Where is the largest chapter of your GLO located? How many members?
 

The 2 largest Tri Sigma chapters are Elon University (80-90 girls) and University of Virginia (80 -90 girls). We're mostly at smaller schools, so we don't have any 200+ chapters just yet :)

I think Sigma Nu at Ole Miss has over 200.

Jocelyn, according to Elon's Greek Life website, Sigma had 162 members in the Spring of 2004 :)

Link to Elon's Greek Life website

WOW. I stand corrected! That's really awesome, thanks hun! :)

Gamma Delta chapter of Alpha Gamma Delta at Auburn University... well over 200.

Dee

Whoa! Do they all know each other? My high school graduating class had 86 people, and I don't think I can name every single person.

Phi Kappa Psi
 

I believe that our Texas Alpha chapter, at the University of Texas, has over 170 active members.

I think Tri Delta's Ole Miss chapter has 250ish.

really fraternal or body shop?
 

it seems insane to even call a group a fraternity or a sorority if it
has in excess of, say, 150. I remember we called the Sig Alphs at
KU "the happy hundred," and laughed when they could not even
identify the actives. To have 200 or more is ridiculous unless the
motive is to have a palace or simply overwhelm others with a
hyper-abundance of blonde cuties...
But, to each his own. I am sure the 200+ chapters have little in
common with their yankee sisters whose chapters may be under
30.
And, the quota system, varies from campus to campus, 5 to 95...
Well, my .02. This really smacks of hypocrisy...and some wonder
why others do not jump into Ole Miss with a chapter....LOL
But don't dare call yourselves close if'n you got a coupla hundred
in your club.
Sometimes I think we have strayed from our purposes.
And often it takes 2 or 3 fraternities at CU to even hold a function
with a sorority. And a couple of them had their charters pulled as
they were down to 85 members!
Well, this tirade will surely unleash some replies! Cheers!

I've always heard that Alpha Delta Pi's University of Texas chapter is the largest, but Auburn University has over 230 members.

This amazed me:
http://www.auburn.edu/adpi/images/co...e-small-04.jpg

(from 2 years ago)

Eric, my dear friend and fellow devotee of the Wilson Heller school of thought...I am reminded of the commerical that begins, "Don't hate me because I'm beautiful."
Fraternities are free to have as many or as few members as they want, uness their national office interferes. Membership often depends on how many they can attract, or how many they feel they need to compete, or how many they feel they should have in order to be what they want to be: intramural champs, first in the hearts of the sororities, national award winners, etc.
A friend of mine - a Lambda Chi alum - tells his chapter this about size: "If you have a fraternity of thirty men," he says, "Then you might make ten friends that you'll have for the rest of your life. If you are in a good, successful chapter of 100 men, you may take forty or fifty good friends with you through life."
There are exceptions, including some big campuses like Penn State, but the near universal reality is that, as Heller said, "all wanted benefits follow size." It's almost always true that the largest fraternities are the strongest, most prestigious, most accomplished, most popular. And, this is important: strong, accomplished chapters can attract who they want. We used to say: first class fraternities attract first class men; second class fraternities attract third class men.
You said one motive for having 150 men might be to "have a palace or to be overwhelmed with cute blondes." Eric, don't knock it! Palaces and cute girls are timeless attractions for the top pledges.
Again, it varies from campus to campus. At my school, my chapter has 180 men and I want them to have 200. We're building a $4 million house. We alumni want the undergrads to dominate sports, student government, standing in the sororities, all of it. Look, here is the bottom line: I do not believe that the quality of friendships is greater or lesser depending on the size of a chapter. I do believe that the quality of fraternity experience is greatly enhanced when the chapter is size-competitive.

Our James Madison U (Harrisonburg VA) chapter is the largest. I think they have 150+.

Erik, I know what you mean...I used to think how can a chapter that big have ANY sisterhood if they don't even know everyone in their pledge class, let alone all the sisters. I've come to the conclusion that you can, it's just different, that's all. I think it's the same for people who've gone to really large or small high schools. I know I would have not been comfy in that size chapter, just because of my personality - but if someone else can be happy that's cool for them. I wouldn't have been comfy at a huge school either...different strokes for different folks. It only becomes a problem when people start thinking every chapter should be like the mega huge chapters and make policy changes and dictates accordingly.

I believe our Brown Charge is the largest, with around 80+ men. Don't quote me, though, since Dartmouth and Stanford Charges are also around 75+ men.

