what would you do?

[SirHornyToad]

Ok, here's the situation...

A Local with 7 actives, a semi strong alumni involvment, but for the most part most of the actives are unmotivated and unwilling to do much if any recruitment due to many different excuses. Alot of prospective pledges are interested due to the effort of a few people who are busting thier asses. And now the kicker, all the actives except for 1 graduates at the end of this academic year.

how would you get people motivated not only to recruit but to also show up to any function (yea we even have problems getting people to go to social fuctions)
fines? doesn't seem to work since people just won't pay them....
Bar them from events? that doesnt work when your so small that every person makes a huge difference....
Take away voting rights? eh we're sposed to do that when people don't pay dues, and when you only have 3 people able to vote it sucks...
Paddle the actives? sounds good to me... but eh prolly isnt very PC....

any other ideas you can come up with? I think it sucks that a few people have to do the work for everyone and wear themselves out when others do nothing....

[Kevin]

How did you recruit these kids in the first place? Did they sign on for some cool hazing, beer, etc, or were they told that it was hard work for a great reward? During pledgeship, was the business side of the fraternity taught to them? Did they learn to deal with money?

I dunno what you do at this point. I'd love to give you the silver bullet here, but it looks to me like without significant alumni involvement -- and I mean to the point of still being active, y'all are pretty much screwed.

[KSUViolet06]

Originally posted by SirHornyToad


Paddle the actives? sounds good to me... but eh prolly isnt very PC....

I'm going to assume you're joking. All that would do is give you a bad reputation and piss the guys off.

[SirHornyToad]

yes, i am kidding, but still, what the hell can we do?
I'm not worried about us dieing at this point because i'm pretty sure our pledgeclass will be about 15 people or so...

The strange part is that for a long time alot of these people have done thier share of hard work, but especially at crunch time its hard seeing this stuff go on, especially when literally 3 people are doing all of the work and the rest we even have trouble showing up for things, even fun things. One example would be our brotherhood retreat that we had last weekend... 4 people went, 2 of which were alums, yea thats right, out of 7 actives and 700 alums from our school, 2 actives 2 alums went on the brohood retreat... so yea i'm saddened by all of this

Our pledging is good, it teaches alot, but unfortunatly, cool people who go into it because of this and that, and learn good things don't always practice them.

I just don't know what to do, alot of me wants to tell everyone off and tell them to get with it or get out, but at the same time, we can't even tell people who don't pay dues to be innactive because we need some sort of numbers =(

[SigPhiSunshine]

I would suggest, maybe telling the actives who don't do what they are supposed to do, that they can't participate when you guys go out to do something, or can't do any of the fun things you do ( if they are showing up to them). If you're worried about them dropping, but you have a pledge class of 15 coming in, I wouldn't really worry about it all that much. If they aren't participating in any of the important events, what good are they even doing your group? If they quit, will it really hurt you that much. Yes, your fraternity will consist of almost entirely new members, but it might just be worth it. Right now our sorority has VERY few senior members. I would say there are maybe 5 out of the whole group. When my pledge class of 6 came through, the new members (us) were the majority compared to senior members. Sure things were shaky at first, but they worked out okay in the end. The majority of our sorority *ooh i rhymed!* is my pledge class (fall 03) and the winter pledge class. We only got 3 members this semester, but it seems like the girls from my pledge class know enough to guide them along, and the winter 04 class is kinda figuring things out still. I hope this helps you, and I really hope things work out for the best.

[SirHornyToad]

yes, but we only get 1 pledgeclass a year at our school, which isnt even for sure, like i hope we get 15 and we've got alot of intrest, but until pledging is over there is no for sure, and if the slackers weren't allowed to show up it would be like 3 actives and 5 alums which really , at least im my opinions sucks, every person counts when your this low on numbers

[Zidion]

Honestly? Id say you're screwed

[Firehouse]

