A Different Kind of Live Recruitment Story

[CougarGrad]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRGH

[AOII Angel]

Congratulations! All the hard work has paid off! It's wonderful to see Greek life growing across the whole campus!!!

[ASTalumna06]

Originally Posted by agzg

Wow all three of you guys are right up there! What's total again? 40?

Yes, 40. I think they're going to be discussing a quota system for next year.

Originally Posted by AOII Angel

Congratulations! All the hard work has paid off! It's wonderful to see Greek life growing across the whole campus!!!

Even the fraternities are doing really well. I don't know exact numbers for Sig Tau and KDR, but I know that Delta Chi received 16 (doubling their chapter).

Everyone is doing very well, and we're hoping that the trend continues

[littleowl33]

Those numbers are great! How exciting for you! Congratulations, and good luck in your future recruitments

[Just interested]

Congratulations to you!!! What a story of perseverance and it really goes to show what can happen when you care and see worth in your organization. I wish you all the best and you will be stronger for it.

[Katmandu]

What an inspirational story!

And what a tribute to the collaboration of actives and advisors focused on the wellbeing of the chapter they both love. Here's to advisors!! I never appreciated them enough when I was an active....

[ASTalumna06]

Ok, so this semester there has been A LOT going on, and I've been much to busy to post after all of the recruitment events. But I thought I would give a brief update of what has gone on since I last posted.

Unfortunately, last semester, there were 2 new members who dropped out early in the process. One of them was having a lot of family issues, and felt that she would be unable to fulfill the time commitment (with the sorority, and with many other things), and in turn, her financial obligations.

The other, well... it was probably a good thing that she left when she did. I won't go into details, but let's just say I'm not quite sure why she went through recruitment and put on a happy, smiling face, only to join, stay for a week, and then drop. It almost seemed intentional.

But... from there the chapter moved on. As I mentioned in another thread, in order to bid first semester freshmen, everyone had to agree to a Greek-wide supplemental new member program, "New Member Academy". It was actually quite successful, although I'm not sure how the new members felt about it as a whole. But everyone made it through the semester, and the chapter initiated 9 lovely ladies in the fall.

This semester, kicking things off with 27 sisters (one of them graduated in December) was a good start. While last semester saw a very large number of PNMs come through recruitment, now allowing first semester freshmen to join, this semester was a little slower for the sororities as a whole. However, our chapter still had a lot of PNMs come out... about 20-25.

Our last recruitment event was on Monday, but the sisters are hosting a game night with Delta Chi on Thursday, and they're hoping to gain a lot of attention from that. They have invited all of the PNMs to attend, so hopefully a lot of them will make an appearance!

This semester, the chapter has also completely re-vamped their membership selection process. Not being used to such a large number of PNMs proved difficult last semester, but they're hoping that this new system will make things run a little smoother.

Bid day is next Wednesday!

[Gusteau]

Good luck - I hope everything goes well.

And if you could let us know how Delta Chi is doing too, I would really appreciate it!

[ASTalumna06]

I'm sorry for the delay with the update. But there's a good reason! I'll get to that later.

After having a successful game night with Delta Chi where most of the PNMs who had consistently come to recruitment events had shown up, and an extra recruitment event the weekend after that, it was time for the new membership selection process to take over.

It went surprisingly well! The entire process was very productive, and everything ran smoothly. The girls extended bids to...

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Nope, not yet.

On bid day, the girls decided to do something different. A year or so after I joined, Panhellenic (after many accusations of bid promising being thrown around) decided to do away with giving PNMs ANYTHING on bid day. Our recruitment has always been some weird breed of informal and formal (with informal recruitment parties, but planned recruitment times and a designated bid day). But recruitment rules weren't really known and giving gifts on bid day wasn't really seen as "bid promising" when I was active, even though PNMs hadn't yet signed a binding agreement when they received a bid.

So again, a few years ago, they did away with giving anything away on bid day (even though I just got a few balloons and a poster saying "Welcome to the AST family!"). So bid day kind of became a boring day. "Here's your bid... go sign it if you like... blah blah blah." This year, the girls decided to do something different.

