If you could change one thing...
 

If you could change one thing about your organization at a/n (inter)national level, what would it be? Please feel free to PM me if you want. I will give you an example of mine: I believe philanthropy should be made more important. I also think one of our ceremonies contains some really outdated language and ideas.But I won't get specific on that!

I would say more support for the smaller chapters.

the one thing i would change is better fundraising so we can have a realistic budget. i have kept my reciepts for the past 2 years i have been rush chairman, and i have spent over 1300 dollars of my own money to fund my rush parties and events. we have not had a good fundraising chair until now but i doubt they will ever be able to pay me back. glad i am vp now not rush. poor guy.

As much as I love my sorority, there are two things I wish would change:

Our website. IMO it's outdated, it doesn't really tell all that much about us and it's B-O-R-I-N-G!!! I feel vaguely disloyal saying this, but when I look at Tri Delta's or Delta Gamma's website I always think to myself that I wish DZ's were like that too.

I mean, depending on whom you ask, we are either the first or second largest NPC organization. We're not some struggling national with three chapters or something like that, and our website should reflect that.


I also wish we would concentrate more on colonizing at "name" schools. Bigger schools with more name recognition. Although I am happy with recent colonizations at the University of Florida and Wake Forest.

I wouldn't change anything our Founders did because I don't think it is our place to do so, plus I love our Rituals the way they are :)

The only thing I would change about SAI is our National Membership Exam. I think it's sad that, with all that information on it, the one thing new members are NOT required to memorize is the Symphony!!

In addition, someone brought up at Convention in a forum with our National VP for College Chapters that there's almost too much info on that test, and that I think like she said, maybe some information should just be understood, not memorized for the test.

Kind of in the vein of what Arya said, more support when it comes to rush and risk management, especially for smaller chapters. We're losing one of our oldest chapters at the end of the year because of this, and I honestly think that we have enough money to provide more support, but we just don't.

Also, make it easier to change policies on the local level. I'm not talking about things like shacking and drinking policies (haha) but more in line with judicial things and the way things are run. At the beginning of this year in our chapter, our standards board was able to kick out an officer that they felt was not doing an adequate job (not for "standards"-related behavior, either -- it had to do with a decision she made for her office) even though the entire rest of the chapter disagreed with them. When we called our advisor about it she basically told us that we had no recourse because Tri Delta's national policies were set up to let standards could do whatever they wanted and they couldn't be changed -- not okay.

We got over the drama, but a lot of people became disillusioned and frustrated with national policies that they perceived as being "unfair" (including me, could you tell? :p ) and it all could have been avoided if we'd just been given a chance to contest standard's decision.

I would have to agree with you on this. My chapter is small and finally Nationals is actually paying attention to us, after maybe the 242371978 time we've asked em and it also be nice that the person who over see's our greek orgnizations and other orgnizations on campus actually pay a lil more attention to my chapter since she IS an AST alum!:mad:

More aggressive expansion/colonization process. At the moment, it's very effective. We've undergone some changes at a national level with expansion, however, we are generally only opening one new chapter per semester. Not fast enough in my opinion.

I feel kinda disloyal to say it but I would like AST to provide help to chapters to help increase our Alumnae base. We are small and we will need those alumnae to help sustain growth with our programs. It seems to be the key to a strong sorority, but I may be disillusioned cause my chapter is so young. I know some chapters have an amazing alumnae base...I dunno how to help my chapter get that.

Phi Kappa Psi
 

If I was answering this post's question ten years ago, my answer would have been the size of a book. We've got our act together, and I'm basically content. If there was still one thing that I would change, it would be to hire 1 more man for extension. This academic year, we will colonize at 5 campuses. I would like to see a sustained rate of extension of 8+ campuses for the next 20 years, and then drop it down to 2-4.

ETA: Now that I think of it, there is one thing that I would really like to change. I'd like to see a $100,000,000 fund to buy top flight houses for expansion, and for those chapters that need them.

Have more diverse RDs (Traveling Consultant). More from smaller Greek systems.

I think they really try. I know when I mentioned my interest in being a Consultant to one of our VPs, she got really excited about it, saying that they would LOVE TO HAVE someone with my background and experience to help chapters.

Most of our consultants come from big Greek systems--they are coming from environments that would be okay with taking a year off after college to work for a sorority. I don't see any of my chapter sisters or like-minded friends who would do anything like it.

Hmm what could I change about PDT?

Well, let's see....we've been around since 1848, and we've expanded to 181 chapters. I believe we should halt colonization for a while and focus on strengthing some of the smaller PDT chapters.

Depending on who you ask, PDT is somewhere in the Top 5 strongest fraternities in the nation, and the strongest internationally. And it should reflect even in the smaller chapters.

definitely would have to agree on the website thing. it looks professional but it has nothing on it. i heard at convention they were re-doing it but still haven't seen anything

more alumnae involvement. from what i have seen with aephi the alumnae get involved directly with national or chapter and i haven't really heard anything about regional alumnae groups. i think regional groups would keep the casual alumnae more connected - not everyone is going to be a hardcore national alumnae. i have also noticed that APH don't have many aephi's. I live in NYC where there are probably more AEPhi's than a lot of the big NPC groups but we didn't have anyone on APH until i told my chapter advisor about it and she got involved.

If I could change 1 thing about Phi Sig it would be

1) Our website... they just updated it like two year ago I think... but after seeing like Delta Gamma's and I think Pi Beta Phi's websites I have to say A LOT more information could be included in our website as well as I really wish we had a members only section where would could send in our reports and such instead of having to submit them the way we do, which is through E mail.. but it's quite annoying since each report has to go to like three different people... Humm.. what else...

2) More rush support from national... I know the other two orgs on my campus get some rush support from their nationals... I would like to see some kind of national program implemented to help us with formal rush the way they have come up with Vision for getting women through informal... I think that Phi Sig is sometimes so foward thinking that they forget that some traditional practices still take place...