Help with COB issues.
 

I'm the COB chair for an NPC chapter who is very far below campus total (20-30 women). We are one of the only chapters on campus that are not at total, and the rest are very close to it. Our recruitment chair and I have gone to my advisors (even on a national level) but we're still struggling, so I'm hoping somebody here can provide a little more advice/ideas as far as COB events and encouraging women to recruit goes.


First, the COB events. It seems that what works best for our chapter, as far as strategy goes, is one on one things with PNM's. However we are not recruiting enough women this way, so our advisors are very insistent that we hold big COB events. The problem is, we have no idea what to do. We've had dinners at the house on weekends, events on campus and in the dorms, but it just seems that a lot of women don't want to join our house for whatever reason. So I guess with events, I'm in search of new event ideas that isn't a movie night (we've been explicitly told no events people cannot talk during, since that's the point of the events to begin with) and isn't crafting, because a lot of women in our chapter aren't crafty and feel like they can't attend them and have fun.

Second, the motivational part of it. How can we encourage our chapter members to go out and recruit women? Most of the chapter doesn't understand that total is a national requirement (we are NPC), but we aren't allowed to explain it because it might come off as being negative or discouraging. We have a weekly recruitment requirement that is very simple to obtain, and even with that, most people aren't doing it and are choosing to be fined instead. Many also say they don't want to 'creep out' their friends, so they don't want to ask their friends if they've ever thought about greek life, or bring them over to the house, which worries me as well.

As I said previously, our chapter is in kind of a dire place when it comes to recruitment, and I really don't know what to do, so I'm hoping that you ladies will be able to provide some help! Thank you for any advice you can provide!!

I'm certainly not an expert, but what about doing an ice cream social night or a game night with "mocktails"? Or combine and do an ice cream and games night? Set up an ice cream buffet with a million toppings and let people get really creative!

I wish you the best of luck.

Here are a few thoughts.

Regarding sisters inviting friends, etc. Perhaps you could divide the chapter up into groups (like your colors -- so for DG, it'd be the Bronze Group, Pink Group, and Blue Group). Have a weekly contest to see which group can recruit the most women -- have some sort of desirable prize for the winning group.

Make sure you have some good PR t-shirts promoting sisterhood & friendship. Require sisters to wear them every *insert day or days of the week here*.

Serve hot chocolate outside popular campus buildings -- perhaps tie a ribbon around the cup with a paper attached giving information about your philanthropy --- AND a note saying if this interests them, that your chapter is currently recruiting.

Publish ads in your school newspaper with chapter news -- "Congrats to Susie Q, Donna Doolittler, and Cindy Lou Hoo for making 4.0's this semester!" -- and add a line about - interested in XYZ? Contact lolo@lolo.com

Chalk the campus.

Do some community service work with the local HS (doesn't help with COB now, but will help in the future) -- try to contact the local HS Key Club or similar.

Event ideas:
- Game night
- Go to a sporting event together (sometimes something smaller than a football game could be good -- like a gymnastics meet or something -- ESPECIALLY if you have a member on the team).
- Go to a pick-your-own fruit farm.
- Laser Tag or Mini Golf
- Any philanthropy event.

Girls that COB are more likely to be a little skeptical about Greek Life (perhaps why they didn't do formal recruitment) - you need to find ways to show them what your organization can offer them -- sisterhood, scholarship, and philanthropic opportunities.

Good luck!

I'm not an expert either but getting your chapter to total is a two pronged attack- recruiting new members AND retaining the members you already have. Who would want to be a part of a group that fined them for not dropping everything to do a constant stream of COB "events'?

You need to incorporate recruiting new members into the fun things you're already doing as a chapter. The best part of informal recruitment is that you can really show pnms what it's like to be a part of your organization. If there are five or six of you that always go to Taco Tuesday together, that's a COB event, if you bring along a PNM.

Maybe you need to rethink your strategy of meeting the weekly requirement of having a structured event vs how many pnms did you contact this week. Something like the it takes 14 sales calls before you actually make a sale mentality. Don't have enough pnms in your pool? Encourage every chapter member to join one new campus org this semester and invite at least one woman they meet there to come to one of your chapter's activities.

