Recruitment Requirement Changes

ilovetheviolets · #16 10-07-2003, 03:42 PM

kappasunshine,
I am a sigma at F&M and I first want to fill everyone in on the situation...

my chapter has been here for 25 yrs.
chi omega has been here for approx. 15 yrs.
KBG has been here for 1 year
there are 7 fraternities, one of which is celebrating their hundreth anniversary this year, and many of which are older than that.

that is three sororities total. as of right now formal recruitment only consists of the two panhellenic sororities (for many reasons). it takes place in the spring, and has been seeing declining numbers (when i went through there were approx. 80 girls, last year we were down to approx. 40...only 29 of which signed bid cards). that is a 50% drop in 3 years.
the president of the college has said that he wants F&M to have a "premiere greek system" to all the national orgs. and to the current presidents of the orgs. i would not say that the administration is trying to get rid of us at all. esp. b/c our fraternity chapters are so old and have a huge network of alumni (girls were only allowed in in 1969...so the sororities are younger by many years).
i know that many national orgs. are against a fall recruitment for sophomores, but i also know that at many schools it sometimes works out better for numbers and so on....i.e. dartmouth. with all the school is willing to allow us to do, and all the requierments we'd have to fill our visibility on campus would be raised incredibly. therefor more people would prob. want to join a greek organization. also, as stated before, we'd get more serious people. the timing would work out well, and it would be a great load off of everyones shoulders during the school year. i do understand the negative points of view, but i just hope that the greek orgs. at my school look at both sides. i mean, for all we know, the admin. could be thinking it's either this or nothing, and we are completely gone...and if that's the case, i'd rather keep my sorority and have to change our function a bit, instead of loosing my chapter completely.
i know this is kind of long, and a tangent, blah blah blah, and i'm sorry, i just have a whole lot to say about this situation (esp. b/c i am the recruitment director and deal with numbers and all that stuff on a daily basis).