Congrats to Michelle Obama

[APhiAnna]

I think that there are definitely some national stereotypes about NPC and IFC organizations at the college level. In particular, I think Kappa, ZTA, KA, Pike, SAE, TKE and Tri-Delt have casually established "blanket stereotypes" that seem to fall in place if a chapter is at least moderately strong on their campus...if they aren't strong on campus then they are viewed as an exception to that stereotype. Going into detail about what these stereotypes are isn't worth it (particularly because there is a negative connotation to most of them), but I think most people that are familiar with strong Greek campuses will catch my drift on those.

That being said I don't think that a membership in a particular NPC or IFC GLO has any sort of meaning to the general population once you leave college. It may be a status symbol to say, "I was an ABC at XYZ University", but certainly just saying "I'm an Alpha Phi" or "I'm a Sigma Chi" doesn't put you into any sort of hierarchy or stereotype. If anything, it lumps you into a stereotype of being Greek (ie, conservative, wealthy, etc).

This is an obvious case of swerving into the wrong lane, but even those outside of the NPHC can pick up that the organization you join has a lot of resonance in the African-American community. I think that saying "I'm an AKA" brings forth many more conclusions and assumptions than saying "I'm an AGD". To speculate why would be out of my league...maybe it's that there are far fewer organizations and that these organizations have more chapters? I really don't know. But I do think that for NPC GLOs, despite national stereotypes, the cultural significance only really resonates when you throw in the campus you joined your GLO at (and that only holds water if somebody is familiar with campus stereotypes).