Does a shorter associate program lead to more drop-outs?

[33girl]

Originally Posted by melindawarren

Another thing I've wondered about-and this is just speculation, and I hope I don't get jumped all over for saying this, but it's something I've thought about-how big are the groups we're talking about here? I mean, there've been monster pledge classes in the last few years. I just think that there may be girls who drop after a certain amount of time because they just don't feel like they can make any headway in such a large group (I don't just mean leadership-wise. How can such a large group mix with a fraternity? What about sisterhood activities?). I can't really speak to it because I'm not in something very big, but I can only imagine that, with a huge group, someone could get lost in the shuffle. But this is all just speculation.

I think that the girls who would drop out solely because of a ginourmous pledge class size are girls who were led to expect (by moms or sisters who attended VERY different type schools) a completely different experience. Ditto girls who were raised hearing about SEC size classes and then come to the Northeast for school and are flabbergasted by their "big" pledge class of 20.

The softer (I won't say shorter, because for many chapters, it HASN'T become any shorter) approach to pledging begain in the mid 90s. Greek life was in the toilet and I think this was a desperate attempt to retain members. It has backfired completely, IMO.

Much of what has been cut out has been the time available for the women to get to know the history, and also to get to know the chapter members (through interviews, coke dates etc). It's pretty delusional to rush the way that we do, and then not carry that on into pledging, i.e. "you joined not because you love the philanthropy or our values, but mainly because you liked the girls you met at this particular chapter. However, continuing to build that relationship isn't really going to be part of your pledging - everything is going to be focused on the national organization." In other words...the NPC groups are trying to rush like they always did, and then thinking they'll be able to get the kind of member loyalty the NPHC groups have. It doesn't work that way.