Spinoff: New Members Holding Positions

[tunatartare]

Here's another question. Let's say one of your new members does hold a position. For whatever reason, she de-pledges before initiation. What happens then?

[adpiucf]

Just as any officer who steps down or cancels her membership, we fill the position with another member. It really does work! I'm sure you've had officers who were initiated members who could not fulfill her duties for one reason or another, or who cancelled her membership. That's the great thing about opening the candidate pool up for these offices to the new members-- it increases the opportunity to fill the positions with qualified leaders.

Another benefit of new members holding office-- it makes the new member class feel included in the sorority goings-on and when they feel a part of the process, they want to make a difference and pitch in. It also helps us identify future chapter leaders. By holding other offices, we are able to see how they might hold up as a VP or President later on.

[AlphaFrog]

I was initiated on a Thursday, and took office as Parliamentarian and VP of Alumnae and Heritage on that following Saturday. It was sort of a special situation, though.

[NebraskaDelt]

It's also nice to have a new member officer who has no preconcieved notions of how past officers of the position have done things. A blank slate encourages new ideas and allows the member to take on the office as their own instead of running it like the last guy/gal did.

I wouldn't encourage a new member to president, but some things can easily be taken care of by anyone in the org and it doesn't take a knowledge of ritual to be able to do it. Philanthropy is philanthropy, intramurals is intramurals and fundraising is fundraising. You don't need to know anything about the ritual in order to run these sort of positions.

[KSUViolet06]

In Tri Sigma, you must be initiated to take a position in the chapter. The president must have previously served on Officer Board. We've had newer initiates in positions, and it has worked out pretty well.

[flirt5721]

In AXiD you must be an Initiated member to hold an office. New members are not allowed to hold any positions. Newly Initiated member can hold office. My chapter has had newly initiated member hold Exec. and non exec offices. It has worked out and it hasn't. It just depends on the girls and if they are really good leaders or not. Sometimes one might think that some one is good but it turns out that they are not.

[KatieKate1244]

In DZ you have to be initiated to hold the office of President, but a new member can fill in other position. We actually had a new member become our VP of Membership this past election (she was also initiated two weeks later), and she's been doing an excellent job.