Initiation with large pledge classes
 

When a sorority has something like 70 new members, how do you initiate them? Do most groups hold a giant initiation or do you try to split it up so the groups are smaller? I have always wondered about this! Our school has chapter total at 45, so we don't face that issue, but it seems like it would be tough to try to have that many girls in a ceremony...and pinning would have the same problem.

We had fairly large pledge classes (between 50-60 girls) and we always did one initiation.

Part of my class was initiated part on Thursday night and part on Saturday morning. They divided us alphabetically.

:eek: I could never have the patience to sit through all that! I mean, I'm assuming you have to initiate one person at a time? I'm glad I go to a small school where pledge classes are never more than 20!

I'm the alumna advisor in charge of ritual for one of our Georgia chapters. Since we usually have around 50 girls in our fall pledge class each year, initiation is a fairly long process. We only take a few girls at a time, so we start early in the afternoon. But we always initiate everyone on the same day. :)

Yeah it does take a loooooooooooong time. But at least it's only once a year! :)

All sororities on my campus rush both semesters (at our school it is not a faux pas to graduate in December, so it happens frequently and so we lose girls at the semester break). Granted, the initiation in the spring is smaller than the fall, but still, we have to do initiation twice a year and even though the most people I have ever seen initiated is 20, even that took forever. I cannot imagine having 3 times that many! Well, thanks for all your answers!

Our fall pledge classes were typically between 7 and 10 people, so we never had that problem.

Other sororities on campus had fall pledge class sizes in the 30's. I know of at least one that split the class in half and had 2 sessions of initiation, one a couple of hours after the other.

I can't imagine having half the NMs initiated 2 whole days before the other half - I would hate to be the alphabetically first girl on the Saturday list :)

I dont know the accuracy, but
 

I have heard that one of the largest chapters has two initiations going on simultanoiusly. Other chapters split it up into two days. If we were in that situation I would advocate 2 at the same time. Dont like splitting it up. I think it alters the intentions of the author(s) of our ritual.

Lifesaver,
You are correct...there are several chapters that hold "concurrent" rituals, especially for large Associate Member classes. I don't agree with running an initiation that way, but, I can understand the reasoning behind it.

The largest class I ever watched go through ritual was 28 :eek: - and, as you can imagine, it took a very very very long time.

I won't go into specifics, (neither should anyone else) - but suffice it to say, the larger the class, the less sleep anyone will get.

I think the most we've ever done was 20 something. But we also rush all year round, so we usually have a fall formal, a fall informal and 1-2 spring informals to initiate, so we get tons of practice! :D

We have 35-25 in the fall and we do it at the same time, out ritual is usually over one night and one morning, but it goes in groups sort of. Its hard to explain without saying something, but granted it does take hours and hours if its 35 girls.

Gosh, I am having trouble remembering if we did it over 2 days or not. My pledge class was 48 and I know we started veeeeery early in the morning. Took a long time because only 2 got initiated at a time.

Alpha Gams are initiated by birthdate. IIRC the new member class are initiated in groups of 7 or so -- it's not a mystic number, just a practical one. It does help to be one of those initiated at the beginning, so you get to see what you just went through!

A couple of weeks after my initiation I was home for spring break. A chapter near my hometown combined initiation and International Reunion Day (=AGD's founders' day) and I got to attend. It was a wonderful reinforcement of my own experience.

(Thanks for bringing this up--I hadn't thought about that last part in years!)

More black markers! ;):p:D

No comment other than to say, "yes" it takes a loooong time. But, it's worth the time and effort....:)

I wish my chapter had such a problem when I was there. A couple of years ago they initiated 45 new sisters! I always wondered how they did it.

Now I am sooo curious but I wouldn't dream of asking! Initiating only a few girls at a time? Like two at a time? The way ours works you couldn't do that! I can understand splitting it up into two ceremonies if the class is big, but we couldn't do two concurrently ... just not possible.

When we install a new chapter of course it's one very LONG ceremony... imagine initiating 70 girls at once!

We held initiation over two LONG days. I can't remember the exact number of my PC, but we did it by twos, and started on Friday and the last to get initiated was late on Saturday. It was definetly a great bonding experience, but exhausting at the same time!

If we have a large new member class then we would split the group into two groups. Two groups of women would perform the ritual (the current and probably past officers). Only one woman at a time goes through Triangle degree....it just shows how special it is for each woman, one at a time.

When we do Installations, it takes forever, but is fun. Two rooms are used.

My freshman year was when AOII recolonized and we had 150 girls. We were all initiated on the same day. It took all day...not kidding! We did have a slight break, but it wasn't like we could go get lunch or something!

All of our new pledge classes since mine was initiated were made up of 50 girls and they all went on the same day as well. It's a long day, but worth it. We only do it once a year so it isn't so bad.

We don't have a problem with having too large of a class, and I can't say too much without revealing anythin but we do have an option (as do other organizations I've heard of) for allowing the class president to act on behalf of the entire class if necessary. Personally, I don't like this option and I think that if the situation ever arose during my term of office I would opt not to let the class president act for all.

Emmi