The more you put yourselves out there on your campus in a positive way, and work on making membership in your chapter the best experience it can possibly be, the more women will want to check out what you're doing and either consider joining themselves or say good things about you to others who might just be your next new sister!

Do you have a copy of I "Heart" Recruitment? Its a great book that details 24/7/365 recruitment efforts.

Here's the link to the amazon.com listing

http://www.amazon.com/Heart-Recruitm...rt+recruitment

Your advisors are idiots. Are any of them from chapters that actually struggled with numbers? Have any of them worked on a LONG TERM basis with chapters that struggled with numbers and made suggestions that helped the chapter to grow and most importantly, RETAIN members? Did any of them have to do COB as collegians? If the answers to these three questions are no, they need to STFU.

You are not, repeat, ARE NOT going to find women who are committed and dedicated to being in a chapter that is lower in numbers and possibly lower on the social totem pole by holding big huge events where every doofus who wants to show up can show up. What you are going to find is a lot of selfish women who are only interested in having letters - and who really don't care which ones - and who will bail in 2.5 seconds when the going gets tough.

COB isn't a microwave pizza. It's more like a meal that takes hours to make but tastes a HELL of a lot better. You are doing the correct thing by connecting with women one on one, and your advisors are wrong. Period.

That all being said...

Every woman in the chapter should be able to come up with the name of another woman that isn't Greek and that she feels would make a great sister. She needs to introduce that woman to her sisters, on a normal, day to day basis. Bring her over to the house after class and talk to whoever's there. If there's a sister who doesn't know anyone but sisters...then you need to institute a chapter rule that every sister needs to be involved in at least one campus activity outside the sorority. Too many women get lazy and depend on the sorority for all their campus interaction.

You can have COB events, but don't make them constant. One or two a month, and INVITE ONLY. If anyone can show up...they're going to feel like the only reason you are opening your doors to them is to get your numbers up. And they'll be right. You can have a slight theme, but the main thing you should be doing is TALKING and getting to know the women. You can't afford to make mistakes, so you should be sure of someone before you offer them a bid. And you can't do that at a big event.

I personally would not go with the chalking or notes...it kind of makes you look desperate.

Oh, and a weekly recruitment requirement IS creepy. I don't blame women who don't want to go along with it. They have come to think of COB as something negative and annoying rather than positive (i.e. I love being a part of this sorority, so I want people I like to have the same experience). c & p pretty much summed this part up.

The basic thing to remember here is...you don't want women who want to join "a" sorority. You need women who want to join YOUR sorority. Those are harder to find, but worth the wait.

I agree that a weekly requirement for COB is way too much and if you're actually getting the girls to pay the fines, that's amazing. I wonder how many you're losing due to the rat race and the pressure. I agree with 33girl that you should probably stop listening to your advisors. But I would have a down and dirty with the members about why it is important to be at total or at least be aiming for total. And these are big girls - talk about the dollars and cents of it. And as part of that conversation I would come up with a plan for what type of girls you would like to get. And pretty, rich, smart and funny isn't an answer. I think if you can be very specific about what you want, and what campus void you can fill, you can make progress. And DON'T get sucked into the "we're all unique and the other chapters are all same same." First, it's not true, second people don't join groups to be different, they join groups for the common bond.

And I would really stress (not force, not fine; it sounds like you have too much of that going on) the importance in joining clubs on campus. And finally, the members need to get over talking to their friends about rushing. Maybe one way you can dance around that issue is to say to friend "we're having a rush event on November 1st. If you know anyone who you think might want to come, would you let me know? And of course, I'd love to see you there. You'd be a fantastic addition to our chapter. We're really trying to improve our status (or whatever word you like better) on campus and you'd be great for that." Or whatever. You get what I'm saying. The non-sorority friends are not stupid so you might as well be up front about the fact that you're looking to grow and are looking for quality women to help that along.

33 are you being a bit harsh on the advisors there? Sometimes when we try to apply a cookie cutter solution from a...dare I say it..."binder" the people we're trying to help get the wrong message, and ultimately we don't end up solving the problem. Advisors usually have good intentions. The "national" absolutely has the chapter's best interest at heart- they want their chapters to be successful!

