New Sorority on Campus? - Page 3

irishpipes · #31 02-14-2007, 03:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DeltaBetaBaby

Just for the record, it really isn't. More than half the women coming through rush don't know anything about greek life, very few chapters require recs, and chapters climb and fall within the social tiers every five years. The chapter houses are nice, but most women don't want to live in them, so the smaller the better. Believe me, it is not the South.

While I agree with most of what you wrote, I disagree with the overall sentiment. The general atmosphere at U of I is more laid back than the south, but the importance of Greek life is just as overwhelming, in my opinion. Yes, at U of I any girl can get into a sorority, but not every girl could get into certain sororities. I do agree that the "tiers" are not as rigid as they are in the south, although certain chapters tend to always hover near the top with the middle being where things change around a lot.

As for the housing, I don't think that it is insignificant. I think it is just culturally different than some schools. At Oklahoma or Arkansas, girls pledge as freshmen and then are expected to live in the house their remaining 3 years. Those houses tend to sleep 80-100 girls so that is necessary. That would never fly at Illinois. Most girls live in the house 1 or 2 years, but definitely want the freedom of an apartment at some point. I am sure that culture developed because the houses are very old and not quite as large, so not everyone could live in. But, I think if you have a house, it better be competitive with the others. As OJ wrote, some of those are historic (I know the AOII house is on the historic register), beautiful, and very convenient to campus, unlike most of the dorms and apartments. On the other hand, I have always thought that a group that came on and was unhoused intentionally could do well at Illinois, given the right marketing.

DeltaBetaBaby · #32 02-14-2007, 08:45 PM

I should clarify my statement. Most women want to live in the chapter house for one year, but many do not want to live there for two. This is largely because of the freedoms you give up to live in a chapter house, and the plethora of cheap apartments on campus. If a chapter only has a one year live-in requirement, they advertise it heavily during rush.

As far as the tiers, yes, there are some that are traditionally strong and weak, but I have definitely seen a medium chapter have one good rush and shoot to the top, or a medium chapter have one lousy rush and fall to the bottom. This is true of the fraternities as well.

Anyway, the point of my post was not to debate the details of the UIUC greek system, the point was that a new group could come onto campus and be competitive, even if they did not necessarily have the resources of the largest NPC groups.

UofISigKap · #33 02-14-2007, 10:29 PM

I hope that whomever is selected helps bring a solid recruitment in which everyone benefits and all the chapters are at a manageable and successful size. I was looking a the numbers in chapters currently. See the grades for the number of new members for each sorority and whole group number. Some of the chapters are HUGE! Some were big when I was there, but I don't remember so many hitting near 200. (Actually, were there any???

)

On a side note: I unfortunately never got to live in house. That is one thing that I wish I would have been able to do. The timing of when I was a member, my student teaching scheduling, and graduation date meant it never happened. Some people in my chapter LOVED living in and did so for three years. I know there is drama involved when you have so many women living closely together, but there are silly runs to the grocery store at 3 am, getting ready to go out for the night and yelling down the hall to find someone with a curling iron that works or a shirt that will go better with your awesome "bar pants", staying up doing laundry and chatting over juice bars from the basement freezer. It's just an experience that I wish I had. I was over there enough, it's like I lived there, but...

Sister Havana · #34 02-14-2007, 11:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AlphaFrog

Damn. What were we thinking?? Competing at UofI is the Midwest's version of Bama or LSU.

No, that would be Indiana.

SoProud2BeAnAlphaXi · #35 03-19-2007, 02:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by irishpipes

The closed chapters at U of I are:

Alpha Xi Delta (1905-? and 1983-1990ish)

Alpha Xi Delta's Kappa chapter was at U of I from 1905-1995 with a successful turnaround recolonization in 1980. I know we were at 150+ members in 1987 but then took a slide around 1990 and couldn't recover. We would LOVE to be back at U of I -- our members in Illinois are absolutely thrilled about this opportunity and all fingers are crossed!!

irishpipes · #36 03-19-2007, 03:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SoProud2BeAnAlphaXi

Alpha Xi Delta's Kappa chapter was at U of I from 1905-1995 with a successful turnaround recolonization in 1980. I know we were at 150+ members in 1987 but then took a slide around 1990 and couldn't recover. We would LOVE to be back at U of I -- our members in Illinois are absolutely thrilled about this opportunity and all fingers are crossed!!

