GLOs a 4-year commitment?
 

Today at church, I was talking with a senior who's a Greek at one of Georgia's universities. I asked her how many of her original pledge class were still in her sorority. To my shock, she said 8 of 55. She said that there wasn't any mass desistering or anything--a few transferred, a few dropped out of college, but most just drifted away.

I was shocked because this student is in an extremely strong group on a very Greek campus. Her friend assured me that it's not just the first girl's group--that her group (also strong) has 9 left of 55.:confused:

I come from large SEC schools where it's such a big deal to get into most groups that you don't just blow it off or quit paying your dues or decide that 5 hours a month of service are too much. If you stay in school, you stay Greek and most pledge classes graduate relatively intact.

What's the norm at your school?

I don't know how many girls I've met here on campus that say, "Oh, I'm not a XYZ anymore... I got tired of it." At which point I want to slap them. I can understand the ones that tranfer, get married, or have to drop out because of various reasons such as money etc. The ones that I don't get are the ones that simply get bored with it. I've always gotten the impression that it's a commitment that you keep through school and after.

At my school, it was normal to see relatively small senior classes. It wasn't just my chapter; it was this way with every fraternity or sorority on my campus. My pledge class had 64 girls; at graduation, we had 14. Well, 22 is probably a more accurate number since we had a bunch of girls graduate a year to a semester early. Believe it or not, having 22 women left from the original pledge class was actually considered good. Many of the chapters on our campus were left with maybe 9 seniors.
There are a few girls that transfer to another school but I think that many just do not want to try and hang around for 4 years. They get into a serious relationship and no longer have time to devote to the sorority, their classes become too hard, or they just become disenchanted by the whole sorority/fraternity thing. As we all know, there comes a time in everyone's collegiate GLO career where we just become annoyed with our chapter and some of the things that are going on. I guess many people would rather give up than try to make the situation better.

At my school women stay active all 4 years. It's typical to have a few resign from their chapters, but definitely nowhere near the number you guys are talking about! I think we have 55 seniors this year graduating out of about 60-65 that started, which is good considering we were just chartered 2 1/2 years ago!

At my school many of the classes are much smaller by the end. Our greek system isn't very large though, in turn new member classes only start out as 10 to 20 members. The other factor is we have many women transfer to other schools. Also I know we have many women who join who aren't freshman, which in turn has them graduating at different times. Also we have women who graduate both early or late. From my alpha class we had 2 of us graduate in under 4 years. One who got into a grad program that let her finish her undergrad at the same time, in turn having her leave early. We also had one woman who had transfered from a community college who graduated from our school in under 4 years. My class had very few that left just to leave the chapter. More than not it was because they were graduating at other times or transfering. There have also been some that have had to leave for financial reasons. In state tuition at my school isn't much but many students are paying that out of pocket and realize that they don't end up having the money to pay for sorority functions and what not also.

Out of eight in my pledge class that accepted bids 20 years ago, four depledged during our pledge period, four of us were initiates; I am the only one who's active in the Fraternity as an alumnus - lost touch with the rest of my pledge brothers.

It's not unusual for people to drop out of active status, even though there is no inactive status in the Fraternity, nor can one resign from membership. Some don't quite place the 'commitment to the fraternity for life' as strongly as others do.

That's how it's SUPPOSED to be. You get out of it what you put into it...........oh the stories I could tell on this topic :P My opinion is that if one is bored with it, most likely they arent putting that much into it to not be bored. As most of us will agree, there are so many things one can do and get involved in with being greek, that if you allow yourself to do those things, there shouldnt be time for bordom. The frustrations that come with being in a group are so worth it if kept at it. Positive things often come from those experiences.

Most of the girls in my pledge class are still active. A few have flunked out, one got married, one quit, and three have transferred. I pledged as a Junior so I was the first one to graduate out of my class.

In my observation this seems to be the norm for sororities at the U. of Pennsylvania. Pledge classes of 50 or more sometimes lead to senior classes of 20 or even 10...and it certainly isn't because students are dropping out or failing. On that campus, it's cool to rush as a freshman, but it's viewed as kind of lame if you still take it seriously by senior year. The campus culture assumes that as a senior, you'll be out in the city on your own, thinking about grad school, etc., and you're basically supposed to be above all of that Greek-system nonsense. (Needless to say, this attitude isn't universal, but it's fairly prevalent.)

wow...this is such a foreign concept to me.

This is another reason that I am the big deferred rush cheerleader that I am. You just get completely burned out by senior year, and if you've rushed before classes and before you have any other friends, it's hard to find somewhere to go to take the pressure off when you need to.

And I'm sure that the group carnation's speaking of was ecstatic when they got that quota of 55. Too bad they could not look further ahead than bid day. (This isn't singling that group out, all groups do that to a point.)

I've said it before, we need to get our minds off quota and onto retention.

