"Don't Go to GC"

[agzg]

Originally Posted by DeltaBetaBaby

Can't watch the video right now...is it safe to assume she doesn't name her org?

I didn't notice if she did but she was also pretty rambling and I ended up closing it because it was boring. That's just me though.

The following is about NPC Alumnae Initiation and is not intended to reflect on other GLOs. In the interest of full disclosure, I'm speaking specifically to my group since I don't know the AI policies of other groups (uh, why would I?).

Listen, I don't really care about AI, honestly. If my org wants to initiate women who didn't join in college, fine. Of course there are women out there who I think would make a great Alpha Gam (of course, half of them are members of other NPC sororities which speaks to the quality of members elsewhere). A person who joined via AI is not "less than" in terms of membership. We learned the same ritual.

What bothers me is women who join via AI then turn around and give formal or COB recruitment advice for collegians. While I don't think necessarily that someone from a small school can't give best guess advice (or at least "OK this is what the process is in general") for larger schools or vice versa, especially with corrections from folks who did attend that type of school, but it is something someone has to experience on the membership side in order to "get it." Whether that was 20 years ago and the woman is still active with the collegiate side of membership now, or whether it was 2 years ago and FR and COB are essentially the same, doesn't matter to me. But it irks me when AIs give advice because they went through FR and didn't get a bid, so they joined as an AI.

I don't think it's a viable alternative. I think, especially in cases where a woman attended a school that had GLOs, that the best way to join is through collegiate recruitment. It bothers me when someone says "oh well there's AI." Is it good in those cases from time to time? Sure. I don't pass judgement. But it's overwhelmingly THE EXCEPTION, not the RULE. If it were the RULE we'd be the freaking Junior League, not NPC sororities.

Obviously there are exceptions in every case, and there are some fantastic heartwarming stories about Alumnae Initiates which make me glad to have it. Also, I'm not sure my group does AI similarly to any group, so there's that.

I'm just saying, AI is fine, but don't act like your membership experience is 100% the same as my membership experience. Until you've locked yourself in a room with 40 other 18-22 year olds for 24 hours and argued out many of the issues in your chapter, your experience is not the same as mine. Until you've gone through changing a collegiate chapter from the inside out, and dealt with issues like underage drinking and hazing and bad recruitments and perceptions on campus and issues between yours and other chapters, your experience is not the same as mine. And it doesn't need to be, as long as you don't act like it is.

And those experiences are why I think that collegiate recruitment is the best way to gain membership to the organization. I wouldn't trade those experiences for the world, even though they were pretty shitty at the time. Also, I'm not saying my experience was better, just different.