I think it has to start with intake. The problems that we are experiencing with many of the inactive brothers and sisters is that they pledged for the wrong reasons. My chapter president all the time talks about how he is able to pay dues, sell (or eat)tix, go to district, regional, and national conventions every year on a grad student's salary. He says its because he knows every year that he has made the commitment to Alpha when he pledged and he sticks to it. Every brother (or sister) has to understand what thet lifelong commitment means. One aspiriant said it best when he stated that Alpha has to be a part of your life. When you start on that quest to Alpha, understand that as you get older and life's challenges come at you, that your response will have to incorporate God, Your family, your career, Alpha, and anything else that is important to you. Alpha is a part of your life. When people pledge, they have to understand this, on an undergrad or grad level.
Our chapter has been trying to reclaim brothers for years. Yeah, grad fees are very expensive, but that is not the main reason why broters are not active. Most Inactive Brothers are not active because they feel that "the brotherhood is not the same" on the grad level, in other words, it ain't the undergrad experience. Brothers, and I want to make clear, Alpha does not end after senior year!!! In fact, most of your Alpha experience is going to be a graduate/ alumni experience, unless you happen to pass away while in College. So understand that the undergrad experience cannot be the reason that you made a lifelong commitment, unless you wanted to be an undergrad for the rest of your life!!!
Reclaimation will work much better when we refine the intake process to understand the character of potential brothers/sisters. This cannot be gauged by how long thay stay "online" or how well they take a test, but understanding that character is gauge best when you spend time with a person, talking with them about what matters to them.
A word on the Alumni "Experience". If any brother feels that the alumni erxperience is "too political" and non-responsive to issues of true brotherhood, understand this: this situation maybe true only because most of the "active" membership in Alpha is Older alumni brothers. Active is very important because only active brothers can make policy and business decisions (such as to change the intake process to MIP). In other words, your voice is not heard because your voice is not there "officially". The only way to make Alpha responsive to your concerns is to actually be able to let your voice be known. I've been at plenty of state conventions where the older brotherhood had to be responsive to the younger brotherhood because the younger brother were there,organized, and thoughtful. Too many of our Alumni chapters have no one in them under 40 years old. That is truly a shame. In order to make the brotherhood responsive to the needs of 22, 23, 24, year old brothers is that those brothers have to be around to voice their concerns. I was at a state convention last year and if it weren't for another chapter brother and myself, there would have been no one there over 22 nor under 40, absolutley no one. Every year Alpha intakes 10 times as many undergraduate brothers than graduate brothers, but every year, the active membership of the gen org. is between 80 to 85% alumni. This means that even brothers on the undergrad level are not paying national dues after they cross. This goes back to issues of character and commitment, something that "pledging" or reclamation can never change.
Blackwatch!!!