Chapter Closed...Please Help.
 

Dear Brothers,

My name is Trey and i'm an Alumni of Texas Eta (Sam Houston State University). In Huntsville, Texas. As many of you Texas brothers know they removed our chapter this past semester doto on going problems.

The reason for the removal is our grades for that year, nationals required a 2.6 and we hit like a 2.55 and they pulled. Sad thing is we actually ranked 3/12 Fraternities for that year.

I am just looking for some advice on what to do now. I know that some of you have been through this (especially my friends at Texas Tech) and was wondering what road to take. My biggest factor (as ex chaplin) was i wanted to cut all the bad seeds. The ones who don't show, don't make the grades, just don't care...I felt that it would be better to be a fraternity of 20 dedicated brothers, than 40 some odd with 15 who could care less.

This is the first time we have been kicked off campus, every other fraternity on campus (other than theta chi i believe) has been through this once. What hurts the most is we were the oldest.

We have had are struggles just like anyone else (numbers, grades, housing, lack of alumni support) - But have never really gotten into this kind of trouble.

At first nationals said 2 years then 4 and now theres talks with older alumni of the chapter as to something else.

I am just looking for advice maybe from some of you who have been there, should we just wait it out? Or are there some things that we can do?

Like every other Chapter, we have our bad seeds, the ones we should have flushed out a long time ago. But our biggest two struggles have been 1. Lack of Alumni support and 2. Having no house for years (also doto a lack of alumni support).

Brothers, any information you could share with me (specially for those of you in Texas) would be great.

Thank you for your time,
Trey

NV Alpha has had a problem with grades and we did two things:
1. Cut the members that didn't make grades
2. Implemented mandatory study hours

Problem with that approach is: does your chapter have the numbers to make the cuts necessary and still keep nationals off your back? Get in touch with your RD, you'd be surprised at how well SigEp nationals will work with a chapter that is struggling and honestly wants to change.

I would suggest getting the guys together that care and writing up a plan to jolt your chapter back to life. Include a list of things such as mandatory study hours, etc. that address the problems nationals pulled your charter for recently. Send this to nationals and re-apply for the charter. Oh, and don't forget to kiss ass.

In the future, bid more intelligently. If the guy doesn't have grades, he doesn't get a bid. Make getting a bid something special, not something any guy who wants one can just get.
Quality over quantity, end of story.

Another idea that I recently came across is to create a club on campus called something like the pEgiS (SigEp backwards) Club. Get all the guys from your chapter who will pull their weight to join and prove yourself through this club by getting grades, etc. Then show nationals the effort you have put in. This should soften them up as well.

In Brotherly Love,
Brother Janning