I don't think we will ever reach more than 100 men in any of our Charges.

like to hear all points of view...
 

Yes, but our pal Wilson Benton Heller never envisioned chapters
of much more than a hundred. After WWII, especially in Florida,
the vets swelled, for a while, chapters of upwards of 180. TKE at
Louisiana Tech, a big jock house, had 176 men a few years back.
The attrition was atrocious. And, the well-known footballer Terry Bradshaw was a member there then. The chapter soon slimmed
down to a hundred, perhaps less. U of IL, Penn State, huge old
systems, rarely had chapters of a hundred. I was TKE adviser at
U of I, jock house, many All Americans...never got over 80. Beta
at Kansas U has an 80-some chapter, all live in. Grades, top on
campus for almost every year in past 60 years. When you went to play the Betas on an IM game...there was no question as to
who'd win...just how bad the Betas would beat you. Phi Psi, SAE,
Phi Gam, Phi Delt...all over a hundred...never had a chance. Beta
could have 200 easily....but somehow keeps the lid about eighty.
Imagine a function with a 95 member Chi O pledge class with the
35 member Tekes, the 25 Pikes, the 40 Lambda Chis (not real)
And, since so many woman vs. men, size-wise, none were to be
required to attend...hoping that the lop-sided numbers would somewhat reconcile. Is this a real exchange, or what?
Naw, true, you can have as big a chapter as your little ole heart desires, and build a 4 million or even 10 million dollar house.
What lesson are you teaching?
I do not think Heller would go ape shit over the thought of the
huge, the mammoth, the mega-chapter. And I personally knew
him well, collaborated with him many, many times...
But, I spoke my piece and you yours...that is what makes this site
valuable. But the definition of 'fraternity' will obviously vary, and
just look at the variety of clubs we have on a variety of campi.

mine is the largest...17 beautiful and wonderful girls. (it's nice to not have any competition ;))

i guess i can understand the whole 40 to 50 close friends when youre in a chapter of 100, but isnt the point of being in a fraternity or sorority to know all of your brothers/sisters? i am best freinds with every single girl in my sororoity and we have about 25 girls. on our campus the bigest chapter is, i believe, 55. last semester, one night at the bar, about a week before their initiation, i asked a girl from XYZ one of her pledges names, and she had to find 3 girls from her sorority before she could tell me. now there is something wrong with that.

Some sororities that are that big make their pledges memorize their composites. I think of that this way, though... our greek life system has thousands of people in it (I'm not sure the exact number), but I still know at least a few people from every sorority/fraternity, and am close friends with about 20 or 30 of them(from outside my chapter) so I figure if I can do that in a Greek Life system where I may only see people once a week, and there are thousands of people, then certainly these people in 200+ member chapters can, too. My chapter was only 90 people at it's biggest, and that's one of the things we enjoyed about it... we knew everyone else in our chapter. But at a big school that's building $2 or $3 million houses, as well as having a different philanthropic event every week (sometimes three in a week, as I've found out before) it does cause a problem and make things difficult. I dunno, it's a crazy debate that could go on for years... what's more important, being competitive on campus or having a true sisterly bond? I gotta say, though... We all feel a bond with ANYONE we see wearing our letters, whether from our chapter or not... and THAT's the point of being a part of a national or international organization.

AOII's biggest chapter is most likely at University of Georgia and then I know my chapter here at Ole Miss has over 200 members too.


At Ole Miss the Chi Chapter of Tri Delta has almost 300 members, as does the Alpha Psi chapter of Delta Gamma, Alpha Mu Chapter of Kappa Delta and Tau Chapter of Chi Omega. I believe the Alpha Delta Chapter of Phi Mu has about 250 members....

Re: like to hear all points of view...
 

Erik, as always, great e-mail. From the KU Beta website:

Academics:
"Since 1934, the Betas have had the highest GPA among KU fraternities every semester but five (they finished second in '48, '51, '53, '82, and '00). The Chancellor's Cup has remained in the Beta trophy collection every semester but two since the award was established in 1979-80."

Sports:
"As early as 1950, the Betas found themselves "competing against houses with larger memberships." That situation has continued to exist since that time. How then, have the Kansas Betas had such an impressive overall record? The Kansas Betas notes, "The Betas won, it seems, not because of better athletic talent but because they cared more, worked harder, and had practically every man in the house involved in one sport or another." Which still remains true today."