Most women at Akron stay in their chapters for all 4 years (sometimes longer). We have the women that drop out here and there and the transfers and so on, but nothing of my knowledge of it being that extreme. Now if you were to ask me how many women were left from my pledge class (Fall 99) during my last year (2003), I was the only one out of 16. Some women transferred, some were sophomores when they pledged and graduated a year and a half before me, and the women who should've went alum along with me decided to go alum a year before me because of upcoming graduations. I allowed myself to stay longer than them by not going to summer school because I wanted to run for office again since I was on Panhellenic the year before. In a way it was nice being the only one because everyone looked up to you as the example and knew that if they had a question they could come to you, but it was also disappointing because it would've been nice to have someone going along side of me. But hey.....it did prove to be pretty nice that we only lost 2 members from graduation in one semester instead of a whole class of women.....

My pledge class started out at about 23-24, one dropped during pledging and about 7-8 depledged some time in those four years. I think we had about 15 seniors by the time I graduated, which is about average. Not all of them stayed super involved (there was a core of about 7 who moved out and we rarely heard from the last semester) but they still considered themselves a part of our chapter.

We had recruitment right away in the fall, before classes started. In the pledge classes below mine, the numbers were about the same.

I'm wondering if this could be related to the fact that most sororities initiate their NMs after 6-8 weeks these days. When that's done, a new member can be slated and become an officer during her freshman year whereas back when you had to wait for grades to be initiated, you couldn't be an officer until the last half of your sophomore year. If you're an officer during your first 2 years, maybe that doesn't leave you much to look forward to the last year and a half.

I don't know--I'm just looking for answers.

NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

I think the difference is that with NPHC and other cultural-interest Greeks, the idea that we are in for life in so drilled into us that either you remain active or consider yourself invisible. We don't have the option of not being in our respective organizations, because regardless of the amount of energy we are able to put forth, we will always be considered a member. It is a lifetime commitment that we aren't allowed to take lightly.

Re: NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

That really made no sense. There are those in your org that chose not to be involved later on too I'm sure. Furthermore, when you're org is a fraction of the size of other orgs, then you will also have less people being uninvolved.

-Rudey

I think that definitely might be something to do with it. Also, I don't know about everyone else but our offices used to run on the school year instead of the calendar year, so if you were a senior and wanted to you could have an office. I know that a lot of groups advise you to not have seniors in office, but depending on your schedule, senior year might not be your most challenging academically and might be really the first time you can devote yourself to it. With calendar year schedules, you can't do that.

It's definitely the norm about here - girls get burnt out, they get kicked out, they get sick of the double standards, etc. My pledge class had 11 girls - 9 of us were initiated. One resigned after initiation due to a completely acceptable issue, two are no longer members and I will not say anymore, and I transferred. That leaves 5 girls out of the class of 11 who are still active - and one is studying at UGa this semester so there's only 4 there. We're juniors.

This wasn't seen with other sororities on our campus because they'd take 11 girls and have 7 depledge, then initiate four. They all list girls on their rosters who they haven't seen around in years just to "look bigger" than us.

I've never seen a campus that doesn't list all their members to make the chapters look bigger. LOL

-Rudey

I've been fortunate to have only seen one sister ever resign in my entire 3.5 years as an Alpha Phi. But I will admit that we have lost sisters to transferring. However, we keep pretty close ties with most of the girls who leave through their big sisters and close friendships.

I'm not saying that my chapter is perfect, because some of us do get burnt out or become "Phantom Phis" for awhile, but I'm hoping that we've drilled in the "Alpha Phi for a lifetime" mentality. We have some awesome alumnae who have remained dedicated to the chapter since graduation, and dedicated to Alpha Phi, and they're a wonderful inspiration to all new and old sisters.

Re: Re: NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

and using that logic, more members would equate more post graduate or prophyte (couldn't think of any other word) involvement...now from the responses in this thread, is that the case?

Re: Re: Re: NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

Foolish boy, yes that is the case.

-Rudey

Re: Re: Re: Re: NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

unintelligent simp, no it's not.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

I'm actually sad that you didn't tell me I was reaching, that your experience is hardcore, and a bunch of other things. I miss that from you but I did enjoy this brilliant conversation you had with me where you showed me how you had more involved members.

-Rudey
--I put you back on ignore Gansta Einstein.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

nah, because that would constitute that you said something of merit to begin with. as it is, you are still a mental simpleton who is too scared and not intelligent to admit when he's wrong. put me on ignore, that just means you're not man enough to back up any of your statements.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

mmmm mmmmm grunt mmmm i luv asns who think their black mmm mmmm owww mmmm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: NPHC and other MC Greeks
 

oh snap

Haha this is hilarious.

Also back to the topic, people do you realize that your GLO no matter how important it is to you, also is not the only thing in your life? My senior year I had a thesis, I applied to over 200 jobs, I was busy dealing with what life beyond college would be like, figuring out what would happen to a relationship beyond college, still taking classes, etc. And I'm sorry but my GLO would never have accepted me knowing I gave to them while flunking out senior year and being unemployed.

-Rudey

My chapter
 

Out of my new member class, everyone was initiated.

Four transferred.
Two dropped out of school.
One deactivated.
Six graduated.

Of the six who graduated, two of them were 5-year seniors due to the schools they were in. Oh, in our time, we were the largest pledge class on campus! :)

4 year commitment
 

My pledge class had 25 members. We initiated 18. Perhaps 10 stayed for four years.
This percentage was probably pretty accurate for NIC Fraternities at UT-Austin in the 1980's.
Good thread, good question to ask.

