Black ball/De-lettering process?
 

My sorority is looking to remove a member of the house for her negative actions towards us, but we do not have any official process to do so. Does anyone have any ideas that could help us create one? If it's possible to share?

What kind of sorority are you in? NPC? NPHC? Local? Other?

Good question.

Has anyone ask said person why she did what she did?

Had a Brother who was Rep in IFC, voted anti the way he was told. He thought at the time he did right, but not way he was told. He was expelled.

Did not want to see it happen, I lost the battle. Found out later that he bad mouthed us all over campus. Was he right to do so or was he just hurt so bad that it killed him?

Find out all you can before comming to a major conclusion on this.

Oh my.

If your username holds and you're in PSP, you may consider contacting your National Office and seeing what policies are in place.

PSP isn't a sorority.

I know; their national website says they have a central office, so that office would likely be able to provide more support than us.

The OP said her sorority is looking to "blackball someone". PSP isn't a sorority. Thus, it isn't the correct organization.

I'm in a local organization. The individual that we are looking to remove just kind of came out of nowhere attacking individual sisters at first, but it eventually got to the point that she started making up rumors about our house and tried to get our charter revoked. Basically she tried to ban us from campus. We talked to her before with a mediator to attempt to solve individual issues between sisters, but it doesn't fix the fact that she tried to get us banned for no reason.

How can you have a charter revoked if you don't have a charter from a National organization? Are you a recognized group on your campus? Is that what you are referring to as no longer being recognized by the campus. You need to go to the organization/Student life that allows you to be a part of the campus. Just wait and see.

Yes, we are a recognized group on our campus. As a house we feel it's almost pointless to go to the student life office to have them assist us in forming a member removal process because, in simple terms, they don't give a shit. To them, our problems are not immediate to them so long as we have the right paperwork.

I would definitely talk to your Student Life director, Greek Life director, whatever you have available. S/He may be able to offer some support or find a way to just make her go away.

eta/ok, so to remove that as an option, do you have an advisor, alumnae, someone who can help who might be seen as a disinterested third party?

Consult your alumnae. They more than likely have run into this problem before. I would NOT contact the Greek life/student life advisor unless you feel comfortable with them having a role in your member selection process in other ways.

We're a fairly new organization (within the last 20 years) so our alumni have never really encountered a situation such as this that called for removal of an individual. But, I suppose the suggestions are worth a try.

If you have been around 20 years, you have had at least one a-hole that needed kicked to the curb. Trust me. You should have discipline and termination procedures in place not just for this sort of thing but if people don't go to events, don't pay dues etc. Again, your alums are the best people to help you.

1 year or 20 years old, I guarantee you have alumnae that went through similar issues. I would find that extremely hard to believe otherwise.

If you have no procedures for this, your group should really sit down and formulate a standard plan for this in the event of any case in which you think someone should be removed from membership. This is not something that should be done willy nilly. Having procedures voted on and written out to follow anytime a questionable event occurs is what more established groups do. From my experience, having members in question speak to a standards board to investigate, go into probation if needed and be removed from membership if the situation progresses that far is the usual way that things are handled. The matter of how many sisters are needed to vote to place a member on probation or to remove a sister from membership is what you need to decide and how fully involved you want your alumnae in this process. I would encourage you to have all of this well thought out and documented. Letting sisters know what these procedures are is also important so that everyone is on the same page as to what actions may lead to probation or dismissal from the group.

My chapter is a mere 11 years old at this point (though we are a chapter of a well-established national NIC fraternity). We have membership removal procedures in place and used 'em early and often.

Our trial code procedures are fairly straightforward. There are basically two sets of categories for membership removal--conduct unbecoming of a member of our chapter or failing to timely pay dues.

In each case, a Plaintiff brother will draw up a complaint which essentially lays out the facts which that brother wants to call the other brother to trial over whether he shall remain a member. In your case, if you had our rules, I'd try to get together a multicount complaint citing each one of the alleged offenses. This document is typed up and is signed by our judicial officer (most often this is the President) and the complainant (plaintiff).

The document is then served upon the offending brother either by hand or by registered mail, return receipt requested with a requirement for his signature (I forget what that's called, I have a secretary who does that for me, ask one of them).

Within a specified amount of time, a trial is scheduled. A trial must at least have a quorum of members present.

The trial is conducted a lot like a real trial, except that there aren't any rules of evidence or anything like that. Non-members are not brought in to testify. When their testimony has been crucial, and in one particular case, the witness was in a sorority, I contacted their chapter adviser for permission to speak with the witness and we had her interviewed and the interviewer gave testimony about what she told him.

Also, the accused has the right to have someone help him prepare his defense.

We then have closing arguments and finally, the plaintiff and defendant leave. We then have jury deliberations and a vote. First to convict (simple majority) and then whether to expel, requiring 3/4.

A detailed record is kept and is sent to HQ.

That's how we do it. I suspect many of our NIC and NPC groups handle things entirely differently. Our system works for us. For whatever reason, a lot of our alumni are lawyers, so help is never hard to find.

Really though, it's your organization. If your bylaws allow, membership removal could be nothing more than a motion requiring a second and a simple majority with debate per Robert's Rules (if you use those).

I see it now--I wasn't understanding what you meant, thanks! I'm at home on break so the noggin isn't as sharp these days, haha

Thank you! this was really along the lines of what I was looking for. Not intending to steal it but really just tips like this to build our own process.