Improving Chapter Grades

[AXOhottie]

What sort of scholarship program does your chapter have? I am VP Intellectual Development and I really want to improve our chapter GPA and I was just wondering what sorts of programs other chapters use. Thanks guys!

[AXOeva]

I stumbled across your post and I thought, "oooo, I actually have something intelligent to post". I am a recent grad and the ID advisor for the Iota Psi chapter.

We have the requisite scholarship banquets at the end of each semester and we hold a voluntary study hall for our new and lifetime members.

We also have a smart cookie award every week at chapter. Sisters can email the VP-ID with names of sisters who got a good grade on an exam, studied really hard for an exam, did really well on a presentation, etc. They get their names called out at chapter and a little bag of cookies.

We also have "Apple Pie with Alpha Chi" in the fall. It is a fac/staff appreciation banquet. We get apple pie and ice cream and invite our professors and important administrators to come and meet the sisters. (Great PACE too!)

Another thing we do is "Present Princesses" and "Delinquent Divas". At chapter the VP-ID passes around two jars, the PP jar has slips of paper in it and the DD jar is empty. If you went to all of your classes that week you put your name on a slip of paper and stick it in the PP jar. If you didn't, you can put some loose change into the DD jar. It encourages sisters to take ownership of attending class. A name is pulled out of the jar every week and she gets a little gift or cookies and the change from the DD jar goes to those gifts and cookies or other ID programs.

That is all I can think of for now, but if you have any ideas from your chapter, I'd be happy to pass them along to my VP! Oh and what school do you go to?

[AXOhottie]

We actually have a lot of similar programs. The theme, per say, that I am going with is that Alpha Chis are "beary" smart. We have a scholarship board in the house, which I turned into a tree. I made bears with everyone's name on them and had each sister write her semester academic goal on a pot of honey. We have a point system where a sister will get points for keeping up with notes/readings all week, visiting a professor during office hours, getting a B or better on an exam, presentation, paper and stuff like that. Each time someone turns in points, her bear "climbs" up the tree towards her goal. On the board we also have a brag board where sisters can turn in papers or tests they've done well on. It's kind of like the refrigerator when you were at home. I am going to solicit businesses for donations to have for a prize for the sister with the most points at the end of the semester. I'm also doing a weekly recognition of someone who has worked hard, and they will get a miniature bear. If there are no nominations, I will pick someone I have seen working extra hard.

We also have a Get Up and Go competition. I divided the ladies into three groups and you mark each day on the sheet whether or not you went to class. It's a fun little competition. I'm trying to think of what else I can do with the groups. I may see how much stuff I can get from businesses and also do a grade competition between the groups.

We do a scholarship banquet each semester to recognize the hard work our sisters have put in for the last semester. We invite our professors over for formal dinner, have our chapter advisor speak, and then do a presentation recognizing the ladies who have done well. This semester, I am also going to have a Faculty Appreciation Luncheon inviting all the faculty over (I attend a small, private school) as a way for us to say thank you for all of their hard work.

This is very similar to what we have done in the past. I had thought we were doing really well, and the last VP Intellect had also. We were really disheartened when we finally got our grade report from last semester. She was under the impression that, with the exception of a few individuals, everyone was doing really well (we have elections in the fall and the new officers take over in January).

I really like the PP and DD thing you do. One of thing we don't have is study tables. I was wondering how helpful those are. Do people actually use them? My understanding is that we had them many moons ago, but people weren't using them and those on academic contracts complained that they didn't' have enough work to do if they were required to attend study tables.

[nauadpi]

This I did when I was scholarship chair for my chapter:

-Smarty Pants (whenever a sister got an A on a test, quiz, project, essay, etc. her name would go on a little pair of paper cut out pants that hung on a clothes line)
-Scholarship Brunch in the fall... It was heald during parents weekend... So families were all invitied. We would give out awards for the most improved GPA and the highest GPA... In addition, we would induct people into our honors society...
-Study Hours... Each week sisters had to do study hours based on their previous semester's GPA... Half of those hours had to be monitored hours... In addition, those sisters who did not make grades for the semester had to be monitors as did the members of exec... If you have over a 3.5 GPA from the pervious semester you did not have any study hours...
-Scholarship Queen... Scholarship Queen was given out each week at our meeting... It was given to the sister who studied the most hours that week... We had a crown that was passed around for it...
-End of semester party for those who had the most study hours for the semester (5 or so sisters)
-Also, we had a board hanging in the hall to show if you had turned in your study hours for the week. You were only given 3 times in which you did not have to turn them in. If you missed more then that, you would not to be able to go to socials...
-Compiled a list of sisters' majors... That way, when sisters were looking for help in classes, they had an idea of who would have already taken that class and could help them...

I think that is everything... If I think of some more, I will post it here...