[violetpretty]

Thanks, oldu for sharing that! Where did you find this information? I was looking for that last year! Last year, when I was a member of Maryland's extension-exploration committee (we presented to Panhellenic and the vote was no), one of my jobs was to make a timeline of all the NPCs ever at Maryland. This KD lady, who has been working with Maryland since 1970 had a list of all the NPCs at Maryland with dates for me, but Chi Omega was not on that list. I remember doing some search and seeing that there was a Delta Beta chapter of Chi Omega at Maryland, founded in 1923, and she didn't know anything about it. I even emailed someone from Chi Omega's HQ asking them when the 1923 chapter had closed, but she didn't know, she only said it must have closed "shortly thereafter", which made me wonder if it was even installed.

I had the following on my timeline (the beginning of it):

1916: Women admitted to UMD
1920: Sigma Delta, a local, is established
1924: Alpha Omicron Pi chartered
1929: Kappa Kappa Gamma absorbs Sigma Delta
Kappa Delta chartered

When I was pledging Sigma Kappa, we were taught that Alpha Omicron Pi was the "first sorority" on campus, but that is not quite right. So I imagine that of the two locals in the early 20s, one was Sigma Delta turned KKG, and the other was a local absorbed by AOII or KD? I found the Sigma Delta bit in some archive on the umd.edu site.

In the 1980s, membership was on the rise, with the highest number of PNMs registered in 1987. So, Maryland looked to extension. They ended up inviting Chi Omega, Phi Mu, and Zeta Tau Alpha to present for extension. Zeta Tau Alpha was chosen, colonization began in 1989, and they were chartered in 1990.

Although we lost 4 chapters in the early 90s, membership was on the rise and we offered Chi Omega an opportunity to colonize in 1996, (we didn't have presentations, we chose them since they presented a few years before) which they accepted. However, they failed to meet their own goals (an oversimplification of a lot of drama and choice words) and pulled out of colonization.

Maryland is actually the largest Panhellenic community with no Chi Omega chapter. It seems like Maryland and Chi Omega have had two spats. Could the third time be the charm?