Is this legal? Deactivated one NPC, now part of a new NPC.

[honeychile]

Maybe it would be wise for College Panhellenic Councils to check out EVERY transfer student prior to Recruitment. I don't know how many that would entail on most campuses, but it can't be more than a fourth of those registering - and I for one would like to be sure that people are who they say they are.

It could be just one more step, as registrations come in. Transfer students put in one pile, and alumnae or whomever could spend the time checking out their status. They could then check them off and put them back in with the rest of the applications.

[susan314]

Originally Posted by honeychile

Maybe it would be wise for College Panhellenic Councils to check out EVERY transfer student prior to Recruitment. I don't know how many that would entail on most campuses, but it can't be more than a fourth of those registering - and I for one would like to be sure that people are who they say they are.

It could be just one more step, as registrations come in. Transfer students put in one pile, and alumnae or whomever could spend the time checking out their status. They could then check them off and put them back in with the rest of the applications.

You know, to this day I suspect that one of my close friends from freshman year (who initiated my chapter Spring semester, then ended up transfering to a school closer to her home in the Fall) tried to go through rush at her new university.

We stayed in touch over the summer (were supposed to be roommates when she came back in the Fall), and then she told me that she wasn't coming back to school in the Fall. She mentioned to me that the university she was transfering to had a chapter, but she didn't feel like she fit in with the girls there. I think she was trying to hint that she was going to rush again, and I casually tried to make the point that she could always choose to remain alumnae and not affiliate with the undergraduate chapter at her new school. We lost touch shortly after that, and I wonder whether she tried to "sneak" through rush to this day.

In retrospect, I should have contacted the chapter at her new school to give them the opportunity to welcome her to campus ...even if she decided not to affiliate, at least the word would have been out and she would have been busted if she tried to go through rush. (But this all happened the summer between my freshman and sophomore year, so I didn't know how to handle it at the time.)

If any of you were at Towson State University in 1993 and encoutered a PNM who transferred from Michigan State University, PM me and I'll tell you her name. It still bugs me to this day that I never followed up on it.

[texas*princess]

I think what that girl did was very dishonest ... not just to the old group but to new group as well. I'd want her terminated if I was part of the XYP chapter.. but that's just me

[LPIDelta]

I don't know if its my orgs form or a schools form but I remember seeing a statement on a recruitment registration form that says something like... "I affirm that I am not now, nor have I ever been, an initiated member of a National Panhellenic Conference sorority" and they had to intial the statement. And then it said something about "If you have ever accepted an invitiation to join an NPC sorority, please list the sorority here." It had some other things too, about financial responsibility etc. but the point is NPC recruitments should include a form which asks these questions. Sure people can lie still, but if they are caught, they can't say they didn't know the rules.

No there is no NPC database and no people don't check--back in the day you used to be able to trust people and take them at their word. I guess not so anymore. Suffice it to say, when people are found out, they usually lose membership in BOTH organizations.

[TSteven]

I don't know if it would be considered a privacy issue, or some so called great burden to do so, but would it be possible for the NPC to unanimously agree to request all colleges to include the girl's affiliation when it forwards her transcripts to the new schools?

[AlphaFrog]

Originally Posted by TSteven

I don't know if it would be considered a privacy issue, or some so called great burden to do so, but would it be possible for the NPC to unanimously agree to request all colleges to include the girl's affiliation when it forwards her transcripts to the new schools?

Privacy issue? No.
Burden that universities wouldn't care to deal with? Yes.

A better idea would to actually have that so-called database that we like to joke about.

[susan314]

Originally Posted by AlphaFrog

Privacy issue? No.
Burden that universities wouldn't care to deal with? Yes.

A better idea would to actually have that so-called database that we like to joke about.

honechile's idea about the local Panhellenic checking up on transfer students isn't such a bad idea either.

Checking on every student who goes through recruitment would be burdensome (and probably a waste of time if the majority of PNMs on that campus are 18 year old freshman). But doing a quick check on the transfer students wouldn't be too bad.

[TSteven]

Originally Posted by AlphaFrog

A better idea would to actually have that so-called database that we like to joke about.

In this day and age, it would be simple to maintain. I would guess the start up might be a tad daunting.

