Bama Fraternities
 

I'm a senior in high school and have written about this sort of thing before but now i need specifics. I am very much like SECDomination in morals (quote below) but I will probably be attending the university of alabama in the fall. does anyone know of any fraternities there that dont get too crazy?

thanks man, sorry I really didn't word that question right. But if anyone goes to alabama and has an answer to my question feel free to send me a message

Alpha Tau Omega.
They're dry, they have the highest GPA, and now they're going green.
http://media.www.cw.ua.edu/media/sto...-3138734.shtml
The daughter, a recent UA grad, claims they're all nerds. If so, good for them. I know several of their members and they are all fine young men from steady families.
BUT...you can still be a sober, upright member of most any other fraternity. Most of the crap you hear about fraternities is just that - crap.

Now if you were going to Florida, Fratty would be happy to give you answers. He is good with stereotyping.

yea thats definitely good advice - i mean im not really opposed to drinking responsibly but when people start getting hammered that annoys me. anyway, is there an AGR equivalent at bama? bc I know the one at UT is great

you could visit the greeklife website at bama and learn what fraternities have chapters on campus.

do be aware that chapters vary from campus to campus-the top chapter at state u will not necessarily be the top chapter at u. of state.

^^^That's pretty cool :)

Wrong school. It was PhiGam. You have a lot more discression,, except for your signature.

I can't say I know anything about Alabama fratnerities but I think it's really cool that you don't seem willing to compromise what your own beliefs/morals/etc are in order to join a group, so kudos to you & best of luck in your pursuit of Greek life :)

Rush in the fall. Meet all the Greek orgs. Tell them your beliefs and see what their reaction is.

Once you meet the brothers you will probably be able to tell which ones you would fit in best with. Be careful though. I'm not going to lie, people can be very fake during rush events.

That won't cut it at a lot of Southern schools. Most top houses will basically be done putting their pledge classes together by the time formal rush roles around.

That gives me the heeby geebies.

I don't know a whole lot about southern schools. I go to southern illinois (about 20 minutes from kentucky) but at times it feels like the deep south.

For example, when I went to a bar outside of town, I say a guy with a shirt that said "KKK - The original boys in the hood". I left pretty quickly when I saw that!

yea i did spring rush for SAE at South Carolina, i just got accepted and am now a pledge, i know especially at Bama a lot of people know eachother from highschool and the local area. So you might want to look for someone you know really well who went there before you and pledged.

I got friends who are Kappa Sig there at Bama and i know connections to older brothers known previously was key because they stuck up for you on voting.

So in other words if you know a lot of people in one i'd go fall, if you don't then try and get to know them in your classes and go spring. It doesn't hurt to try fall though, if all else fails you are right where you started.

Call the greek life office. Ask for the VP of Recruitment. He can give you all the phone numbers and emails of the rush chairs for every house. Call them up or email them and most of them will invite you to at least one rush event. DON'T wait until the fall to start looking. You will end up in a university house...you'll know what I mean when you get here. ATO sounds like a good option for you, but there are tons of guys in most of the houses that sound like you. They just don't get the attention because they don't fit the stereotype the CW likes to portray of everyone.

The KKK's really not a strictly "Southern" thing. It's a very popular hate group in the Midwest.

^^^ My historically black sorority was founded in 1922 in Indiana - also known as Klandiana at that time.

True, but I'm from Northern Illinois. I had heard stories of them but never actually seen one. We also happened to drive by a "meeting" in a cornfield on the way to the party once. Regardless of your race, that stuff is just creepy.

:eek: :eek: :eek: It seems like that moment should've happened about 75 or 100 years ago.

I'm from the Deep South. Lived here my whole life, and I've never (that I know of) actually seen a Klansman either. Definitely never seen a meeting or rally in person - I've heard of them taking place, and seen video footage, but I guess I just keep to the right areas of town or something ... they're definitely around: http://www.splcenter.org/intel/map/hate.jsp

you serious???

I'm from Georgia as well. go into North Georgia, Lilburn, Blue Ridge, Elijay, etc...

there are Klansman on the road collecting money to this day like a shriner. Ofcourse they get stuff thrown at them by most but some actually give to them.

Hell back in Marietta, Georgia some kids used to sneak up and watch Klan meetings for shits and giggles.

I'm so glad I grew up on the Southside! Wow.

I Found Fraternity Scholarship & Membership Totals
 

My son is probably going through recruitment in the fall as well if he can find a good fit with a group there. His dad and I would also like him to find a "less crazy" fraternity as well. He's not into all that himself. He'd also like to find one that doesn't have a low GPA.

I looked on www.ua.edu website and found the Greek Life website. From there I found the listing of the fraternities, sometimes with the local websites of each fraternity. Some groups don't have websites, but many have some impressive websites.

I also found the Spring 2007 listing of Fraternity Scholarship and Membership Totals. www.ua.edu/~greeklif/Scholarship.html They don't have the 2008 listing yet. Anyway, that ought to help somewhat in the meantime.

