In What Ways do GLO's Compete?
 

As a member of an NPHC fraternity, I know that the most well-known ways that we exhibit our rivalries and competition with one another is through our step shows.

In what ways do other GLOs compete with one another? In general or on your campus.

I don't mean like competing for best parties, best pledge class, or other subjective/social competitions. I mean like, does your school have a lip synching contest, dance contest, talent show....you know, like anything public that all the GLOs participate in for a trophy, prize money, or even just bragging rights.

The biggest way we compete against each other at NCSU is Greek Week. It's full of sports competitions as well as lip syncs and Greek sing. It's a ton of fun and you love bragging rights when you win.

Additionally, we compete in academics all year round - what GLO doesn't like having the highest GPA?

Also, sororities are pitted against each other in Sigma Chi's Derby Days (kinda like a mini-Greek Week, just for sororities - they have all sorts of sporting events and a dance contest).

All GLO's also have an opportunity to compete against each other at our (DG's) Anchor Splash competition. It's a big swim meet (with silly events) that Fraternities, Sororities, and other campus organizations are invited to participate in.

Yeah, so we have a lot of competition.

During Greek Week and Greek Fest, we have plenty of competition among all the GLO's. but for the Fraternities, A game of football really bring out the competitivness in us all.

For our campus the main competitions were Greek Week, Homecoming, VEISHEA, and Varieties. Academics were also a big way to score bragging points. Other org's Philanthropies were always big i.e. "We were the Kickball tournament champions for the 10th year".

I'd like to say that most of these competitions were friendly and helped the entire Greek Community strive for the best, but that wasn't always the case.

Besides GLO-sponsored things (i.e. Derby Days, Anchor Splash etc.), at IU they compete in Academics (year-round), homecoming, Little 500, IU Sing, and Greek Week. There are also year-end Greek Awards where they award things like Greek Man/Woman of the year, chapter of the year, etc.

These were only open to IFC/NPC organizations, though. (Well, others competed in the Little 500 race and stuff.) NPHC organizations, other cultural GLOs, and professional/service GLOs were not invited to do such things. I know APO wanted to enter IU Sing my junior year and we were told we couldn't. We weren't happy. :(

Greek Week is probably the most competitive, followed closely by Homecoming. We also compete in Sigma Chi's Derby Days, Lambda Chi Alpha's Pumpkinfest, KA's Kingpin Bowling, and Kappa Sigma's kickball tournament.

We won Homecoming this year, beating another organization that has won it for over 10 years.... we were slightly excited ;)

At The University of Akron we compete big time in Songfest! Songfest is a singing and dancing competition. There are all-sorority, all-fraternity, and combined fraternity/sorority performances. Overall though we could make anything a competition...even attendance to events! haha! How silly is that!

We have the status quo, with homecoming being the biggest event followed by Greek Week. Our chapter has an annual lip service contest where sororities compete in and we compete against other fraternities in Spring Fling, Rock The Arrow's, and flag football competitions. I know at UCF every no and we try to include NPHC's in some aspect whether its homecoming or even greek week sometime it worked sometimes it didn't, it was something I would have liked especially since my cousin was an A Phi A.

Thanks for all the answers so far!

When you are listing the events, could you please explain them as though I have no idea what they are? (For example, what does "winning" Homecoming entail?)

In addition to the things listed here (Greek Week, Homecoming), fraternities and sororities at Penn State also compete to raise money during the Panhel/IFC Dance Marathon - some duos (each fraternity pairs with a sorority) raise as much as $300,000 during a year. The Marathon overall raised $3 million last year alone for a cancer fund at a local hospital. Not small change.

I used to love sitting outside after dinner and watching the step shows in our Quad....don't know if they're still doing them at PSU.

Wow, that is fantastic! $3 million. is wonderful. Keep up the good work.

At my school "Winning homecoming" usually means that the pairing of GLOs (it was usually 2 fraternities and 1 sorority) had accumulated the most points through various homecoming activities: tournaments, Yell-like-Hell, banner, community service, lawn display and window and victory lane painting. There are usually 3-4 fraternities that really compete and have consistently won over the years.

"Winning Greek Week" is pretty much the same; the winner is the pairing that amassed the most points through: tournaments, olympics, lip sync, blood drive, pennies and soup labels, and the polar bear plunge.

VEISHEA and Varieties are a little different, but still very competitive.

RainbowBrightCS -

I should note I've been out of school for a while - when I was in school, the Penn State Dance Marathon raised "only" around $100,000 - we went on road trips and went door-to-door or stood out on street corners "canning" - begging for money.

They still do that now, but they're also a lot more sophisticated - soliciting alumni for contribution and hometown businesses for sponsorships.

So I can't keep up the good work, but your comment inspired me to mail out my alumni contribution as soon as I get home today!

We really only cared about who won Greek Week and who won Intramurals. Derby Days was still fairly new, so that wasn't as much of a big deal - not all the sororities took it seriously. Also, no one "won" Homecoming week, but we cared about which group had the Homecoming Queen ('cause she was usually Greek). Also, at the end of Homecoming week there was an award given to the group who was the most spirited, and that usually went to a Greek org, but we didn't really care about that either.

Having the highest GPA was a big deal, but only so we could mention it during recruitment.