Name: Doe, Jane
SS#: 123-45-6789
NPC: ABC
Initiation Chapter: XY
Initiation College: Big State University
Initiation Date: 01/31/2007

Originally Posted by MeiMeiCat

Well, Iwas pinned by a Sig Ep at my school who transferred (and we broke up)to another school without a SFE chapter and went Pike. Not sure on the disclosure, but he was a pretty honest guy...I am sure he told them....

So I guess you can do it. Whether it's right or not, I can't say.....it seems dodgy.

The OP asked about NPC sororities. There is an NPC unanimous agreement saying that once you join one NPC, you cannot join another.

It's not quite black or white for fraternities.

[puddintane]

Originally Posted by honeychile

Maybe it would be wise for College Panhellenic Councils to check out EVERY transfer student prior to Recruitment. I don't know how many that would entail on most campuses, but it can't be more than a fourth of those registering - and I for one would like to be sure that people are who they say they are.

It could be just one more step, as registrations come in. Transfer students put in one pile, and alumnae or whomever could spend the time checking out their status. They could then check them off and put them back in with the rest of the applications.

I'm the Greek Advisor at my University and we had this happen about eight years ago. When the girl that had initiated two sororities had asked her about it, she did confess, and voluntarily gave up her membership in her new sorority. We never really got to find out what would have happened because it didn't get that far.

After that happened, word got around, and the women were suggesting what you had in your post.

The issue is, anything that is in a student file is subject to privacy issues, so even as the Greek Advisor, and as a member of an NPC Sorority, I can't disclose to students anything that is in their file to Greek Organizations.

We had to do the same thing with GPA. Years ago, we used to give the Greek Organizations a list of grades of grades at the end of every term, we can't do that anymore. If the sorority has a GPA minimum, all we can verify is that they meet their minimum, but can't say an individual student has a 3.4 intead of the 4.0 they put on their application, when their minimum might be a 3.0. I've seen it, and I can't say anything about it. I can, however, say something to the student, but I can't force them to be truthful.

Just keep in mind, that it's not limited to transfer students. Many freshman have flunked out of another college and start again at another school as a "freshman". If they are not receiving financial aid, there is no way to catch it.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by puddintane

I'm the Greek Advisor at my University and we had this happen about eight years ago. When the girl that had initiated two sororities had asked her about it, she did confess, and voluntarily gave up her membership in her new sorority. We never really got to find out what would have happened because it didn't get that far.

After that happened, word got around, and the women were suggesting what you had in your post.

The issue is, anything that is in a student file is subject to privacy issues, so even as the Greek Advisor, and as a member of an NPC Sorority, I can't disclose to students anything that is in their file to Greek Organizations.

We had to do the same thing with GPA. Years ago, we used to give the Greek Organizations a list of grades of grades at the end of every term, we can't do that anymore. If the sorority has a GPA minimum, all we can verify is that they meet their minimum, but can't say an individual student has a 3.4 intead of the 4.0 they put on their application, when their minimum might be a 3.0. I've seen it, and I can't say anything about it. I can, however, say something to the student, but I can't force them to be truthful.

Just keep in mind, that it's not limited to transfer students. Many freshman have flunked out of another college and start again at another school as a "freshman". If they are not receiving financial aid, there is no way to catch it.

Would you be permitted to answer a question like "was so and so ever a member of an NPC group?" Simply a yes or no, not even which one?

Can students sign a waiver for certain items? (I believe this must happen at some colleges because they generate GPAs and comparative lists for NPC groups which are availabe on the Greek Life page.)

[gphiangel624]

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

Would you be permitted to answer a question like "was so and so ever a member of an NPC group?" Simply a yes or no, not even which one?

Can students sign a waiver for certain items? (I believe this must happen at some colleges because they generate GPAs and comparative lists for NPC groups which are availabe on the Greek Life page.)

We went around and around with this issue a long time ago. Our recruitment registration forms have a statement, evaluated by our campus Registrar (who is also our FERPA Compliance officer), that basically states the PNM verifies the information is true and correct, and that she authorizes release of the information included on her registration form to the Student Life office, Panhellenic, and the chapters that belong to it. My office (Student Life) then reviews GPAs, past pledging/initiation data we have on file, and verifies if it's true or not. The PNMs are made aware of this entire process from the start, so we rarely get misinformation from them.

