Sorority Expansion
 

I wasn't sure where to exactly post this but I have a question that I've been wanting to get answer about this.

I attend SIU Carbondale where the Greek System is really starting to take off with the expansion of two more fraternities this year on my campus bring the IFC total to 14. However the real problem is the fact that we only have 3 Pan Hellenic sororities being DZ, SK and AGD.

Recently our school has invited the Pan Hellenic expansion committee or whatever come to our school last year and left our school with quote "A toxic environment to let a new chapter come in." Which I think is ridiculous but that is just what I heard from some of the girls in two of the sororities.

So my question is, Why does the Pan Hellenic rules have to require 70+ girls in each out and forcing us to have three chapters instead of us getting maybe two more sororities and letting them down size to maybe 40 girls in each since that's the average size of every fraternity on campus is?

Because I think if a sorority wants to expand to a campus, they shouldn't have to go through the national Pan Hellenic council to get permission first and then go through a long process of paperwork and a campus evaluation where chances are they come during a bad week.

What chapter are you in there? Or are you IN a chapter at all? (You're unclear on that)

SIUC has a party school reputation and there are almost certainly valid reasons why the NPC isn't interested in expansion there at this time. You heard the information through a glorified game of telephone so don't assume you have the full story. (I don't know if the party school rep is part of the reason, but it is there.) How do the chapters get along? Is the school supportive of Greeks? Are the students supportive of Greeks?

And more importantly, what happened during "a bad week?"


Sororities and fraternities don't usually try to have equal numbers in their chapters. It's not uncommon that the NPC chapters are larger than the men's fraternities. And chapters of 70 are not seen as particularly large as far as the NPC goes. However your 3rd hand info said it wasn't about numbers.

All of the NPC sororities are NPC sororities because they agreed to the NPC rules on expansion (among other things.) That's why they follow these rules you think are silly. And you assume that a sorority would want to come to your campus in such a "toxic environment" anyway.

If the school will allow a local, or a non-NPC national or regional sorority then that could be the way to go to bring another sorority onto campus if that's where the interest lies. But if the campus has issues, more chapters won't solve anything.

A. It's National Panhellenic Conference. This is one of my pet peeves so just stick with me here. National Pan-Hellenic Council is a completely different entity, and there is no such thing as Pan Hellenic (as a governing body over Greek Life Organizations).

B. NPC is fully within its right to choose to expand or not expand on a given campus, provided that the college administration and Campus Panhellenic Council have opened for expansion. This happens more than you would think - NPC is interested in the health of its chapters - if there are "dealbreakers" on a given campus then it's likely that it will not want to expand there just yet. This is not necessarily a bad thing. All you've given us for reasoning is that it's a "toxic" environment - this could mean a number of things and is not neccesarily a slam on the greek life environment or the chapters that are currently there. Since I don't know much about that campus, I can't really speak to whatever is or is not "apparent" on the campus.

I say they're not willing to expand there yet because things can change, particularly through the hard work of a campus greek system as a whole. Please keep this in mind, sometimes you can accomplish a lot by taking a practical problem-solving approach to some of the campus-wide problems that are apparent.

C. NPC is not forcing you to only have 3 sororities on campus, they're only allowing 3 NPC chapters. They are also not forcing you to have 70+ members per chapter - total is usually decided on the campus level. If there are women interested in starting a local organization or looking into bringing a non-NPC national organization on campus, and the administration and CPC are open to that, then more power to them. The NPC is only 26 (I rarely say "only" in that statement) organizations - they are not THE only 26 organizations. Although I have a strong bias toward the NPC, that does not mean it's the only way for a woman to have a rich and wonderful greek life experience.

D. NPC organizations must follow NPC expansion agreements. If they did not, it would be a free-for-all that could create real problems, perhaps not on your campus but on a number of other campuses.

E. I'm interested in what's a "bad" week, and why your campus would HAVE a "bad" week knowing that an NPC expansion committee is on campus. These things don't usually happen by surprise.

F. Ideally, the NPC doesn't want to set up a new chapter to "fail" - and no organization wants that either.

5 NPC sororities have chartered and closed at your campus. One closed as recently as 2008. Your panhellenic likely has very valid reasons for declining to expand at this time.

PKTsaluki-

Not sure how long you have been at SIU, but 2 years ago (I believe), an NPC organization was scheduled to recolonize/reorganize their chapter. Unfortunately, there did not seem to be enough interest among the unaffiliated women to bring the chapter back.

Everything I can find about Greek Life at SUIC that isn't on their own website says "If you're serious about Greek Life go elsewhere, all they want to do here is drink."

And that's not just a Greek problem at SIUC but a campus problem. I have friends who went to SIUC and the party school rep is a BIG problem. This is a school that used to close for Halloween, whose students have caused significant property damage every year (although better), and that now tries to plan family weekend over Halloween just to keep thing semi-sane. Even if the nights no longer end in tear gas, it's not an image that people want to be associated with.

/grain of salt and all that

So, is this just a guy who wants another sorority on campus? (PKTsaluki)

Telling us we do it wrong. :rolleyes:

Is it just me, or do fraternity members, particularly undergrads, love to do that?

OMG Fiance would do that. No, we do not operate the same way you guys do.

This. As someone who would also rather see 6 chapters of 40 than 3 chapters of 70, I'm with PKTsaluki on that score. The thing is, the sororities HAVE TO VOTE TO DECREASE TOTAL. If their nationals aren't letting them do that (and this does happen occasionally) that isn't Panhellenic's fault. If there are sororities with big houses to maintain who don't want to lower total that also isn't Panhellenic's fault.

I know what vp is saying about having sororities that aren't NPC, but what happens in this situation is the "service" or "professional" sorority turns into a social sorority that occasionally does service and gets around the alcohol rules of NPCs. Then Panhel gets pissed and the bad blood gets even worse. It's not a good idea to promote establishment of something other than a social group if what people truly want is a social group.

Closed colony thread that LaneSig referenced:

http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...d.php?t=102389

I won't say that just because a colony fails doesn't mean there is no room for a new Greek group. That is nothing against the above group, just a general statement. Sometimes the "fit" that seemed great to Panhel members doesn't come across to the campus at large. It happens.

And regardless of whether the school is "toxic" it was very unprofessional of the NPC rep to put it that way. "The system has some challenges it needs to address" would have been a little better.

My school is finally getting its head out of its ass and inviting back some of the fraternity chapters that were closed for bogus reasons. However, there's NO WAY IN HELL I think they're ready for any of the sororities to come back. Different things are different.

We don't know what the NPC rep said, we know what a fraternity guy heard from a sorority member. If it had been for public consumption it might have been worded differently.

It's certainly possible that there could be a new chapter, but honestly, chapters of 70 are really reasonable IMO. Those are pledge classes of about 20 accounting for a bit of loss/graduation etc. That means about 60 people who complete rush each year. I'm not really seeing a desperate need for expansion there.

ETA: Not that there couldn't be an interest for a non-NPC group, but I agree that it shouldn't just be an attempt to dodge NPC rules, but an actual desire for a MCGLO, a service GLO, etc.

It's funny I read the post and my first thought was "oh, he wants more even mixers"

FWIW I don't think 70 is an out of the question size, I just personally would rather have more options. If that means the chapters are smaller, so be it. What I'm trying to put across to Boy Who Wants More Chicks is that this isn't something that big, bad NPC is doing - or every school across the country would have the same magic number for total.