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Originally Posted by 33girl
Well, look at a place like DePauw. It's heavily Greek and from what I understand, the non-Greek students as well are involved in other activities. But no matter how fun that is, there are STILL going to be students who do not like being in the middle of a tiny town in Indiana where they have to drive half an hour to get to a Victoria's Secret.
My point is - someone who hates a small town atmosphere that much isn't going to stay at the school just because they can pledge a Greek org a semester earlier. And if Greek life is that much of an incentive to stay around, won't the students still stay even if they know they have to wait a semester to join?
"Going Greek first semester makes a tiny campus more fun" is the flip side of "Going Greek first semester makes a big campus smaller." The campus is what it is. You can't (and shouldn't) live in a Greek bubble.
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I don't think anyone should live in a Greek bubble, but I think that both of the things you said are in fact true in many cases: going greek can make a tiny campus more fun (although I didn't think we were talking about the size of the campus so much as what there was to do) and going greek can make a big campus smaller. It doesn't completely change the nature of the campus, but it makes the individual experience better in a lot of a cases.
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Originally Posted by NutBrnHair
Oh, but I think having that connection to a small group and forming close friendships definitely helps the attrition rate at many campuses.
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And I think the data bears this out. I think it's one of the reasons why campus administrators who might otherwise be anti-greek instead embrace Greek life. Schools with Greek life are thought by some to have better campus life generally and that membership in GLO is associated with many positive student traits: higher grades, more campus involvement in other areas, better alumni relationship, etc.
I think it's one of the big reasons that a lot of school previously thought of as commuter schools in Georgia look to expanding their greek system and/or it's amenities as a method to change the campus experience for students.
ETA: I don't know how much any of this is affected by changing recruitment from second to first semester, but I would think it would help. GLO membership probably does help students feel attached to the campus, and it'd be better to establish it earlier.
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