|
A few members have been lost because of graduation, obviously, but the 20 I'm talking about have just dropped. Many of them were newer members. I was talking to a sister a few minutes ago who I've recently become sort of close with, and she said that some of the girls she talked to that pledged with her and dropped (she was in this past fall's class) said that the reason was they just didn't feel welcome. They felt that they would pay all this money but were never told exactly where their money was going, and every week there was another bill for something else; also, they went to the required events and said they felt like everyone was "looking at them funny." If I understand her correctly, I think she means that the new members felt sort of cut-off from the rest of the chapter, like they weren't really a part of it. I understand both sides of this, because it's really hard to absorb a new group of 50 pledges all of a sudden, but there's a lot of them that I never, ever saw. It's an effort that needs to be made on both sides to get to know one another, but...well, I thought we were on the right track by encouraging participation, but maybe we need some more ideas.
|