Why?

We already know who we want.

I would venture to say that 3/4ths of the Fall pledge class is already signed before for Formal Rush. The 1/4th we find through rush or already know alot about them but aren't sure.

edit: at Arkansas you can't "officially sign" someone. Early bid cards are a way of getting someone to commit, even though it has no real bearing.

Not crazy to me.^^

Back in the day, numerous sororities knew exactly who they were targeting and they made sure efforts were made for those individuals during rush. It was obvious. (You know much of this was discussed/planned ahead of time) Actually, that was my first rude awakening in college and in life. What was even a greater shock, when you found out one or many of the young women did not know a single member in the sorority. Obviously, other factors came into play on some level, but recruitment was not done on an even playing ground. (at least from my experience)

That sounds about right. Most IFC recruitment at Bama occurs prior to the official Formal Recruitment in the fall. Any interested guys need to get themselves "out there" now.

FYI - That's how it was with my older brothers at the Univ of Illinois back in the early 80's. Same thing when I was a Little Sister helping the guys rush in the late 80's. I have no idea if it's still like that today.

Some High Schoolers Already Have Fraternity Stickers...
 

At my children's private school here in Mobile, AL, there are several high school boys who already have the fraternity stickers on their cars. I started noticing them before Christmas!

I know that's the way it is, but all this early rushing doesn't seem fair to those who are coming in from out of state. They did send out an IFC brochure outlining how they give out bids during recruitment.

As far as sorority recruitment goes, some around here think being from one of the bigger cities, say like Mobile or Birmingham, actually hurts your chances. That it's too competitive. Just a theory based on seeing lots of great girls get cut at Auburn and Alabama from Mobile and other larger cities in Alabama.

Is there a quota of some kind in fraternities at Alabama, or Auburn,for certain areas? At Southern Miss (granted- not a big Greek School) we never had a quota, but certain sororities and fraternities did pull an unusual amount from certain areas. Still, it was pretty spread out, not that localized.

I wouldn't call it a "quota" but the same as most other fraternities throughout the SEC and elsewhere tend to pull guys from certain areas specifically. For example, I could name the predominant cities/schools that each fraternity at Arkansas pulls from.

Quota
 

Yeah, that's what I figured.

Now, do fraternities at Alabama have a certain number of new members to shoot for, like sororities do? For instance, ours was up to 30 new members. We couldn't get more than that.

I noticed on the Scholarship and Membership totals from Fall 2006 (they didn't have a more recent one up) that the new member number for each fraternity is all over the place.

Or in the Blues Brothers movie.

"Illinois Nazis... I hate Illinois Nazis."

Generally speaking, each IFC chapter usually has a specific target number (or range) in mind regarding new members. These numbers are self imposed/selected and not mandated by the IFC.

For example, a chapter may need twenty new members to meet it's financial obligations over the course of the next four to five years.. Thus, twenty would be the "minimum" target number. Most chapters will continue to bid over that number if there are men that they (the chapter) feels are worthy of a bid.

That's only sort of true here.

Depending on the size of the chapter is how many bids can be given out. A smaller chapter (60-70 guys) can give up to 50 bids out (which is a bit much). As the size of the chapter grows, the amount of bids that can be given grows.

Not only was our number up to 30 new members, so were all the other sororities- provided they had made quota the previous year. Our advisor had a whole science, mostly psychology:), to it because it was vital that we made the quota! We always made quota, thank goodness! :eek:

I worked with recruitment, and it was interesting how it all went down. At the time, we had 9 sororities and pretty much all would make quota except for 2-3 sororities. Sometimes they were a good sorority and didn't have a good advisor ranking people correctly on the bid list. I never even knew what a continuous open bid was until I became an advisor.

I would suggest you check out Phi Kappa Sigma. They recolonized and were installed last fall after a period of time being off campus. They have been affiliated with UA for almost 100 years. The original colony members came almost exclusively from the Honors dorm and this past semester they had the second highest grades of all fraternities at Bama. I know most of these guys and they are normal college students but firmly stand on a no-hazing policy and are just all around great guys. If you would like to send me a private message, I can tell you how to get in touch with them. Where do you live?

SAE, baby. :D


Bama is a crazy Greek scene. You can be moral and sober in any of the houses (we have a few kids like that in mine), but particularly at Bama to find a no binge drinking, no drugs, strictly no hazing fraternity you are going to be looking at non-traditional fraternities and fraternities way down the social tiers.

But in all seriousness, I would reccomend looking at the traditional fraternities and just sticking to your own morals. Just because you choose not to drink doesn't mean none of your friends can. I'm a pretty stereotypical "frat boy" and one of my good friends in the house doesn't touch alcohol. If you can't be comfortable around people who don't have exactly the same behavioral patterns as you then it shows (in mind) that you are insecure in your own beliefs and don't trust yourself to be around it (And probably don't belong in the greek system if that is the case).