Improving sorority relations for mixers

[TSteven]

Great ideas LAblondeGPhi.

Originally Posted by LAblondeGPhi

Step 3) For the women who have not returned your phone calls: go to their chapter house (or whatever), and say that you wanted to stop by quickly to introduce yourself if the social chair is available. Don't overstay your welcome, just stop by to introduce yourself and see if you can plan a meeting soon. Leave your information if she's not available.

Just to piggyback on Step 3. As LAblondeGPhi noted, do not overstay your welcome. However, if the social chair is available to talk/meet during your stop by introduction, be prepared to meet with her right then and there. You don't want to wait to set something up down the line only to find her busy.

Originally Posted by gr33kfan

I don't think any brothers know social chairs which is the tough part.

Some Greek Life offices keep a list of the Social Chairs and their contact information for each GLO. Some schools provide that info on their campus Greek Life page/website. If not on-line, contact the Greek Life office directly and ask them for a list. Be sure to let them know who you are and why you want that information. "I'm the social chair of ABC and we would like to invite the sororities to our XYZ fundraiser."

[gr33kfan]

First of all, thanks for all of the great responses!

Originally Posted by Greek_or_Geek?

Serenades. Sorority women love serenades. You don't have to be perfect or even very good for that matter; simply be sincere and entertaining. It will get you noticed in the right way.

We've actually done this! Both singing and dancing, and indeed the girls liked it (even the sororities that will probably never mix with us no matter how hard we try haha).

Originally Posted by DeltaBetaBaby

Is your fraternity small compared to the sororities (and the other fraternities they mix with)? It is hard for a 150-woman sorority to mix with a 50-man fraternity, for example. We used to address this by having dinner mixers with smaller fraternities, so it was only the in-house women, and it balanced out better.

Also, if you are trying to get on their schedule for the first time, you may just have to foot the whole bill. That won't be a big deal if you can have a BBQ at your house or something.

Most fraternities at my school are in the 50-70 person range (including us), and sororities are 150-200, and the frats and sororities that mix seem to manage. Also, I assumed we would have to pay for everything since the sororities can find other frats who they like more anyway who also probably pay for everything lol.

Originally Posted by pshsx1

Also, how soon are you contacting the sororities?

If you're trying to plan a mixer in December but you waited until November to plan it, they won't have any open dates. Sit down with your VP of Programming or whoever oversees the chapter's calendar and nail down dates that you want mixers. It also helps to figure out what dates the sororities have blacked out every year (ex. formals, rituals, whatever).

That's the biggest problem I ran into when I was Social Chair. Plan early and be persistent are the best pieces of advice I can offer.

I remember in the fall, the social chair contacted sororities in the end of August before school started. Not really sure about this semester though, but he definitely didn't wait until the last minute or anything. I do think the problem was probably not reaching out enough though (such as calling) so I think that is definitely something we should try.

Originally Posted by TSteven

Great ideas LAblondeGPhi.



Just to piggyback on Step 3. As LAblondeGPhi noted, do not overstay your welcome. However, if the social chair is available to talk/meet during your stop by introduction, be prepared to meet with her right then and there. You don't want to wait to set something up down the line only to find her busy.



Some Greek Life offices keep a list of the Social Chairs and their contact information for each GLO. Some schools provide that info on their campus Greek Life page/website. If not on-line, contact the Greek Life office directly and ask them for a list. Be sure to let them know who you are and why you want that information. "I'm the social chair of ABC and we would like to invite the sororities to our XYZ fundraiser."

Thanks for the advice. Although none of the brothers know social chairs directly, I'm sure I could get their info from the friends who I do know.



I guess more generally, at my school it seems like most frats mix with sororities mainly in terms of themed parties. Is it too much to ask for the first time to have a mixer party?

