Question about Big/Lil
 

Hey, I am just curious about something...are there sororities that give new members their big sisters on Bid Day? If so, why? I just saw Bid Day pictures of someone I know who got into ADPi and it seems that she already has her big. I would ask her but I am not close to her anymore like I used to be.

Our new members don't get Bigs until about a month into being in the sorority. I don't get why you would get a Lil the day they join when you hardly know them yet.

The Kappa chapter at my school does that, although I think they are the only ones. I too was really happy I had a month to get to know ALL the older girls before we got bigs.

Yeah, we do that,too, although it is somewhat different. For 3 weeks, the NMs are paired up with 3 different actives.

We had "anchor mates" who picked us up for Bid Day, and served as a substitute big for ritual purposes until we got our big sisters.

Kappa Nationals requires all of our New Members to receive their Key Sisters (Bigs) within a few days of pledging. For me, there are pros and cons to this.

The con is that most of the older sisters and new members don't know each other yet, so it can be kind of a crap shoot in terms of assignment (though honestly, I've only ever seen it go truly badly once or twice... the standards committee knows the sisters pretty well and usually does an excellent job). Another part I don't like is that we can't do a big "Secret Week" like the other sororities on our campus do - those seem like a lot of fun! We still do something comparable during I-Week, but obviously you know who your Big is that that point. The flip side is that in my experience, those secret weeks can produce a lot of risk management issues (girls being blindfolded and led around, made to do tasks, etc.).

However the BIG pro is that you have a mentor and group of friends immediately upon joining. When I joined, I didn't know a soul in the sorority or in my pledge class and I was pretty intimidated. Getting my big gave me a lot more confidence and helped me find my place in the sisterhood. I would have had a much rougher time adjusting and understanding what was going on if I had been "afloat", so to speak. My Big was able to introduce me around to all the upperclassmen I would have been too shy to get to know on my own. It really faciliates immediate bonding between the upperclassmen and the new freshmen.

In our associate member ceremony (not Ritual, f.y.i.) your Big Brother is supposed to pin you and give you your Cornerstone (manual). Not all chapters assign bigs immediately like this, but my chapter did with my AM class and it definitely helped me meet more people and be more comfortable in Delta Chi. I actually didn't like my pledge class in the beginning (we're all very close now!) so my Big Brother is one of the main reasons I stuck it out.

It doesn't work out for everyone, but I've never seen catastrophic results, at worst they're just kind of apathetic towards each other. I think it can be a big advantage.

Our ADPi chapter does this as well, but the rest of the chapters' new girls receive their bigs a week to five weeks into their new member period.