Indeed, TKE does have some "weenie" chapters.

Ahem, now back on the subject
 

Trish,

I suggest you contact the greek advisor at the Colorado School of Mines (Golden, CO) for some advice. Mines sounds a lot like the college you are writing about. They have about 2000 undergrads, of which there are probably 500 women (all engineering). In 20 years, the sorority community has grown from 1 small NPC and 1 local to 3 NPC's (Sig Kap, Pi Phi, and Alpha Phi). The college just built new houses for each of them on the row, sleeping about 25 or so per house. I am not sure how big the chapters are, but they seem to be doing well. Definitely a success story, although some of the more narrow minded posters here may disagree. Many of the fraternities on campus have been around since the early 1900's- just goes to show you that greeks can do well on smaller campuses, with smaller rosters.

Good luck in your efforts!

Thank You!!
 

Thank you to everyone for your great advice! Your comments show me that we are on the right track....we have completed campus questionnaires, etc and I will definitely take all your suggestions to the women. I will also contact the Colorado school suggested. Thank you Thank you!!!

If you have any additional suggestions, I'm game!

Re: dear miss manners
 

THAT'S BECAUSE THERE ARE ONLY THREE SORORITIES AT EACH SCHOOL.

Re: you missed the point entirely
 

Grow up, unless you can personally vouch that there is not a SINGLE chapter of TKE under 50, or whatever number you think constitutes 'large', stop being judgmental and condescending towards others.

Re: Re: you missed the point entirely
 

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH
SNAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP

You all just bitch slapped an old man.

-Rudey

In these difficult times, I think the only way we really get through them is to ask What Would Brother Rodney Do?

Edited to add: I need a picture to go with the name. Who do you think represents Rodney best? http://images.google.com/images?q=rodney&hl=en

-Rudey
--WWBRD?

TKEs in small chapters
 

yes....
and, Jocelyn...you need to take a course in reading comprehension. You need it badly. This is not a generalization,
and it is not aimed at small NPC chapters. It is aimed at you.

Re: TKEs in small chapters
 

Cough cough. Pot, meet kettle.

Re: Re: you missed the point entirely
 

um.. im 99% sure the TKE chapter at my school has under 50 members... considering they took one pledge during formal rush last year.... oops, i probably shouldnt have gone there :rolleyes:

ETA: according to their chapter website they have 32 active members (assuming that they removed the names of those who graduated last year... considering that the rest of the site hasnt been updated since last spring)

Zeta Kappa chapter of TKE at Portland State University has 20 members.

I'd really hate for this to turn into a TKE-bashing thread and get closed. This thread could be very helpful for Trish and anyone else who is helping a small chapter. Can we please just ignore Erik's comments and get back to the original topic?

And might I also add that the chapter at my university is below 20 as well. And we're not bashing TKE here, but the point is that you say things like unhoused chapters are not real fraternities and small chapters are unfit to remain part of the national and are"weenies". What you don't grasp is that your OWN organization has small chapters that are unhoused. So when you make statements like that from your "lofty" place, you are insulting your own fraternity as well.

But anyway, Trish, as long as you are all maintaing in numbers, and are roughly around the same size, there's no need to worry (despite what others say). Just focus on good Panhellenic PR, there's some good threads over in the Rush forum right now about that. Also, WEAR YOUR LETTERS and SMILE. :)

Erik, if you think our headquarters are making mistakes by keeping small chapters, perhaps you should write to them and tell them how to do their jobs.

Re: you missed the point entirely
 

What about Mu-Nu? That chapter is certainly lacking in size compared to SigEp, SigTau, Delta Sig, and AGR on its campus (a teacher's college, no less), despite being founded large. Would you like to tell your brothers their chapter is worthless?

Also, I was wondering why TKE doesn't have the ability to be successful at Marquette despite several attempts. Perhaps we should talk about that, Eric. I'm pumped up and ready to tell you how I think your fraternity does things wrong

I know that our chapter was at one point down to less than 20 brothers; largely through the efforts of brothers within the chapter we built ourselves back up into the 60s and 70s (with little or no help from IFSC). That's not to say that numbers are the most important thing, but there are ways to do it.

Does your campus have a freshman move-in day? Does the school ask for volunteers? Brothers in our chapter helped with move-in, and it not only was a great way to meet freshmen, but also to meet parents. That way, when Rush came along, we were known as the nice guys who helped with move-in.

How about going straight to the dorms/residence halls. Sometimes the best way to get people is to knock on doors and find them. There may be a large percentage of the school that doesn't even know there's Greek life.

Good luck with your goals, hopefully you're finding some help on the board.

Now, AXiDTrish, I shall help you.

