too much expansion

skip101 · #1 01-11-2002, 02:12 PM

On my campus the number of GLOs has doubled in the past 10 years. The number of students going through rush is actually down. Organizations that used to have between 50 and 90 members and now down to 20-40 and some have less than 10. Some of the groups on our campus have lost their houses and some have even died out.

Does anyone have any ideas on how to prevent national organizations from opening new chapters?

dzrose93 · #2 01-11-2002, 02:25 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by skip101
On my campus the number of GLOs has doubled in the past 10 years. The number of students going through rush is actually down. Organizations that used to have between 50 and 90 members and now down to 20-40 and some have less than 10. Some of the groups on our campus have lost their houses and some have even died out.

Does anyone have any ideas on how to prevent national organizations from opening new chapters?

So sorry to hear about the Greek trouble on your campus. It sounds as if the Greek Life department didn't do a very good job of communicating with the National GLO's who were interested in expanding to your school. They are suppose to weigh the amount of students going through rush and the number of members in each house carefully in order to determine if the Greeks on your campus are equipped to handle a new GLO.

Did the person in charge of Greek Affairs on your campus even inform the existing GLOs that a new group was interested in colonizing? If not, that issue needs to be brought up - and quickly. In most instances, the existing GLOs can provide the best information on whether or not the campus can support a new group and still maintain the other ones at the capacity they are used to. If the existing GLOs are left out of the equation completely and aren't given a say in the addition of a new GLO, problems like the one you've mentioned are usually the result.

dzsaigirl · #3 01-11-2002, 02:40 PM

I have a question related to that. Some schools have almost 200 members per house and others have as few as 20 per house. A decision to bring a new group on campus depends upon the increase in the number of people rushing and the need for another group to take them in. This is the thing: It seems that if a school has TONS of members per group, they should have brought another group on campus long ago so that the chapters could be a bit smaller. I mean, 20 is soooo small, but 200 sisters? I have talked to DZs from A&M who didn't even know every girl in their pledge class, much less everone in the sorority! It seems like 50-100 would be a good functional number. Is there any stance that NPC has with regard to ideal chapter size? Please ask me to explain more clearly if this has been a confusing post.

bruinaphi · #4 01-11-2002, 02:57 PM

If there are NPC groups on a campus there is supposed to be a Panhellenic vote on expansion. On some campuses with 200+ members per chapter, the Panhellenic members vote against expansion even though rush numbers continue to increase b/c there are other factors that they take into consideration. For example, if a campus has lost a large number of chapters in recent years, then experiences an increase in rush numbers, the campus might want to look at why they lost the chapters before and try to take steps to improve their system before bringing on other chapters. They do this b/c opening a chapter is a VERY EXPENISVE endevor and it is not fair to GLOs to bring them onto a campus where they are likely to close back up within 10 years.

shadokat · #5 01-11-2002, 04:43 PM

What campus are you on skip?

33girl · #6 01-12-2002, 01:04 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by dzsaigirl
I have a question related to that. Some schools have almost 200 members per house and others have as few as 20 per house. A decision to bring a new group on campus depends upon the increase in the number of people rushing and the need for another group to take them in. This is the thing: It seems that if a school has TONS of members per group, they should have brought another group on campus long ago so that the chapters could be a bit smaller. I mean, 20 is soooo small, but 200 sisters? I have talked to DZs from A&M who didn't even know every girl in their pledge class, much less everone in the sorority! It seems like 50-100 would be a good functional number. Is there any stance that NPC has with regard to ideal chapter size? Please ask me to explain more clearly if this has been a confusing post.

As long as people keep joining 200 member chapters, 200 member chapters are going to exist. For NPC to put any sort of nationwide cap on it would be like McDonald's saying "oh, we have enough restaurants, let's quit." Obviously that will never happen.

There's big differences between a system that is just growing, and one where chapters go on and off all the time. The first is a good expansion risk, the second maybe not.

Optimist Prime · #7 01-12-2002, 03:38 AM

yeah but mcdonalds is greasy and smells bad. do you really want girls like that?