Recruitment (it appears they choose 24 guys a year):
"At 1425 Tennessee we regard rush as one of the most important of all Hutt actives. Every year we bring together 24 of the strongest young men, and make them stronger as they become one united class over the next six months. Although we receive many recommendations from the active chapter we also rely on the alumni for their support; and it is through your support that the Hutt stays strong. However, if you are interested in rushing the Beta house and do not know any Beta Alumni or actives within the chapter please fell free to contact our rush chairs."

I was thinking, based on rush numbers alone, if Auburn Gamma Delta's well over 200, then Epsilon (Kentucky) and Upsilon (Oklahoma) must be around that number also...since quota in recent years have been in the 40-50-60 range.

I really don't know if I'd be able to handle so many sisters!

According to our website this is our info. It was updated on Sept 16

•Largest chapters:
Alpha Psi-Mississippi: 250
Alpha Iota-Oklahoma: 237
Mu-Missouri: 223
Gamma Zeta-Louisiana State: 213
Alpha Nu-Southern California: 204

D Phi E's biggest chapter is probably the Delta Kappa chapter at University of Florida with like 175 members.

How many are actually active in the 200+ member chapters...?

The sororities on my campus max out at like 90, but truely active girls-that's closer to like 30. Maybe 40 tops. Among the frats on my campus, the largest is under 60, but active guys...maybe 25.

In my opinion, numbers really don't meet anything. I would rather have a small chapter that when I call them brother, I am proud to say that, rather than have 150 guys with most of them I don't know personally.

I just guessing b/c I don't think it's published anywhere. I think ours is the Psi chapter at James Madison Univ. w/ 130 women. Correct me if I'm wrong.

I think so, too. That's a lot of sisters! :D

For Gamma Phi, I'm sure of the absolute biggest chapter, but I do know that Oklahoma, Southern Cal, possibly Kansas are all very large chapters.

DU is around 160 members at OU. Missourri has 130.

I can truely understand Eriks point of view about largeness of a GLO.

If one is walking across campus and sees someone wearing letters would they know them or think maybe it is someone just wearing them?

At one time, We had a chapter size of 65 which was very large on our campus. Many years when I was active in the earlt post grad years, I knew everyone.

A space evolved for me of some years that I was not active and knew so few. Now, though, back into Chapter life, I still know many if not most for the last seveal years. But remembering names is another thing.

I just cannot imagine having chapters of these sizes and not knowing who my Brothers and Sisters were.

Whoa! That's an Alpha Delta Pi ARMY!

the poor photographer who had to mat that entire composite. I bet he took a long vacation.

Probably a pretty long vacation at that, because we have 16 sororities here, all about the same size. But they (Vantine Photography) just do the composites; local photographers do socials and other events. The last couple of years we've taken composite pictures not long after starting fall semester and it's taken until almost the next summer to get our composites back.

Anyway, back on topic, I don't know where our largest chapter is, but I'd be willing to be that we're one of the larger ones.

A lot of companies won't consider our chapters because they aren't large enough. I think fraternal composites has done a few, but so many chapters were fed up wth their service that we've found other ones. My chapter's most recent one turned out FANTASTIC. They were taken in the backyard of our house, and we all look very pretty. It's funny because in half of those pictures, my big is crouched down behind the person holding one of her concert black dresses around us as a drape!!! hehehe.

Wait, I'm confused, I thought you were a local...

So what you are saying, they do not want money becaues of the size?:(

What Asses!:mad:

When did size matter?

Yep, we are. We still get composites done.

Well, if you really think about it, paying a photographer for his time and driving and the processing and printing costs for a chapter with only 17 girls isn't really cost effective for most companies.

Really? Maybe it's because all of the sororities on my campus always range in the 20's-30's, but we've never had problems with getting companies to do composites for us. They're good about putting our crest on the composites too.

Awesome. As a working photographer...it does get expensive doing group portraits. I've been toying with the idea of doing black and whites for us...might be fun/interesting. The guy we got to do this years gave us a super good price and he did awesome work. He was a friend of one of our older sisters, but we all looked beautiful and we got it this summer, whereas our 2003 composite is still MIA I believe.

I think that Theta Sigma at UCF might be our largest chapter. I've heard they have 175ish. Not sure about that though.

Upsilon is one of the smaller chapters at OU, around 130ish....

And quota has been around 80-90 since 2001.... :(

Hee, hee - be careful! They're armed (with Louis Vuitton!) and dangerous!