And to girls in sororities, have you ever had frats on your campus who you just didn't want to mix with? Maybe they do indeed have cool people but also some awkward/shy guys that made you say "ehh we could do without them, we have these cooler frats to mix with anyway"? That's how I feel the situation is with us :/

[DeltaBetaBaby]

Originally Posted by gr33kfan

And to girls in sororities, have you ever had frats on your campus who you just didn't want to mix with? Maybe they do indeed have cool people but also some awkward/shy guys that made you say "ehh we could do without them, we have these cooler frats to mix with anyway"? That's how I feel the situation is with us :/

At Illinois, the fraternities outnumber the sororities by a lot, so the sororities do a lot of the choosing, but my sorority was on the lower end when it came to popularity with fraternities. Therefore, I felt like we always had the internal debate: Do we want the more popular fraternity, or do we want the fraternity who is really excited to have a mixer with us? When I was younger, I thought it was all about getting mixers with the hottest/most popular guys, and then as I got over it, sophomore and junior year, I was much more interested in mixing with guys who were excited and would throw a good event.

I'm not sure how that is helpful to you, but are you getting to know the women in other situations? For example, you should definitely be participating in their philanthropy events and things like that. Can you invite some girls over for something like a mixer without calling it that? Ask them to stop by for study snacks during midterms or something. Invite them to a barbeque. Sometimes, sororities think in terms of a set number of social events, so they don't want to bump another fraternity for you, but if you did something additional, they'd go along with it.

Finally, have you considered the non-NPC groups on your campus? They may want to party with you, too.

[LAblondeGPhi]

Originally Posted by DeltaBetaBaby

Finally, have you considered the non-NPC groups on your campus? They may want to party with you, too.

Totally agree.

I know it's not standard, but I think it's a great idea to expand outside the Greek community: think about women's club teams or service organizations (UCLA has Bruin Belles, USC has the Helenes, etc.) I've known of sororities mixing with the business school (yes, the graduate school of business), and rugby club teams.

For teams, I think hosting a day-before BBQ or spaghetti dinner is an opportunity not just to socialize, but to support the team. My high school cross country team used to skip practice the day before a meet in favor of spaghetti carb-loading.

[gr33kfan]

Originally Posted by DeltaBetaBaby

At Illinois, the fraternities outnumber the sororities by a lot, so the sororities do a lot of the choosing, but my sorority was on the lower end when it came to popularity with fraternities. Therefore, I felt like we always had the internal debate: Do we want the more popular fraternity, or do we want the fraternity who is really excited to have a mixer with us? When I was younger, I thought it was all about getting mixers with the hottest/most popular guys, and then as I got over it, sophomore and junior year, I was much more interested in mixing with guys who were excited and would throw a good event.

I'm not sure how that is helpful to you, but are you getting to know the women in other situations? For example, you should definitely be participating in their philanthropy events and things like that. Can you invite some girls over for something like a mixer without calling it that? Ask them to stop by for study snacks during midterms or something. Invite them to a barbeque. Sometimes, sororities think in terms of a set number of social events, so they don't want to bump another fraternity for you, but if you did something additional, they'd go along with it.

Finally, have you considered the non-NPC groups on your campus? They may want to party with you, too.

The situation at your school is exactly the situation of mine. We have so many more frats that the sororities are not really losing out by not mixing with us (well, besides getting to know us haha). Also, a lot of the people at my school focus a lot on status, so they have the same conflicts you do. One of the sororities that said that they were "too busy" was a sorority that was only added to our school fairly recently and it seems like even though we are more "on their level," they want to mix with the "cooler" frats, since that will also help their reputation... I feel like even upperclassmen still care about the status here, unfortunately. Part of me thinks these ideas about reaching out could help, the other part of me realistically thinks nothing is going to change :/.

We could try a dinner or something though. And yeah non-NPC could be a good option too, although sometimes I just think its sad that we're ignored by the NPC ones.

Originally Posted by LAblondeGPhi

Totally agree.

I know it's not standard, but I think it's a great idea to expand outside the Greek community: think about women's club teams or service organizations (UCLA has Bruin Belles, USC has the Helenes, etc.) I've known of sororities mixing with the business school (yes, the graduate school of business), and rugby club teams.

For teams, I think hosting a day-before BBQ or spaghetti dinner is an opportunity not just to socialize, but to support the team. My high school cross country team used to skip practice the day before a meet in favor of spaghetti carb-loading.

Good ideas! And they'd probably care less about the status stuff, though again, at my school you never know...