Quote:
Originally Posted by 33girl
The point is that when you've been Greek, to transfer to another school that doesn't have your sorority and having to watch all the other Greeks having fun while you sit on the sidelines is not fun.
|
I'm EL, I'm a Pi Beta Phi and I love my sisters, my letters, and our values. I am deeply committed to improving my community through service. The school I went to has a chapter of Epsilon Sigma Alpha service sorority, and my junior year I went to their "rush" event, I figured that it would be like my business fraternity just service based. When I got there, I saw how close their sisterhood is and how much fun they have together. I also found that their chapter runs almost exactly like my Pi Phi chapter except they do more service projects each semester. They have social events, formals, rituals, everything! Right then, I knew I couldn't join. They were a "real" sorority and I'd already found my sisters.
I graduated, and then just recently decided to go to another school to get a second degree. This school is a commuter campus and has 1 NPC sorority and it's not Pi Phi. When I got here, I
desperately missed my sisters. I need that fellowship, but the sorority here has low numbers and there isn't a need for another social sorority. Then I decided to focus on volunteering; I browsed the university website and didn't find a single service organization! Then I remembered back to that day I went to the ESA recruitment. I researched their organization and requested information on their website. The very next afternoon I got an email. Tracy Swanson (who is an Alpha Phi) literally did all of the foot work. She contacted my school's student activities office, she talked them into letting me set up a booth at the activities fair even though ESA wasn't established there, and she put me in touch with ESAs in my state that could help guide me. They showed up to help at my booth. 20 members of the other collegiate chapters , a former international president (!) and the state president came to my first call out meeting. They were very excited to have a new chapter and have been so supportive ever since then. This meeting was in September, we affiliated with the university in November, and we chartered our chapter in January. It was all actually a surprisingly simple process! Tracy said that it can be done in as few as 2 months.
These girls are not my Pi Phi sisters and will never replace my experiences in my chapter, but our sisterhood is really just as strong! I cherish ESA’s symbols and meanings just as much as Pi Beta Phi’s. What's so fantastic about ESA is that they have no requirements of their chapters, all of them do things differently, and some of their chapters don't even do ritual! Chapters are encouraged to develop symbols and meanings that are important to them and incorporate them into the initiation ceremony.
Because the only experience I have with a sorority is with Pi Phi, my chapter does a lot of things like NPC sororities (I don't know any other way). I try very hard not to do anything exactly like my chapter did them, I've twisted things to make them uniquely ESA, created things that I'd never done before, and used a lot of input and ideas from my other charter members who know nothing about how sororities function. When we meet up with the other collegiate chapters in the state and we swap ideas, we always integrate things they do that are ESA tradition that we didn't know about, and they find things that we do that they want to adopt. They have a week of rush parties followed by pinning (sound familiar?) that increasingly become more formal as the week goes on. Our chapter does the same thing but probably with a little more NPC influence.
We are brand new but I feel like because of my experiences, the overwhelming support of the other ESA chapters in our state and our national HQ, and the dedication of my new sisters, we are starting strong! ESA can be anything its founders want it to be, it can be all service, all social, or a mixture of both! Women, not letters make a sisterhood.
Maybe you could find another type of college sorority or even a community based sorority to join. When you find the right one, just like with KD, you'll know you found your new home! PM me if you want more info, even though this went on for miles as it is!
epsilonsigmaalpha.org
esaintl.org
Good luck! I hope this helps. You will find sisters again, even if it's just a friend that sits next to you in biology!