My pledge class had 7 members.
One deferred initiation until the following term, but is still active.
One transfered.
One did not return to university for second year.
One took a term off, but is now active again.
Thus out of 7 pledged:
4 of us are still active.

Oh wow...let me think. 18 pledged ADPi on Bid Day 1996....and in the end there were 6.

1 dropped out on Bid Day
11 dropped out or were kicked out for various reasons...mainly because of grades and other standards issues.

So in the end there were 6 of us...I love them all dearly...they know it is for a lifetime...not just 4 years.

That's the way it was for me...by the time I graduated, there were less than 10 seniors graduating with me. The older a member got, usually the less you'd see her around. My sisters thought I was strange because I was still doing stuff with my sorority when I was a senior...I think they both went alum early. However, my chapter was different from most in that we started as a colony and we COB'd a lot in the beginning, so most of the pledge classes we took while I was active had a mix of freshmen, sophomores, and some juniors. We even took a senior once who had a couple more years to go. So the group of seniors that I graduated with were from a number of different pledge classes...I think only 2 or 3 of them were from my own pledge class.

Yes, we talk, educated and try to impress upon new members that joining a GLO is a lifetime experience and that they are expected to be members of the collegiate chapter during their entire undergraduate career. As many of you have stated and as research has shown, an undergraduate in their senior year has different needs. They've reached a point in their lives that learning financial planning is NOT how to pay tuition, rent and dues... it's looking at investments, mortgages, paying back those student loans. Keeping those women active in your chapter as mentors, leaders-by-example (if not in elected positions) may take rethinking our position on attendance of mandatory events, including educational programs.

Pi Beta Phi has restructured our senior transitional program to make it more appealing to those women and hopefully more meaningful. If we still provide something of value, something unique, perhaps we won't see the seniors all disappear by December.

Interesting thread!

In my local, all 7 founding members remained active through graduation. I pledged with 4 other women; one disappeared when we became a colony of AEPhi but the rest of us remained active through graduation.

Since we became a chapter of AEPhi, I don't believe anyone has ever depledged. I can think of only a handful of women who deaffiliated. Most of those were due to a reorganization that happened the year after I went alum (i.e. women resigning in protest). So we had, and still have, a pretty high retention rate through the collegiate years.

Some other chapters at my school have poorer retention rates. My freshman year, XYZ took quota of 32; 16 were still active at graduation. :(

Wow...I've never heard of that many girls dropping out! Up until this year, pledge classes were around 55, and we still have around 45 seniors. In my pledge class we had 2 deactivate and 1 transfer, but everyone else is still active...

Just to ditto Ms. Gunther, Pi Phi has some great new programming for seniors designed to combat just this problem, and I've found it to be highly effective so far in my term as President, especially compared to the programming I was implementing before as Membership Chair.

In response to the question in general, deactivating is huge at W&L. Lots and lots of women leave after their sophomore year--usually, I think, to disillusionment with rush and the whole Greek system. I think GLOs are so "hyped" here that people enter with rose-colored glasses. I think the fraternities tend to have fewer deactivations than the sororites, and the sororities can vary. Almost all the groups lose at least one girl every year. I have a friend in a group who is very strong on our campus and she said that 25% of her pledge class had already left (this friend is a junior like me). My own pledge class has had like 2 transfers, 1 deactivation, and 1 person take collegiate alumna status. I'd say these numbers are about average--but some groups have many more. Honestly I think a lot of women get turned off to the cutthroat nature of rush here--many women come here without much knowledge of GLOs (myself included) and do it because it's the thing to do, unprepared for the reality of rush from the other side. But that's just W&L, I think.

As a senior Pi Phi I just wanted to mention how great this new program is. It has bonded my senior class even more, and it has given us a chance to talk to alums in our area.

I know I plan on becoming an active alum as soon as I graduate. I never intend to be one of those four year members. :)

My school in general is different anyway as people don't generally come in as a freshman with the idea of going greek we take a lot of transfer juniors and sophomores so pledge classes contain a lot of people... becuase of this though we have a lot of turn around also.. (with sisters leaving after only two year if they started as a junior) People also transfer a lot... EVEN so three of the ladies I pledged with are still around (although one had a hiatus at JC to up her GPA) but I am the only one who has graduated.... but we genreally initiate all of our women every semester... ( at least the two and a half years I was active we never had a new member drop) but then after that is when we start losing them if we're going to... transferring, disaffiliation etc.. but I'd say we keep about 90% of freshman who join until they are seniors... :D
I don't know... but it seems to me at schools where being greek is THE thing to do/be that if you don't you feel like an outcast so of course you're going to do it even if you don't really care to make the committment... so of course a lot of the members aren't going to stick around if they just joined out of social pressure really instead of genuine interest in belonging to the greek community.

My new member class had 12 girls accept bids, one of them depledged, so 11 were initiated. Of those 11, 8 graduated, 1 dropped out of the university (she may have transferred, but I think she took at least a semester off...), and 2 are on the 5 year program and awaiting graduation.