U of Texas Spirit Groups
 

breathesgelatin has given me some great links to some of the older spirit groups at Texas like Texas Spirits and Lassos. I'm fascinated! It seems that you can be in some and be Greek and in others, you can't. Can anyone share more information about these? It sounds like it's pretty competitive to get into some of them.

There are no restrictions on greeks and the spirit groups. They are excellent though!! I highly suggest them. There is Lassos, spirits, Sweethearts, Lonestars, and there is a spirit group for each sport. Texas Diamonds, Texas Angels (Football), even a golf and swimming support team!! Spirits is very popular and so there are a lot of applicants, so yes I know it can be very competitive. But you never know if you dont try! Good Luck!

Spirits use to be called the Spooks and is very selective and a major honor to be selected. You don't have to be greek to be a member but I think most are. I am not familiar with the other groups. There is also Texas Cowboys for the guys but I think they had some hazing problems several years ago so I'm not for sure if they are still around.

Texas Cowboys and Silver Spurs are the big spirit groups for the guys. Texas Cowboys take care of Smokey the Cannon, as well as generally promoting Texas Sports. Silver Spurs takes care of Bevo, as well as generally promoting Texas sports.

As far as I know both are still around and very active on campus.

You don't just join Cowboys or Spurs, you must be invited.

I've never heard much about these groups, but I noticed that the Texas Spirits are just for Freshmen and Sophmores. What happens after that? Can anyone share whether or not those girls feed into another group or how that works?

I always thought these groups were really interesting... I'm a grad student at UT, so I see them recruiting on campus all the time but wasn't really sure what they were all about... it does seem like a lot of them draw from the Greek community, but then others seem to operate like GLOs themselves and not draw membership from Greeks... of course these are just my impressions gleaned from the West Mall and sitting in the student section at football games, LOL.

I am a Silver Spur. Both are definitely still around.

Is this like the Tigerettes and Tiger Hosts at Auburn? Or the Gator Getters at UF?

I'm sure they have different names now, so maybe I'm showing my age!

I think....

My cousin was an Aker's Angel at UT back in the 80s. She was Greek, as well

His point was that you cannot just walk in and say I want to join the Cowboys and then you are in. Greek or not, you still have to go through a selection process.

Not entirely true.

...also, are you saying that only 7% of the Alumni has donated?

Cowgirls - aren't they basically a drinking society? That's how I heard it described by an alum but I wasn't sure.

So in your opinion NONE of the female spirit organizations are prestigious? That's interesting. I've noticed that some of them seem to be replicating NPC sororities, or trying to, but I assumed there were also some differences.

I'm not sure if they're selective, but "prestigious" definitely isn't the word I'd use, mostly because they're so new and there's so many of them.

As for the male spirit groups, they're basically watered-down fraternities. They're more active on campus than most the tiny chapters no one knows about, they even interact with some of the smaller sororities like DG and one has a house (Tejas), but they're no where close to the larger houses.

Well, when I was in college at UT the Cowboys was still mostly Greek. This new system came about when the Cowboys returned after being gone for a while after the 1995 incident (which happened when I was at Texas.)

So I do not know a ton about how the Cowboys work now, but I do know that when they came back several fraternities did not get their seats back and they still refuse to let them back in. So there is a lot of fuss over that. And I do know there is still a very tough application process. A lot of people want to be Cowboys. It is still very much an honor many strive for.

As for other organizations- I just don't know. When I was at Texas I did not really pay attention to that scene. Most of the groups named in this thread I am hearing about for the very first time.

Just to clarify for everyone about that and some of what TexasSt has said,

If you look at APO, the spirit groups and the vast array of scholastic or social or whatever groups- many of which carry Greek letter names to emulate IFC, NPHC and PanHellenic (did I get everyone with those 3 umbrellas?)- there are two kinds of people who belong to those groups at UT.

First you have the majority who genuinely have an interest in that organization for what it is about and who were not interested in being Greek at UT. These are good people.

Second you have that group of people who tried desperately to rush a fraternity or sorority and did not make it- and this is the next best thing they can do. The Wranglers in my day had plenty of guys who were rush rejects even though most of the ones I knew were pretty decent folk. When I saw them at games, I could usually spot a guy or two who had made himself stand out in a bad way during rush. I knew a lot of great people in APO who did incredible charity work, but I also knew a few losers who were just so desperate to have Greek letters to associate with.

This does not mean the organizations themselves are bad- I think the point is that some of the members are in there for the wrong reasons and it is just kind of sad and pathetic to see that.

I didn't go to UT, so I can olny speak "secondhand." However, one of my best friends was the equivalent of an executive council officer of Spurs about 4 years ago. From everything he told me, they operated almost identically to a fraternity. He was attracted to them because of thier heavy emphasis on supporting Texas sports and their committment to philanthropy. While my impression was that they primarily socialized with female spirit groups such as the Lassos, I know they did often have socials, mixers, etc. with sororities. I visited once during the Texas/ Nebraska game and we got to go out onto the field during halftime and get our pictures taken with Bevo, becuase as another poster mentioned, their primary responsibility is to take care of the mascot. From everything I heard from him, he had the same "fraternity experience" a GLO member would have during college.

I thought I'd bump this again because we have some new GCers from Texas. I love hearing about these longtime groups.

I can't believe I missed this thread.

Spurs is pretty prestigious compared to some of the other fraternities.

By the way, is Scalphunters at FSU more closely related to these groups or more closely related to a Skull and Bones type deal?