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Interchapter wise I don't have an opinion yet, I'm still learning a lot about different chapters across the country! As for my chapter, I learned that diversity can sometimes have a dark side (no pun intended,lol). When we started as an interest group a few years ago, we stressed diversity almost as much as community service. Our interest group was half black and half white. We had native africans, bosnians, koreans, latinos, gays/lesbians, older students....you name it. Unfortunately, in our interest group and petitioning days we had some drama. We were losing people as fast as we were gaining new people. It was like we were going in so many different directions. Eventually, we stopped focusing so much on diversity and started focusing more on common goals. At the same time, our chapter started blossoming. There was less drama and more retention. Yes, we lost some "diversity" for a while, but I think it was worth it. However, we're now gaining it back.
In other words, intrachapter wise, I think stressing common interests and goals is more important than stressing diversity. Hopefully, diversity will follow.
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