help in saving our chapter

phisigsigchic · #1 08-09-2002, 10:37 AM

Alright I need every single GCer to help me out here. I was told by one of my sisters that if we do not rush 40-80 girls this semester, national is going to take our chapter away from us. To be honest, I absolutely hate our national all they ever do is b*tch and moan but I do want to still be in a national sorority and have our chapter and keep our house. Anyway, so far its not a total emergency problem is we have MAJOR competitiion with all the other sororities on campus. We are the smallest ones and it always seems that girls are going ZTA or Gamm Phi Beta (they are the biggest competition). Now, I know we can do it especially since I will be recruiting like a mad woman. But does anyone have any ideas on what we can do to recruit so many girls throughout the year? We have 3 chances throughout the year to recruit. Fall informal rush, formal rush (in the spring semester I believe) and then another informal rush late in the spring. Throughout informal rushes, we hold a lot of COB's. So any ideas of activities, advertising, how to get girls interested are welcome. I was also thinking of hitting up the freshman when they move in this year. even though they can't rush until spring semester, I could get them to start hanging out and liking us so they will go Greek and we will be their number 1 choice come rush time. Alright thanks GCers!!!

kddani · #2 08-09-2002, 10:50 AM

Wow, what a tough position to be in if it's true that your nationals may pull your charter.
If your nationals is this serious, are they sending people to aid you?

We had some rush trouble, no where near what you're going through, and we had one of our national directors of collegian membership come stay with us for a few days. She was incredibly uplifting and motivating and that made a huge difference. We also had chapter consultants and alumnae help.

I guess a lot of what you can do depends on the culture of your campus and the greek life there. I imagine it's somewhat like my school was (U of Pittsburgh), fairly casual.

You don't even necessarily have to have specific events to COB people. Invite them along on everyday activities. Eating lunch together, just hanging out in your suite or house if you have one. Seeing the sisters for what they actually are, not the show that everyone puts on for rush. I am a firm believer that you are more likely to find quality girls through COB than formal rush. And we've found COBers to have better retention rates.

Another thing you can do, probably wouldn't be best to tell your nationals.... invite them when you go out partying, etc. Don't even necessarily let them know that you're "rushing" them. Just let them see what cool girls you are and that you can have fun with each other, instead of making it this big pressured thing that you're trying to convince them to join. Let them make the decision on their own. Let them ask you how they can join!

There are so many different approaches to this, feel free to PM me if you want.

phisiggrrl352 · #3 08-09-2002, 10:52 AM

yep, it's really all about gettin your name out there so that when the time comes people will remember phi sig!

is it possible to participate in an activity along with your school's office of student life? if so, that would be a way to let people know who you are that might not normally "be interested in a sorority."

and don't forget girls, er, i mean women in your classes. recruitment requires a bit of courage (at least for shy me) but the hard work will be rewarded!

i was also thinkin you should take a look at your competition. what types of things are they doing to promote themselves? or are they relying on their reputation? i'm not saying copy events or anything like that but if they've got a good thing goin, they must be doin something right!

LOTS AND LOTS OF LUCK TO YOU!
i'll be thinkin of your chapter and sending good luck wishes~

*p.s. i hope this didn't sound too competitive or seem like it was targeted against any other organizations. just tryin to help a sista out!*

phisigsigchic · #4 08-09-2002, 11:01 AM

Aww thanks phisiggrrl. I don't think you were being competitive in your post, we phi sigs gotta stick together. Yea the other chapters basically have their reps. At least ZTA. I not that worried right now because we have a LOT of not shy sisters (me being one of the most out spoken one of them) so I will be rushing people like crazy. Kddani RU Greek system is pretty instense and competitive since we have so many old established fraternities and sororities and then we have the cultural ones as well. Its a LOT of competition. Also, a lot of people think they are too cool for Greeks. This is a big problem at RU where almost everyone DOES not like us. So its hard to convince people sometimes. But like I said, I am completely not shy and I am going to try recruit even the most hard core anti-greeks (hey I used to be one of them and look at me). All my friends who are non-greeks are going to have to watch out now. But you guys def have the idea that a good way to try to presuade is to get them to just hang with you period. Now that I think about it, thats how they got ME! I used to hang with a lot of the sisters and finally I was like well they are all my friends so I should join. Hmmm getting ideas now

AOX81 · #5 08-09-2002, 11:23 AM

phisigsigchic: I just sent you a PM

FuzzieAlum · #6 08-09-2002, 11:25 AM

Have you considered rushing "Muffy the sorority girl"?

Seriously, remember that rush is all the time. It's not just during the official rush periods. Sure, you aren't extending bids, but that's when you're getting girls interested. By the time the last rush of the year rolls around, most girls know which chapter they want already.

Good luck!

AlphaSigLana · #7 08-09-2002, 11:46 AM

Our presidents used to pull this. They'd hold emergency meetings and tell us we had to get so many girls. Well we got enough girls and many of them(sorry to be mean-- were white trash). I'll explain one girl in a minute. Then some girls depledged others decided that college wasn't for them etc. So then we lose members. This summer we have lost four counting me.
I would suggest not worrying so much about losing your charter. Work hard, but chances are you won't lose your chapter unless you have 10 girls or something total in the house.
So there was this one girl we had join our house. At our retreat we reveal stuff and she told us how she used to be on crack and had to go to Narcotics annoymous. Okay-made mistakes move on. anyway her cousin joined our house(4.0 GPA), but they both did pot all the time, they talked back to our advisor!!!, they wouldn't come to mandatory stuff. Anyway fast forward to last week of school--- the one girl(#1 who dropped out) calls me and says," you should be lucky it's the last week of school otherwise I'd kick your ass. Stop talking crap about me." I asked her who said I was saying stuff and she replies," Don't talk to me " and hangs up. Well I was one of the only sisters who was nice to them when they first joined. Other peole talked more stuff then I did turns out they saw my name on a letter that was turned into standards(we had 7 or more of us complain to standards about them, but these girls only saw my name)
So believe me numbers do not make a house.