OK, here are some thoughts. You are being way too hard on yourself and on your friends. You say three of your seven man chapter are the workhorses. Well, that's about the same percentage for 100-man chapters too. You have a lot of men graduating, and it's understandable that graduating seniors are more focused on starting their careers than on routine fraternity duties. As the years pass they will remember their fraternity fondly and want to come back and reunite with their friends.
If it was me
1) Take charge, make a plan and sit down individually with each brothers to tell him what is happening and ask for his advice. You may find that they have good ideas to offer. Nothing will be accomplished if you yell at them, or address them as a group. Do it one-on-one. You'll be surprised at the effect this approach will have.
2) Look to your campus and see if there is an existing group that can be pledged together. For instance, a rugby club, or sailing club, a good independent intramural or some other manly outfit that would enjoy the additional advantages of being their own fraternity, especially one with a distinguished history.
3) Calm the alumni. Obviously they're proud and involved, and so their concern might tend toward panic. Again - and I cannot stress this too strongly - take charge. You don't need a title, just be able to articulate a vision and act confident. Don't ask permission; just do it and people will defer to you. Tell the alumni that things will be OK but you're going to need their help, maybe money, maybe being there as bodies for a rush function.
4) Go to sororities if you have them. Tell them you're looking for a few good men and ask for referrals and recommendations.
5) Don't sell yourselves to rushees as a 7-man small fraternity. Sell yourselves as a 700-man fraternity with a rich history and unique tradition. The best men want to be part of something strong and attractive.
6) When talking to your undergraduate members, stress that confidence is the most attractive Human attribute in rush. Never apologize for being small, and never use your numbers as crutch, ie. "We're tiny so we have brotherhood." The fact is that to rushees, all fraternities have Brotherhood, just like every automobile has wheels. But some automobiles are Mercedes and some are Kias. Your 7-man fraternity with 700 alumni could be an exotic Juaguar. When they ask how many members you have, say "700 from the beginning, and our alumni are proud and active. We like to maintain 25-35 undergraduates at any one time." Do not say, "We only have 7 guys and they're graduating so please join our fraternity so we won't go under."
Remember: take charge / have a plan / outward display confidence / "rush" the Brothers one-on-one / have a goal in mind.
PM me if I can help.

[SirHornyToad]

Thanks firehouse, those are alot of good ideas...

Alot of it struck personal cordes for me. I pledged 4 years ago, and in the middle of my second year i had some personal problems/depression and failed out, well coincidentlly enough i also ended up owing the school alot of money and couldnt come back for 2 years. During that time i remained an associate (our consitution says even if your graduated or just not in school if you pay full dues you can be associate which is basically a fancy word for active) and i feel i did my part, well this year i paid off the school, and got loans for this years tuition, so i'm all good, and since i've been around for 4 full years already, and since I don't have confidence in the president , and since i'm Vice President who in our constitution is defined as, "assisting the president in all matters" I have basically taken up about 80% of the responsibility in our house. And i am mentally, phsyically and emotionally tired from this semester up to this point, I had a plan and it's going well, considering we have 12 for sure and 3-10 maybes, i've talked to people individually but some factors are ok and some arent. I did alot of growin up in the time from when i pledged until now, and honestly going from a rookie who was trying to prove something to being a seasoned vetern who cares and knows whats going on isn't always how some brothers see it. The ones who know I'm compatent and recognize my change and responsibility it's ok going 1 on 1, the ones who don't make it very difficult because they basically dismiss alot of what i say anyway.

As far as looking for an existing group, I think it probably wont work for a few reasons. One is that our fraternities and sororities aren't looked on as being cool in alot of ways at our school, mostly just because of stereotypes and sin's of the past, from people we hardly even know who were actives 10 years ago. Plus it's hard to do things along those lines when pledging is soooo far away for us.

I think alot of our alums aren't worried because they have either given up hope, or i have already calmed them. We have alot of alums who are already involved with thier time and money and almost make up for the actives we loose.

Our sororities pretty much all love us except for one who we are having a personal issue with, but by next spring it should be fine, but if the system as a whole gets not too much respect here, then thier word isnt much better then ours.

The don't sell yourselves as small thing is actually a great idea and that WILL happen next year because it is much more of a true representation of us then 7 lol

the confidence thing is good too =P