Were you at U of I in 1987? That's when I rushed.

SoProud2BeAnAlphaXi · #37 03-19-2007, 03:36 PM

Nope, I'm not a U of I alum, but my cousins all were hitting U of I starting about then (I still remember SO clearly when my aunt became Mrs. Active Officer in the Parents Club about 2 minutes after my first cousin went "away" to school ... he was very understanding about it, at least publicly). My dad's a Delta Sigma Phi from U of I, one cousin is a Delta Tau Delta ('85ish), his wife (and my dear friend) is an Alpha Gam ('87ish), and my other cousin is a Delta Zeta (also '87ish) -- all U of I. I'm just about the only one in my family who didn't go to U of I, and it's probably only because my leg of the family had left the state by then.

PM me if you want to compare names!!

FSUZeta · #38 03-19-2007, 09:16 PM

i looked over the grades report . it seems most chapters are comparable in size. i mean, when one chapter is around 180 and another is at 150, will a pnm at a recruitment party really notice that one has 30 less members than the other?

i did only see one npc sorority that had low numbers-did i just miss seeing the other one? i believe that orangejuice mentioned 2.

DeltaBetaBaby · #39 03-19-2007, 11:03 PM

PM me if you really need to know that badly.

Drolefille · #40 03-20-2007, 12:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FSUZeta

i looked over the grades report . it seems most chapters are comparable in size. i mean, when one chapter is around 180 and another is at 150, will a pnm at a recruitment party really notice that one has 30 less members than the other?

i did only see one npc sorority that had low numbers-did i just miss seeing the other one? i believe that orangejuice mentioned 2.

If you look again it's rather clear. They're still a good size in my eyes, just not particularly for this campus.

agzg · #41 03-20-2007, 12:31 AM

The fact that there are 19 sororities on that campus boggles my mind! Coming from a campus where there are 5 chapters, with 40 members being total, and houses that never housed more than 11 members at a time... wow!

Sometimes I wish I'd gone to a bigger school... I stayed at the KKG house at Pitt earlier this semseter when my friend (the house director) had to go away for the weekend and I still couldn't believe that they had a live-in, non-member house director! Or that they required someone to be there in case of emergency! It definitely would have been nice to have when I was in undergrad.

irishpipes · #42 03-20-2007, 10:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FSUZeta

i looked over the grades report . it seems most chapters are comparable in size. i mean, when one chapter is around 180 and another is at 150, will a pnm at a recruitment party really notice that one has 30 less members than the other?

Another thing to consider is the culture at U of I. Sophomores make up a lot of the pool of PNMs. Most chapters pledge a lot of sophomores, even the occasional junior. This can affect graduation/retention rates, and that is one reason why the perfectly acceptable chapter size is more of a range of maybe 150-180 rather than a more consistent number.

ZTAngel · #43 03-20-2007, 10:57 AM

Any word on which groups were chose to present and when presentations will be made?

FSUZeta · #44 03-20-2007, 05:09 PM

hope i did not offend anyone with my question. that was certainly not my intent!!

i thought that perhaps the op had mistakenly thought that one of the non-npc sororities was actually an npc sorority. i was looking for numbers below 50.

i really did not mean to hurt anyone's feelings.

DeltaBetaBaby · #45 03-20-2007, 09:39 PM

No, I don't think anyone was offended, but the case at U of I is that you need to return in the fall with at least 80 actives to recruit well. Rush groups can have 65 girls each in the first round. PNM's will notice if they outnumber your actives. If you need to return in the fall with 80, then you need to have over 100 during the year.