My chapter was very successful with rush by rushing girlfriends of our boyfriend's fraternity brothers. We doubled our size doing that, and since we knew these guys only pledged quality members, we knew we'd more than likely be getting quality girls. We focused on different groups of people every year - the first semester it was the XYZ girlfriends, the next semester it was some girls from the basketball team - niche recruiting works really well on a small campus.

If it is a technical school in the sense of engineering, I would have Panhellenic make a presentation to the Society of Women Engineers - those are women who already understand/desire female companionship and will likely be somewhat receptive to sororities.

No offense, but wouldn't that give your GLO a rep for only taking(insert group here) girls. I'm glad it worked for you guys, but I know that on my campus has a bad problem with stereotypes. My interest group is trying to find more ways to start recruting for next semester, and that makes it hard for us. I'm not really experienced with Greek life at all, so if there's something here that I don't understand, sorry.

Not really - because we take a new member class every semester, and each semester we pledged a differing group - and now we're at the point where as a stronger chapter, we don't have to work as hard to recruit because we already have ties established all over campus.

Nothing like a little TKE bashing party! YIKES! AXiDtrish, good advice from others regarding going to other campus organizations...get your members to join other campus organizations and recruit from within. That has been successful for several chapters I know of.

Hey now, I kinda ment my comment about size in a retorical manner.

Rushing the girlfriends of fraternity members is actually a very common way to target women. First, if you know the guys, it can be positive in regards to character. Second, you know she is probably not agaist the institution of GLOs. It can be a very good idea when done right.

Website?
 

Where are the Greek life websites spoken of in the threads? I could not find them anywhere in the thread.

Oh, OK. I see what you mean now. So that adds to your diversity as a chapter. Very cool. Thanks for explaining.

Pretty much - because some of the XY girlfriends are also going to be on the soccer team, and some of the basketball girls have roommates who are in theater - etc. Also, one thing I've found that works really well is to wear letters a lot and NOT talk about it - don't be the girls who are all "OMG I am so glad I am a Gamma Phi GPHI blah blah blah..." but wear letters and go about your day being a nice person.

Yes Rudey?

From your quote which was to slam me just again shows your ignorance!


"In these difficult times, I think the only way we really get through them is to ask What Would Brother Rodney Do?"


Yes, it is easy to pick on Erik and I do not agree with him all of the time.

Weenie Chapters, yes, We all have them. A lot depends on the Campus structure of course. Maybe he is talking about getting a rise which it has done. He is well aware as many of us are that this is the case. Does He know any thing a About Sororitys, I am quite sure He does from having worked with many people in the College and National level.

There are a few of you who get pissed off about anyone or thing that is said that is not agreeable with your dogma.

"STFU U.", wow, that was really funny and very cute, starting a Chapter there.:rolleyes:

I come from a very small chapter too. When I was collegiate we had only 14 members at one point, but now my chapter is up to 25 and we still have formal in the spring. One of the things Adelphi has changed is our style of recruitment. We made formal "semi-formal" and held a round robin event in the quad instead of inside. By having it outside in a place where everyone passes by we were able to pick up double the amount of PNMs and all 4 sororities doubled in size.

Re: Websites
 

Yes, I was wondering about the sites you mentioned. I would like to see the website for the other chapter, and I would be more than willing to help the chapter without a site to create one.

AXiDTrish (or whoever started this thread), please PM me if you would like help with your website. This past semester, I redesigned our website and added a lot of new content too. If you'd like to see it, visit http://www.cbu.edu/Clubs/AST . Sisterly love, Marly


>>Make better use of the web. Seriously. Its a great PR tool, and it can reach not only currently enrolled women but prospective students thinking about attending your school in the future.

My suggestions are

1. Get a website for the chapter that doesn't currently have one.
2. Clean up the other chapter's existing website. Right now it does more harm than good in the way of PR.
3. Get more sorority representation on the Intergreek Council website. Currently, sororities seem like an afterthought since the page is so focused on the fraternities.
4. Have up to date recruitment and COB information available on the both the IGC site and the chapters, with the necessary contact info listed. -- BetaRose

I agree with whoever said doing the freshman move- in. That's a big deal on my campus and all of the sororities and fraternities usually love to help out. This past semester we did a "death by chocolate" event right before finals week so girls could come and relax. We had it in a big room with a big tv and we watched One Tree Hill, Real World, and Laguna Beach. Girls came in pajamas and some even brought their blankets! It was a lot of fun. Try making a day when all the actives have to wear letters to gain more visibility. If there aren't a lot of women on your campus, you could make little welcome to school packs for freshmen with things like pens, pencils, candy, gum, etc. and attach a little note to them that says something like Welcome to ___________ College from the sisters of Alpha Xi Delta. If there's food attached to anything, people will save it and remember it.