Regarding puddintane's concern about the grade report, I'm willing to share how we work our grade report process if you want to PM me. Again, it's approved by our campus Registrar and FERPA compliance officer as well.

[jwsteele]

I'm not in a sorority so if what I'm about to say makes no sense or is irrelevant please correct me. Fraternity rush is quite different obviously. But to me, as an outsider, it seems like:

a) This isn't really a widespread problem, I can't imagine a chapter would make several members check up on all the random transfer PNMs (particularly at a large school) when there is so much else to do at rush for the almost non-existant chance that somebody is trying to pull this off.

b) I would think that the girls currently rushing would be able to catch it...I know that at my campus, which is a competitive campus not in the South, girls pretty much stalk the PNMs going through rush as soon as they get their applications doing everything from reading their Facebook walls and profiles to see if there are "problems" (ie slutty comments or drug references) and doing "pre-rankings" based on academics, involvement, talents, etc. If a girl is transfering they try to find out how she carried herself at that former school. (They shouldn't have really told me all that to be sure but it gets out). I would think that if a girl was initiated before at another school a simple Facebook search or word-of-mouth would reveal it, but then again maybe I'm wrong.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by jwsteele

I'm not in a sorority so if what I'm about to say makes no sense or is irrelevant please correct me. Fraternity rush is quite different obviously. But to me, as an outsider, it seems like:

a) This isn't really a widespread problem, I can't imagine a chapter would make several members check up on all the random transfer PNMs (particularly at a large school) when there is so much else to do at rush for the almost non-existant chance that somebody is trying to pull this off.

b) I would think that the girls currently rushing would be able to catch it...I know that at my campus, which is a competitive campus not in the South, girls pretty much stalk the PNMs going through rush as soon as they get their applications doing everything from reading their Facebook walls and profiles to see if there are "problems" (ie slutty comments or drug references) and doing "pre-rankings" based on academics, involvement, talents, etc. If a girl is transfering they try to find out how she carried herself at that former school. (They shouldn't have really told me all that to be sure but it gets out). I would think that if a girl was initiated before at another school a simple Facebook search or word-of-mouth would reveal it, but then again maybe I'm wrong.

Well, if they already do the stuff listed in part B, they already do check out the transfer students, so it might not be that much more time consuming to do it formally.

Just out of curiosity, if a girl were shut down her profile completely, would all her previous tags, comments, and wall posts also disappear immediately or would she have to go through one by one?

(The amount of background screening that groups try to do at some of the really big rushes is really pretty amazing to me. Especially with their network of alums, for some groups, I think, in the south especially, there are rarely any unknowns on the final bid list. )

[jwsteele]

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

Just out of curiosity, if a girl were shut down her profile completely, would all her previous tags, comments, and wall posts also disappear immediately or would she have to go through one by one?

(The amount of background screening that groups try to do at some of the really big rushes is really pretty amazing to me. Especially with their network of alums, for some groups, I think, in the south especially, there are rarely any unknowns on the final bid list. )

If a girl shut down her profile you couldn't search for her tagged pictures, comments and wall posts, but if you looked at, let's say, her friend's profile you could see pictures that her friend tagged of her, comments she made on her friend's wall, etc. (and trust me, I know girls that will go to that extreme to find the dirt on PNMs). It's also as easy as calling up a girl you may know from that girl's hometown/high school and being like, "Did she volunteer in high school? Is she well-liked? Sleep-around? Good grades? etc."

I am also amazed by the "pre-recruiting" these girls do...it really amazes me. My friend was telling me last night (admittedly in breach of membership selection secrecy, but that's a whole other story) that the recruitment team will go over EVERY single PNM's application and school history (and there are usually like 800 of them) and then flag those with recommendations, legacies, connections (if they already know girls) and those with stellar academics, involvement, talents, volunteerism, leadership, etc. and then focus on those rushees during formal rush.

In my fraternity, we admittedly do a lot of "pre-recruiting" as well (ie, looking up guys from our hometowns, having alumni compile lists of stellar rushees from their hometowns, etc) but the amount of work we do is nothing compared to the sororities. Sorority rush just fascinates me (at least at the really competitive schools).