Pledge ideas

[bianca131]

I know usually you're not allowed to share what goes on during pledge events, but can someone just share maybe a few ideas you maybe thought of using. We have a few but we need a whole lot more because it's not enough to fill our 6-8 week plan.

We thought of arts and crafts, games, and hunts. We need more, any idea would be great.

Thanks.

[PhiMuGirl07]

Do a retreat.

[ree-Xi]

Be careful about "hunts"...these type of events can be labled as hazing.

Going on the assumption that the purpose of the new member period is essentially to learn about the organization, get to know the members, and get to know your fellow new members/classmates, here are some suggestions.

*Some of these have been modified to fit modern-day hazing regulations

1. Make a banner for the current seasons' sport's team that says "ABC Loves the Bulldogs" or whatever your team name is. Use a big sheet and poster paint. The activity is a bonding experience, as is going to a game with the sisters and sitting together and holding up the banner.
2. Write a pledge class song. Choose an easy melody that everyone is familiar with and change the words. Serenade, then teach the sisters at the end of the pledge period.
3. Make a scrapbook for Big Sisters. Each week, maybe at the pledge meeting, work on a different page. After 6-8 weeks, you can have a cute little book. And it can be a surprise that the chapter has never done before.
4. Once a week, have a BUDDY day. Each pledge/new member is paired up with another one, and they spend the day together, walking to class, have lunch, etc. The point is to get to know others in the pledge class, kind of "a day in the life" type thing.
5. Write up a short survey to pass out to the active members. Ask questions about things you might not necessarily know, like - do you have siblings, do play a musical instrument, what kind of pets have you had, have you ever won an award, what was your childhood nickname, etc. See who shares common interests or who does something really cool.
6. Make dinner for the active members. Spaghetti/salad/garlic bread is the easiest. Make placecards and use clues from the above suggestions for the sisters to guess who sits where.
7. Write down your org's history on index cards and play "jeapordy". Do it just with the pledge class or pair up with a sister who you can "call on" to help, like in "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." If it's in your budget, buy a few "prizes" to hand out to the winners.

Make the events fun and meaningful. Start new traditions that both new and active members can look forward to. I hope that some of these suggestions are helpful!

[EtaEpsilove]

I have a few different ideas that we've done before.

1. To encourage bonding between different pledge classes, we invite each pledge class to meet the newest pledge class once a week. So one week the seniors host a spaghetti dinner, the next week the juniors do an ice cream social, etc.
2. We also leave gifts for our Diamond Sisters (in ADPi this is the equivalent of a little) each week in our sorority suite (sorority house). For example, one week all the bigs leave blankets for the littles, th next week it's candles, the next pin boxes, etc.
3. We have all of our newest members make picture pages of themselves so we can get to know them. They leave this in the suite. Similarly, all of the older members make picture pages for the new girls, and our New Member Coordinator compiles them and distributes them to the new members.
4. We have a sleep over in our suite for all of the new members. That night we arrange for different fraternities to have their newest pledges serenade our members. We also have getting to know you games and watch movies and stuff.
5. We've done various stuff like gone ice skating, midnight movies (rent out the movie theater in our town for a midnight showing of a movie), ice cream social, etc.
6. Have a progressive dinner. Because we don't have sorority houses, most of our upperclassmen live off campus. We divide everyone into groups, and we have different sisters volunteer to host different courses at their houses. So, you go to one house for an appetizer, another for the main course, another for dessert. It's really fun to travel with all the new members, and you learn people that way. Make sure this is NON-ALCOHOLIC. We have never had a problem with that, but I've heard of it being an issue with other chapters in the past.

Hope that helps! PM if you have any other questions! Good luck!

[Zeta13Girl]

we just got new housing and one of the ideas i had were for our new members to develop an Idea of how they would like it to be decorated and bring each section to the chapter for the active sisters to vote on the idea if they like it or not.

You can do something like FREDapalooza or up all night FRED(fraternity education) where you have a bunch of games put together for new members to play and learn about the organization... on a side note as the former fred chair for my chapter we did the jeopardy idea but i seperated the new members onto seperate teams and they had to guess which active sisters they thought knew the most about the fraternity to be on their team(not who they liked). It's really funny when the game is in action to see which team wins.

[bianca131]

Thank you girls for all your ideas.

[jmagnus]

We had to make a pledge class flag. At the end of our weekly pledge meeting, the pledge educator said something to the effect of.

"I'll be back in 5 hours. Buy some stuff and make a flag describing your pledge class". It was kind of rushed, and guys don't tend to be the best at making crafts, but it was an awesome experience.

[RushLeader08]

ice cream socials!!!

[ktbug10474]

we did this for my allstar cheer team

it was right after tryouts and i know it can be difficult because it might be considered hazing but we had a scavenger hunt and the seniors and/or coaches left clues and we had to follow them all the way back to the person's house where we were spending the night *we started at our gym*

it's actually really fun because you get to know everyone rather quickly since you have to work together. but i can def see where it can come in as hazing...


maybe another thing you could do is have a sisters day out
and get the entire sorority to do something together... do something that relates to your sorority, go bowling, watch a movie, and then have sisters night in at the end of the day and have a big sleepover watch movies and eat popcorn ( kinda like the sleepovers when we were little)

[Kaorin_Kanoe]

Originally Posted by EtaEpsilove

I have a few different ideas that we've done before.

1. To encourage bonding between different pledge classes, we invite each pledge class to meet the newest pledge class once a week. So one week the seniors host a spaghetti dinner, the next week the juniors do an ice cream social, etc.
2. We also leave gifts for our Diamond Sisters (in ADPi this is the equivalent of a little) each week in our sorority suite (sorority house). For example, one week all the bigs leave blankets for the littles, th next week it's candles, the next pin boxes, etc.
3. We have all of our newest members make picture pages of themselves so we can get to know them. They leave this in the suite. Similarly, all of the older members make picture pages for the new girls, and our New Member Coordinator compiles them and distributes them to the new members.
4. We have a sleep over in our suite for all of the new members. That night we arrange for different fraternities to have their newest pledges serenade our members. We also have getting to know you games and watch movies and stuff.
5. We've done various stuff like gone ice skating, midnight movies (rent out the movie theater in our town for a midnight showing of a movie), ice cream social, etc.
6. Have a progressive dinner. Because we don't have sorority houses, most of our upperclassmen live off campus. We divide everyone into groups, and we have different sisters volunteer to host different courses at their houses. So, you go to one house for an appetizer, another for the main course, another for dessert. It's really fun to travel with all the new members, and you learn people that way. Make sure this is NON-ALCOHOLIC. We have never had a problem with that, but I've heard of it being an issue with other chapters in the past.

Hope that helps! PM if you have any other questions! Good luck!

You have amazing ideas, truly amazing. But I just want to warn you that there could be "bad" groups with not so nice intentions lurking on GC. What off campus groups like to do at my school is imitate the on campus recruitment process so they'll catch unsuspecting freshman off guard. We can't take first semester freshman so we get what is "left over". One of our off campus groups stole the ritual book from one of our most prominent sororities. (Don't ask me how.....)

[AZTheta]

pssst...you just bumped a thread that started in 2007. the OP probably isn't even around.

[preciousjeni]

Originally Posted by Kaorin_Kanoe

We can't take first semester freshman so we get what is "left over".

Heffa.

[DrPhil]

Originally Posted by preciousjeni

Heffa.

LOL.