Are we completely no frills? No. But we're working towards it, and I think that's about as much as most other schools can say. Yes, the idea of "no frills" came years ago... but to go from bells and whistles one year to completely no frills the next isn't realistic. That would be a hard adjustment not only for members, but for PNMs, who would have to adapt to a completely different atmosphere during recruitment than what they had expected.
A lot of things have changed about recruitment at Mizzou from last year to this year alone. Personalized items are no longer allowed. (Printed napkins, etc.) Members are no longer allowed to write letters to PNMs during recruitment. (Last year on pref day, some of the chapters' presidents wrote individual letters to each PNM who attended their sorority's party that day.) Panhel is now providing t-shirts and nametags for the members of each house. (Which saves some houses from ordering polos from Express in bulk, haha... but certainly not my house!!
) Decorations for skit day are now limited to a 15 foot walkway and the room that the skit will take place in. (This is BIG because in the past, houses have gone all out... literally decorating the entire interior of their house.) Only water will be served during parties. (Last year there was everything from bottles of Coke, punch, fake Cosmos, smoothies.)
So to answer your question, yes, it really IS changing. It's not all changing, but it's more than just decreasing the amount of balloons.
It may be overdue, but I'm really proud of our panhel execs for taking some initiative with this.
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