I believe in thank you notes. The thank you note which the Pi Beta Phi Foundation recently received from Mallory Rawson, a scholarship awardee, reaches new heights in thank you notes (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fN3wYVZX0_8&feature=youtu.be). My friend and past Pi Beta Phi National Panhellenic Conference (NPC) delegate Linda Ibsen makes an appearance at 1:54. Even though Mallory is a Pi Phi, the name of any of the other 25 NPC groups could be inserted in the video and the sentiments would be equally true.
And although I had a post about the G.I. Bill planned for today, my life’s motto is “Whatsoever things are flexible.” Mallory’s thank you note and the segue it provides gives me the opportunity to climb on one of my soapboxes.
I think we all know that we love our own organization the best. That is just the way it is. George Banta, Phi Delta Theta and Delta Gamma, expounded on this in a past post at http://wp.me/p20I1i-ZY. I often think of Pi Phi as one of my own children and the other sororities and fraternities as my nieces and nephews. I love them like family. And I will brag on them as family, because truly we are family.
On the twitterverse, I see evidence that the sorority recruitment season will be upon us soon. All over the country, prospective NPC sorority new members are collecting recommendations (“sorority recs”). My advice to those prospective new members is to keep an open mind and to maximize all possibilities. The sorority experience is very much the same in all 26 NPC groups. It is my belief that when all the externals are stripped away – the colors, flowers, songs, badges, mascots, and symbols, we are basically the same organization. We stand for essentially the same things.
As an chapter advisor, I had my own theory on legacies. They were either the best thing for a chapter or the worst thing. There really did not seem to be, in my experience, a middle ground. If a member was there because she truly wanted to be, she showed it. If she was there because she wanted to make someone else happy, that usually came through, too. I always ask moms, grandmothers, and sisters to think about what experience they want their legacy to have. Do they want her to be an XYZ even if it is not a good fit or do they want her to have a sorority experience like their own – deep friendships, lifelong loyalty, and all that goes with that?
Many, many years ago, I had a conversation with a friend who told me about one of her chapter sisters. “She fit like a comfortable shoe,” is how she described her. I love that analogy when it is applied to sorority recruitment.
© Fran Becque, www.fraternityhistory.com, 2014. All rights reserved. If you enjoyed this post, please sign up for updates. Also follow me on twitter @GLOHistory and Pinterest www.pinterest.com/glohistory/