The President had found a short ceremony on the national website that she suggested the sisters perform on bid day. The whole thing was a poem about a "lonely sailor girl" who found a ship of sisters who wanted her to join their crew. By the end of the whole thing, all of the sisters and PNMs formed an anchor. The President then presented the PNMs with their bids.

The sisters had covered the entire room with green and gold decorations, and the whole thing was adorable!

And I am happy to say that all of the PNMs accepted their bids, and the chapter now has...

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Nope, not yet.



Ok, just kidding...

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6 new members!

Each one of them seems very excited about joining the sorority, and they are all very involved around campus and seem to understand what it means to be a part of the chapter. I think that this semester will go very well!

There are now 33 ASTs! (but there are quite a few missing from this pic) The new members are the 4 standing directly in front of the banner, and the 3rd and 4th girl in the middle row.




Theta Phi Alpha has 4 new members. They also had some new members drop last semester, so I'm unsure as to how many total sisters they have right now. Alpha Sigma Alpha decided not to participate in recruitment as they are so close to total (38, I believe) and they wanted to focus on other things right now.

Now... the reason it took me so long to update... I've been in the process of moving to New Jersey. Needless to say, I won't be the chapter's Recruitment Advisor any longer. However, at the very least, I will try to keep updating with recruitment numbers and will report any small (or large!) victories.



(And Gusteau... Delta Chi has 9 new members!)

[thetygerlily]

Wow- thanks for the update ASTAlumna! 33 is incredible, especially up from so few. My chapter went from 5 to 30 in the time I was there and it's quite the sight to behold. Definitely a lot of learning opportunities, and having dedicated alumnae made a world of difference. This chapter was lucky to have you there to help them get up to 33!

Good luck in your move to NJ... you can start a new thread with the recruitment story for the new chapter you go to. Growing, struggling, or successful- they're all interesting in my book, especially when you're a great storyteller. Thanks for sharing!

[ASTalumna06]

Update!

I know I haven't provided any updates since last year, but things have been crazy with my travel schedule for work, and I haven't been able to keep up with the chapter and all that's been going on. But.. I briefly wanted to mention that Panhellenic has now moved to a partially structured recruitment system in the fall. They implemented it last year, and everything seemed to work out a-ok!

And while last year they had just over 60 girls show up on the first day for the recruitment kick-off, last night, 84 PNMs attended! Needless to say, everyone is thrilled

[scrapinfificat]

I only started reading this thread this morning but I have so enjoyed every post. I love how this small group has blossomed and grown. You have very special young women on your former campus. I sincerely hope that you will be able to update or maybe someone from your chapter might continue to update. Thank you so much for sharing the story of your chapter - the other side.

[AUKD]

Originally Posted by scrapinfificat

I only started reading this thread this morning but I have so enjoyed every post. I love how this small group has blossomed and grown. You have very special young women on your former campus. I sincerely hope that you will be able to update or maybe someone from your chapter might continue to update. Thank you so much for sharing the story of your chapter - the other side.

The very same with me. Great posts, and an even better story

[victoriana]

Wow, I didn't even know this thread existed. I'm so happy I found it. What an amazing story to read through. I can't wait to hear more

[ASTalumna06]

Originally Posted by scrapinfificat

I only started reading this thread this morning but I have so enjoyed every post. I love how this small group has blossomed and grown. You have very special young women on your former campus. I sincerely hope that you will be able to update or maybe someone from your chapter might continue to update. Thank you so much for sharing the story of your chapter - the other side.

Originally Posted by AUKD

The very same with me. Great posts, and an even better story

Originally Posted by victoriana

Wow, I didn't even know this thread existed. I'm so happy I found it. What an amazing story to read through. I can't wait to hear more

Thanks everyone, I'm glad you've enjoyed it!

It was tough for Greek life on the entire campus for a while, but things seem to be looking up - for both the sororities and fraternities. All of the chapters are growing, and I know a year ago there was some talk of expansion on the fraternity side, so we'll see where that goes as the chapters continue to expand.

Again, I'll try to keep up with what's going on and provide any updates that I can. And I'll definitely get some final numbers together when recruitment has concluded.