madmax · #8 08-09-2002, 11:57 AM

How many members do you have and how does that compare to the rest of campus and other Phi sigma sigma chapters?

phisigsigchic · #9 08-09-2002, 12:02 PM

Wow I never thought of that. But its true. Because while we will all be out there looking for girls, we might bid the wrong ones. And that would suck so much seeing as we have such a great group of girls and we all get along so well. Your right though about the numbers and them not taking the chapter away. I think if we show them that we can get a good number of REALLY good girls and get our name out there, even its not 50 or 60 girls, we will probably make them happy. I have been hearing about this from a lot of other GCers. I guess national might just be trying to scare us into really getting high up on numbers. We are a good chapter and have never caused any trouble or anything and have always done lots of philanthropy work and we have a high overallm GPA. so I doubt they would want to get rid of us right away.

phisigsigchic · #10 08-09-2002, 12:20 PM

Madmax - Right now we have about 45 active sisters. We would have so much more if so many people didn't go inactive. Anyway ZTA and Gamma Phi Beta and I think Delta Gamma (although I am not entirely sure about them) are close to 90-100 actives! Their pledge classes are huge! Other phi sigs I have heard are even worse off than we are. Our national does not train us very well for formal recruitment at all. We do really bad on that on my campus and other Phi Sigs have told me the same thing happens to them on their campuses. Hopefully since national will be paying us a visit and helping us out this year, they will train us for formal. Also, what I think is another problem is that freshman can not rush until their second semester. Freshman are really good potential rushees because they are approachable and are willing and open to new things while when they get to their second semester or thenthe upper classmen some are already dead set against ALL greeks or know they only want to rush a certain place. I think if RU let freshman rush right from the beginning, we would have SO many more sisters.

FuzzieAlum · #11 08-09-2002, 12:38 PM

A suggestion - if you feel that nationals isn't helping to train you for formal, what about contacting alums in your area who aren't Phi Sigs but who also aren't ZTA or Gamma? That is, alums from other NPC groups who don't have a chapter in your area. They should be happy to help out Greek life. If you have a local Alumnae Panhellenic, they should be able to help you with rush training.

Also, I agree about numbers. You do need SOME numbes if nationals says you do. However, let's say you get 30 girls and these are good girls - you'll be fine.

SigEp42 · #12 08-09-2002, 01:33 PM

Phisigsigchic, I am in the exact same situation as you, with one exception every brother knows about it. Stuff we are doing to help out rush are things like holding a philanthropy event the first week of school. Hopefully this will get our name out there and recognizable for the entire freshman. We are also going to be having barbeques before rush begins. Our house is next to a major dorm so it will get us seen again. Stuff other people do is have a set place on campus where their brothers/sisters hang out, some where public. It sounds dumb but when 30 girls are hanging out on the steps of a building or in the quad they get noticed. Other things people do are take out page ads in the news paper about their organization.
I’m not sure but it sounds as if only a few sisters know about this. I would tell all your members about your situation because if you don’t succeed it will be out of the blue for them to loose their charter. Make it clear that your standards won’t be suffering just because you need numbers. If you don’t have one already come up with a clear system for evaluating the pnm’s. I am a fan of the 0-5-10 scale.
Good luck, I’m sure you will do fine and get the numbers you need. Just go all out.

kddani · #13 08-09-2002, 01:51 PM

SigEp42-
Good luck, i didn't know the sigep's were having problems.... of course you guys are still better off than so many of the fraternities that aren't on the hill.

Our houses haven't really done anything for awhile, actually I can't remember an event together since I was a pledge in fall 1999. Your social should give our social a call when the school year gets back in.

I wish that the sororities could still help the fraternities rush.

Good luck! I hate to see a chapter on our campus having problems. It's hard enough being Greek at Pitt sometimes.

SigEp42 · #14 08-09-2002, 02:18 PM

Yea, we aren’t really in trouble yet we are below where we should be by about 5 guys, no where near phisigsigchic. We should be fine and on our way to a bigger chapter after this rush. We only have 3 seniors and that’s why we are so low. Just goes to show you a bad year for rush will come back to haunt you 4 years down the line. The good thing is we have 3 very strong years in the house now everyone is very active. (even more now that they know.
I actually have been getting help from some sororities and other girls.
They have a brother or a brother’s friend that’s coming to school and they will introduce him to us and put in a good word.
We should do stuff together, we have an awesome social chair I’ll tell him to give you a call. I always have fun with you guys your hayride was great and from what I remember of the love shmove party, Valentines Day was great too.

kddani · #15 08-09-2002, 02:33 PM

oh the infamous love shmove party.... i think i know who you are now. I wasn't in attendance of the love shmove party too long. You're tara's friend, right?
Glad to hear you guys aren't in serious trouble. 3 seniors isn't too bad a thing though because next year you'll be in better shape. That's why we're in great shape this year, because the only people who graduated are me, tara and three others. So we're right at total I think, before fall rush even.
One bad year of rush will definately come back and bite you in the @ss at some point in time... we've been there.
I tried to get my brother to rush, but he just wasn't interested. I would've recommended Sig Ep too.

Good luck to you and your chapter!