Rho Chis/Rho Gammas?

[GDIfly]

Does anyone know how or why people started calling their Recruitment Guides by Greek letters? Is it just because everything sounds cooler as a Greek letter, or is there some significant reason behind it?

[AChiOhSnap]

Originally Posted by GDIfly

Does anyone know how or why people started calling their Recruitment Guides by Greek letters? Is it just because everything sounds cooler as a Greek letter, or is there some significant reason behind it?

Rho Chi corresponds to "Recruitment Counselor." Since most fraternities/sororities have Greek letters that stand for English words/phrases...it just makes sense that it would carry over into other aspects of Greek life.

I'm not sure why some schools switched from Rho Chi to Gamma Chi or Rho Psi or anything like that though.

[SoCalGirl]

Originally Posted by ariesrising

Rho Chi is the name of an actual fraternity. The official NPC term is Rho Gamma (Recruitment Guide). My school uses Pi Gamma though, and I've heard of dozens of other terms.

www.rhochi.org/

Rho Chi is an honor society that finally got around to making a deal about it enough that the NPC had to change the name. All schools were allowed to use an appropriate substitute while they took suggestions and votes on the new names. I believe my school uses Sigma Rho Chi instead of Rho Gamma.

[adpiucf]

Sigma Rho Chi is the formal name adopted by NPC for Sorority Recruitment Counselors once it was discovered there was a pre-professional/honor society called Rho Chi.

[GDIfly]

Wow, that sounds pretty uptight of Rho Chi. I would think it would always be pretty clear whether someone was talking about Rho Chi the person or Rho Chi the society... not much chance of confusion, really.

So, why go through all the trouble of saying "Sigma Rho Chi" (what a mouthful!) when you could just say "RC" or "RG" in english? Also, what other greek letters do fraternities and sororities use for normal english phrases?

[AChiOhSnap]

Originally Posted by GDIfly

Wow, that sounds pretty uptight of Rho Chi. I would think it would always be pretty clear whether someone was talking about Rho Chi the person or Rho Chi the society... not much chance of confusion, really.

So, why go through all the trouble of saying "Sigma Rho Chi" (what a mouthful!) when you could just say "RC" or "RG" in english? Also, what other greek letters do fraternities and sororities use for normal english phrases?

Because the Greek phrases are all in fun, I guess (???)

Sometimes sororities'/fraternities' open mottos correspond to the first letters of their Greek letters. Not always though. I can't think of any other examples off the top of my head, although I'm sure I'm missing something obvious.

The other phrases tend to be sorority/fraternity secrets.

[TSteven]

Originally Posted by GDIfly

So, why go through all the trouble of saying "Sigma Rho Chi" (what a mouthful!) when you could just say "RC" or "RG" in english?

I'm sure many people do shorten it and use the English equivalent. Just like many might say "A" for Alpha etc.

I was told from a 'guide' many years back that there were a couple of unofficial reasons for using Rho Chi or Sigma Rho Chi etc. First reason was to get the PNMs use to hearing/using Greek letters. Second reason given was that since these "guides" had to disaffiliate during recruitment (or what ever time line mandated by their specific university), they were in affect in their own Greek organization. In some cases, even taking a "pledge" to this "organization" as it were. On some campuses, the "guides" even roomed together during recruitment. As such, they bonded as would any other GLO.