BrianMUDU · #8 01-12-2002, 12:43 PM

Miami University, the Mother Of Fraternities, is having a bad week!

The number of people who registered for rush was above 800. Rush started this past Wednesday, and you could look up and down the streets and see absolutely no one! Yes, there are a handful of big houses that got a lot of people (alpha chapters and a few others), but other than that numbers are down A LOT! One chapter, who usually didn't get a lot during Rush, still actually hadn't seen their first person on the second night. The person who was the Greek Affairs director in the past estimated that there couldn't have been more than 450-500 people rushing. Where did all of the other 800 go?!?? Our numbers are down dramatically from what we thought because we did a better job than last year preparing for rush. It is a very weird rush here at Miami, so I hope things go better for anyone else that has rush in the near future. Personally, I blame our Greek Affairs and IFC. The past three days everyone has repeatedly said "What is going on?? Where is everyone??" I have a feeling this will really hurt some of the weaker chapters. Not to mention we have about 4 new fraternities on campus this year, ouch.

ZZ-kai- · #9 01-12-2002, 02:29 PM

Any word on how the Betas are doing there? I know that they ran into some problems in the past decade, but they have really gotten it together since their re-org. about 2 years ago. I met a bunch of them this summer at Convention, and they were all great guys. Drop me a line if you have heard how they are doing. Sorry to hear about rush.

Quote:

Originally posted by BrianMUDU
Miami University, the Mother Of Fraternities, is having a bad week!

The number of people who registered for rush was above 800. Rush started this past Wednesday, and you could look up and down the streets and see absolutely no one! Yes, there are a handful of big houses that got a lot of people (alpha chapters and a few others), but other than that numbers are down A LOT! One chapter, who usually didn't get a lot during Rush, still actually hadn't seen their first person on the second night. The person who was the Greek Affairs director in the past estimated that there couldn't have been more than 450-500 people rushing. Where did all of the other 800 go?!?? Our numbers are down dramatically from what we thought because we did a better job than last year preparing for rush. It is a very weird rush here at Miami, so I hope things go better for anyone else that has rush in the near future. Personally, I blame our Greek Affairs and IFC. The past three days everyone has repeatedly said "What is going on?? Where is everyone??" I have a feeling this will really hurt some of the weaker chapters. Not to mention we have about 4 new fraternities on campus this year, ouch.

BrianMUDU · #10 01-12-2002, 06:44 PM

The Betas are one of the exceptions this year. They had a great turn out and are doing excellent as far as I know. They are definately on their way back up to where any fraternity should be.

Aphigal · #11 01-12-2002, 07:01 PM

Hi Brian,

That is too bad the fraternities are having such a rough week. I know the numbers for sorority recruitment is actually up at Miami. Currently, estimated quota is 60-61, last year it was 50, definitely a big jump with 17 chapters rushing.

Why do you think there is such a difference in the fraternity vs sorority numbers?

Miami1839 · #12 01-12-2002, 07:32 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by BrianMUDU
The Betas are one of the exceptions this year. They had a great turn out and are doing excellent as far as I know. They are definately on their way back up to where any fraternity should be.

Thats nice to hear

AGDLynn · #13 01-12-2002, 08:08 PM

Holy Toledo! I can't believe that quota would be 5!! That's only 85 sorority PMNs! Glad that things are looking up!!

How big is your school?

At the State Univ. of West Ga., I think there are about 7-8k. Quota was 21. The highest got 24, I think. The lowest got 10.

bruinaphi · #14 01-13-2002, 04:30 AM

I think that aphigal meant to type that last year quota was only 50 and that 60-61 is a big jump when you have 17 chapters (it's an increase of 170 new members which means at least 250? more rushees depending on their atrition rate).

BrianMUDU · #15 01-13-2002, 05:12 AM

Yes, I heard about sorority numbers being much higher this year, too. It is just really weird. It is illegal to bid on the first night, but we know of more than a handful of fraternities that did it. The next day everyone realized numbers were really down, so most chapters went bid crazy starting the second night.

AGDLynn,

Miami is not too large -- about 15,000. Almost 30 fraternities and slightly under 20 sororities and about 30-33% Greek at the University last I heard.