What makes a strong fraternity?

[33girl]

Originally Posted by CuriousGeorge3

Anyone involved in any greek system has probably heard of been involved in the never ending debate of "Who's the best house on campus?" We have all had our opinions, but how did we come to the conclusion we did?

I want to extend this a little further and ask, what's makes a strong house? I doubt many of us have answered this question in writitng. Is it numbers? Sometimes bigger houses (120+) aren't as close knit as smaller houses (<120). Parties? In the end we are social fraternities, but are the houses that throw ragers every other weekend as good as the house who throws an even bigger one once a month? Looks? The personalities of the people in that house? Philanthropy hours? Money? A combination? Then what do you weigh more?

We can also expand this out to what make a strong sorority as well. Feel free to let us know the "strongest house" on your campus, and why they were considered the best. Let's not worry about being politically correct and give some honest responses.

Well, in my time, I would have had to say the strongest fraternity was Sigma Chi.

Reasons:

They were not the smallest but not the largest either - i.e. there weren't many "who is that random Sigma Chi?" sightings, as in they were a Sigma Chi and didn't do anything else. (The fraternity that was the largest had this issue.)

They were cute.

They were fun to be around.

They threw good parties with good music.

They had a diverse mix of brothers and many of them were very strong individuals (i.e. famous on campus).

Several of them had beaucoup $$.

They were kind of closer with one sorority but definitely tried to get past it.

Most important - they showed that they truly cared about each other and about their fraternity. I still remember how the brothers talked about their history, their different programs, their alumni - it was with a level of pride that no other fraternity on campus had.

Then again, this is one person's opinion, and female opinions are different than male opinions.

[ree-Xi]

In my opinion, it's the way that the chapter treats women, men outside of their fraternity, and the adminstration. Respect goes a long way.

[PhiGam]

Originally Posted by 33girl

Well, in my time, I would have had to say the strongest fraternity was Sigma Chi.

Reasons:

They were not the smallest but not the largest either - i.e. there weren't many "who is that random Sigma Chi?" sightings, as in they were a Sigma Chi and didn't do anything else. (The fraternity that was the largest had this issue.)

They were cute.

They were fun to be around.

They threw good parties with good music.

They had a diverse mix of brothers and many of them were very strong individuals (i.e. famous on campus).

Several of them had beaucoup $$.

They were kind of closer with one sorority but definitely tried to get past it.

Most important - they showed that they truly cared about each other and about their fraternity. I still remember how the brothers talked about their history, their different programs, their alumni - it was with a level of pride that no other fraternity on campus had.

Then again, this is one person's opinion, and female opinions are different than male opinions.

Great post

[SigmaChiGuy]

Lift a lot of weights. Take sterioids. Run.

IN!

[AGDee]

We had two that were equally strong but for different reasons.. TKEs and LXAs.

They were the two largest chapters and ran about the same size. They were tight rivals for Greek Week, Intramurals, Homecoming, etc.. they generally ran neck in neck and one of the two always won those things. The TKEs held a lot of leadership positions on campus and were more preppy. They had weekly happy hours and were always well liked. They had higher scholarship than the LXAs. They weren't quite as warm and friendly as the LXAs though and sometimes seemed more like a business than a brotherhood.

The LXAs strengths were more that they were really friendly and warm and well liked. Their philanthropy was known campus wide (A Gangsta Party/Kidnapping of RAs and student leaders who then had to raise "ransom" to get out.. the money for MDA) and was a lot of fun. Their brotherhood was more evident as they were truly really close .. often stopping everything they were doing at a party to sing "We are all good brothers..." or "Magic Carpet Ride" and they just seemed to have a really strong bond.

If the TKEs seemed a little closer and the LXAs had a few more student leaders, they would be almost perfect.

[Firehouse]

Who is best?
"Best" is subjective, but it's very predictable within the greek world.

Fraternities are judged & evaluated by their peers, by rushees and by sororities on five "external" criteria. If you want to know who's considered the best on a given campus - provided that campus has a competitive fraternity system in terms of number of chapters and size - then chart these things and you'll have the answer.
One caveat: don't think of this in terms of a snapshot of a given moment in time. Fraternities that compete to the the "best" are likely to remain strong over time. Think of these criteria expressed over, say, three years:

Size: Size matters. If you have a 50-man chapter at Penn State you can compete. If you have a 50+ man chapter at Ole Miss you cannot compete. The top fraternity doesn't have to be the largest, but it has to be size competitive.

Appearance: Looks count. Yes, the best fraternity may have a few sketchy guys, but as a group the best fraternity looks like you'd expect the best fraternity to look. The men are strong, manly, handsome (or at least not scarey) and in sufficient numbers for that image to be associated with the chapter.

Athletics: Sports count with men. The best fraternity doesn't have to win the IM trophy every year, but they do have to be competitive in the "manly" sports. The best fraternity won't field a weak football, basketball or softball team that carries the stench of loser. Varsity and club athletes are points of pride. Eli Manning and his dad Archie Manning are both Sigma Nus at Ole Miss. Tiger Woods is a Sigma Chi. Bobby Bowden was president of his Pike chapter in college. Big names count.

Power: The best fraternity attracts many of the best men on campus. The best men on campus routinely hold important offices and have impressive titles. The "best" fraternity always can point to a few of the most prominent campus leaders in their chapter.

Social Preference: Fraternities with the top reputations pair up naturally with their sorority counterparts. If the fraternity has men that girls like, and if the fraternity as a chapter acts decent toward women and has a good time, they will be socially preferred.

If a fraternity dominates all five categories, then they are the dominant fraternity in terms of reputation. They are the best. If, say, five different fraternities each rank #1 in a separate criteria, then there is no clear #1 on campus. If you WANT to be considerd the best, then you must focus on winning the Five Criteria.

There are "internal" criteria that are very important to the strength of the chapter. However, no one is judged by their rivals, the rushees or the sororities on these things.
Outside of your chapter (to which these things ARE important) NO ONE CARES about:
The pedge program;
The alumni program;
Winning Homecoming;
Community service (trust me - no one cares in terms of ranking the "best");
Financial management;
Scholastics (unless your grades are horrible, then that could be trouble; but that's usually a symptom of other problems);
The meal plan;
The themes of your parties;
Any number of other things.

There are small campuses where the criteria have to be adjusted slightly, but these are universal principles within the fraternity world. REPUTATION follows performance in the five external criteria.

[Kevin]

Why would anyone lock this thread?

Other than the fact that the answer to the question is obvious, I see nothing wrong here.

[LaneSig]

Originally Posted by Firehouse

Athletics: Tiger Woods is a Sigma Chi.

Sorry, Firehouse, Tiger is not a Sigma Chi. His teammate at Stanford and fellow pro golfer, Casey Martin, is a Sigma Chi.

Our current most famous pro athletes: Drew Briese (sp?), QB of New Orleans Saints and Sean Payton, head coach of New Orleans Saints.