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I'd love to see some numbers that showed whether shorter membership periods did in fact cut down on hazing incidents. Back when almost all sororities went to the 6-8 week new member period, cutting down on hazing was pretty much the only reason we were ever given for it. Has it helped any? We still hear all kinds of stories ever year about hazing.
I've got 2 big problems with the short programs. First, the fact we don't have grades before we initiate members, at least for Freshman which is about 90% or more of our pledge classes. The "threat" (for lack of a better word) of holding someone over for initiation if they don't pull grades is a huge incentive to get them to study.
Second, there simply isn't enough time for them to learn all about the Chapter and org's history, values and beliefs. We used to attend Pledge meetings once a week for an entire semester. I find there is so much that our newest members don't know about ADPi.
But, our nat'l org finally figured this one out. We're rolling out a new program for continuing membership education. The first year of membership will focus on sorority stuff, just like the old program used to do in addition to time management, study resources on campus, etc. Each year following we'll provide educational programming tailored to their year in school on topics that should be relevant to them. For example, seniors may have a workshop on business etiquette while sophomores will attend one on financial management. All members are welcome to attend any of the other workshops offered, but they will be required to at least attend the ones for their class.
As I said, it's new and we'll have to see how it works out. Juggling more membership education sessions is going to be tricky for both the facilitators and the actives. But the groups will be smaller and should be easier to manage. We've also added an officer to help our Mem Ed VP handle all this.
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