This is kind of spooky and adds a new perspective to all of this. It seems to support a possible reason - however misguided and or misinformed it might have been - behind the original post.
Greek Life considers new sorority chapter/
November 17, 2011
The Murray State News
Haley Russell
Assistant News Editor
The Panhellenic Council at Murray State is considering including a new sorority chapter to the Greek Life community already including 11 Interfraternity Council organizations, seven national Panhellenic Council organizations and five Panhellenic organizations.
The Panhellenic Council held a meeting on Nov. 10, to discuss the possibility of expanding Greek Life at Murray State.
Tara Hawthorne, director of Greek Life, said though this committee has been formed, there are still no guarantees.
“At this moment, there is not a new chapter that is coming,” she said. “We’re just in the process of talking about if a new chapter will come.”
Hawthorne said the process of deciding whether to bring a new chapter is a long one, beginning with the creation of a proposal to send to the National Panhellenic Council.
“It’s a very long process through Panhellenic,” she said. “Initially, what you do is you bring that topic up to Panhellenic chapters saying ‘do we want to look at extension and possibly bringing another chapter here,’” she said.
From there, the council lists the pros and cons of bringing a new chapter to Murray State’s campus and whether they want to pursue it by setting an exploratory committee.
Hawthorne said the committee discussed different factors that will go into the possible new chapter.
“We met on Thursday (Nov. 10) and talked about recruitment, enrollment numbers, the pros and cons of having another sorority and whether we felt that the University and Panhellenic and the Greek community could support another chapter,” she said.
The next step in the process is to write a proposal including Greek Life statistics specific to the University, the thoughts of the committee members and why the University wants to grow its Greek community, Hawthorne said. This proposal will then be sent to each of the Panhellenic chapters and their national organization’s representative.
After the proposal is submitted, the Greek Life office will host different events to get student and faculty opinions, Hawthorne said.
“We’ll also do some open forums; we’re going to try to do one with students and then we’ll do one with faculty and staff members to get their thoughts, their pros and cons to see if they would like to see another chapter or not and if it would be supported by the University,” she said.
Hawthorne said the construction of the proposal and the open forums will be the committee’s focus next semester. If the Panhellenic Council accepts the proposal, the committee will send a letter to the remaining chapters that are not represented at Murray State. If the chapters are interested in forming a new chapter of their organization on campus, they will present to the committee.
Now, though, Hawthorne said she believes it’s time for the University’s Greek Life to expand after the last chapter to join was Alpha Delta Pi in 1968.
Said Hawthorne: “I think it’ll just be something great and something different for our chapters and for our community. I think if Panhellenic and the different chapters have the right mindset of this is something that we can welcome, we are continuing to grow, we’re all at a comfortable place, let’s continue to grow in another chapter.”
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