The important thing for every chapter to know and understand clearly, struggling or not, is that when it comes to recruitment the advisors and the national ARE NOT GOING TO DO THIS FOR YOU. YOU MUST DO IT YOURSELF. They are there to support you, to give you suggestions and to provide resources but not to recruit the women for you.

Thank you all so much for all of your advice! I'll definitely read through it all again and take it all to heart! I just wanted to clarify one thing.


For this, it's not a requirement to attend a COB event each week, it's actually more along the lines of what you said about meeting PNM's - it's hard to explain without giving away the chapter (to the chapter members, that is), but it's basically a list of several things they can do each week, ranging from simply being seen on campus (by another sister) wearing her letters, meeting a new girl in class, inviting her over for (activity), all the way to actually extending her a bid (but obviously not to somebody we just met!!). It is NOT difficult at all, which is why I'm so amazed people are refusing to do it. We do have some shyer women in the chapter, which is why we put in options to attend campus events in letters or be seen on campus in letters by another sister, because that's great PR right there which we also need around campus.

How do you think a conversation would go where the girls were asked would they rather up their effort to get the chapter competitively sized, or fold? Unfortunately, you might end up with a negative answer, but you might end up with an interesting discussion about what they can do and why it's important. Knowing how your members feel about their chapter might be a good start toward rebuilding.

Be sure also that you are not just inviting women to these events but going to pick them up and bring them to the event. Never, ever just invite them and not send an escort.

The comment that sisters think it is creepy to talk to friends about their chapter makes me think that the sisterhood within the chapter is hurting. Who wants to join a group if the members themselves are embarrassed to talk about it? I'd do some things that are just sisterhood events and work on enjoying each other before bringing others around. This time of year, you could have a silly pumpkin carving contest, the ice cream social idea, a games night with games like Apples to Apples. Silly skit nights, etc. Y'all need to have some fun together.

THEN you can start bringing friends around to these sisterhood events. When I think of my best sorority times, they usually revolve around sisterhood retreats where we did these kinds of things.

ETA: I don't like the "threat" that you have to get to Total. I would focus on the positives of having more members.. less work for everybody because you have women to serve on committees, more money for everyone because of the income, etc. Help them understand why having more women is advantageous to them as individuals.

Some really successful COBs in my experience are mocktails, casino nights, and ice cream socials. However, at the casino nights, it is actually 'get to know you' games. the girls pick a card, then the 'dealer' has a list of questions for each card (i.e. 3 words to describe you; most prized possession; if you could go anywhere, where & why; etc.). Even better, some of the cards are 'sister exchanges' where a sister at the table has to go to a different table and send over a girl she replaced, so that the PNMs meet new girls. It's really fun, I just went through and that was a big hit. Good luck!

It sounds like you need to up the profile of your chapter on campus. Instead of over-emphasizing COB, which it sounds like is going on, maybe spend some time creating and implementing a public relations plan.

Easy things you can do:
*have a weekly pin attire day where everyone dresses nicely and wears their badges
*make sure sisters are wearing letters/carrying tote bags when they are looking nice
*attend other chapter's philanthropy events, sincerely participate and have a good time
*have chapter members get to know each other, maybe active dates or get to now you games, etc
*join major/career related clubs and organizations; network
*Is there another sorority on campus that you are friendly with? Have a mixer with them to see how to interact with new people of the same sex. Our campus did dinner exchanges all the time and sister sorority week once a year.
*develop pride in your chapter, it will show to others when there is genuine sisterhood

These suggestions are low cost, but can go a long way toward improving the internal workings of your chapter. Be the chapter that everyone notices because you have a tight sisterhood, not because you're smaller than the others. :-)

The problem is that, if they are under intense pressure from HQ, they want these women pledged NOW. It's not creepy to talk to your friends about your chapter, it's creepy to invite them over once for dinner and hand them a bid at the end of the day. I think your suggestions still stand, because simply having fun with your sisters and including outside friends works well, but I wouldn't immediately assume sisterhood is hurting; it's just as likely that the women are totally COBed out.