Quote:
Originally posted by ktkennyd
It's really sad to see the number of Sigma Kappa chapters that have closed or are now dormant. By looking at this list it doesn't look like we are doing a good job maintaining chapters or building new ones and this worries me. As an organization I think we need to work harder to maintain the chapters that we have and to expand if we want to continue to exist. But maybe it is like this with other sororities and I have just never heard anything about it.
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Now I'll be the first to admit that I don't work at NHQ, have no idea what national is working on and am therefore speculating wildly. But, it seems to me that we have two issues: 1) our expansion has slowed down, which I think is true of most NPC sororities and 2) we're losing a number of chapters. Looking over that list, it seems we really didn't take the hit in the 60s and 70s that other sororities did (or maybe we recolonized most of those) but we really started losing chapters in the early 80s and it hasn't really stopped.
We have over 80 dormant chapters. I don't know numbers for all the NPC sororities but I believe Kappa, PiPhi, Theta, Tri-Delta and DG are all between 20 and 40. Zeta is about the same as us. DZ has over 100, but they also have a lot more active chapters.
Obviously, national is not going to be able to prevent every chapter from closing, but maybe they're too quick to give up on a chapter. I know my own chapter (Alpha Phi) got a lot of help from national, including live in chapter consultants and even visits from Angela Guillory. Despite all the help, they just weren't doing well with rush and they lost the chapter house. But a core group of dedicated girls decided to keep the chapter going and were able to get the numbers up somewhat (no where near competitive on campus, but sustainable). Unfortunately, after two years as a small unhoused chapter, NHQ came in and forced them to close. And they've basically made it impossible for the chapter to ever recolonize.
I just can't help but wonder if say Kappa or DG would have kept the chapter open.
