from my friends who are Greek are other schools. However, you mention release figures, recruitment counselors, and quota to the sisters here and it goes right over their heads. I think the problem is that no one is educated about what the GA is trying to do... hence the reason why people get so upset.

The suggestion to move total from 40 to 30 last semester was a big jump, especially before our larger recruitment period. But from 40 to 35 now doesn't seem so crazy. I think a major problem will be getting all of the chapters to understand the logic behind it.

Usually totals are lowered or raised based on past performance. Since none of your groups have NOT been at total for the last 7 years I think it makes sense. 10 is usually the number I have seen it raised by. It shouldn't make any difference to any of the Chapters.