Don't expect these to be the silver bullet solutions to your problems.
In Greek life, we have no shortage of problems. Pervasive and longstanding ones too. What these problems lead to are Greek communities that sit on the brink, with pressure mounting to make changes or else. Student leaders and staff are often left with trying to figure out what to do. I have seen time after time, these concerned leaders come together to solve these problems and emerge with big, lofty, silver-bullet solutions that don’t have much of an impact at all. If you are in the midst of visioning or problem-solving for your Greek community right now, let me try to help save you time, energy, and resources. Here are five go-to answers for fixing our Greek communities that most likely won't:
In Greek life, we have no shortage of problems. Pervasive and longstanding ones too. What these problems lead to are Greek communities that sit on the brink, with pressure mounting to make changes or else. Student leaders and staff are often left with trying to figure out what to do. I have seen time after time, these concerned leaders come together to solve these problems and emerge with big, lofty, silver-bullet solutions that don’t have much of an impact at all. If you are in the midst of visioning or problem-solving for your Greek community right now, let me try to help save you time, energy, and resources. Here are five go-to answers for fixing our Greek communities that most likely won't:
One of our first inclinations is to bring people together
and develop a sweeping plan. When I was an
undergraduate at Miami, a committee of staff, students, and alumni created the
Miami Plan for Greek Excellence. I know
many institutions have such a plan.
These plans can be beneficial in identifying the problems, and the
discussions that create the plans can be enlightening and productive. However, the plans themselves almost never
create a lasting positive impact.
Why? First, the plans are rooted
in logic and intellect and most of the problems they address are not. Second, staff and student turnover on most
campuses make sweeping multi-year plans tough to stay committed to. And third, no matter how much student “voice”
is brought into the plan’s development, it cannot avoid being seen as an
authoritarian top-down approach.
I love professional speakers as thought-provokers and
educational entertainers. But too many believe that putting one in front of their whole Greek community will
bring about big change. To
have that expectation is to unfairly burden the speaker, and to unwittingly subscribe
to the discredited notion that speeches create action. A speaker is a great compliment to a larger
educational strategy. But, a speaker is
typically not the sage savior that will “light a fire” that produces change. If you have ever attended a regional
leadership conference, such as NGLA or AFLV and the only real idea you came
away with was a speaker that you just HAD to bring to your campus, then you fell
victim to this silver bullet. Instead
of internalizing the speaker’s message, the dialogue in your head (and this is
common) probably sounded something like “if only my whole Greek community could
hear this!” Great speakers can set a
table, but you need to own the meal.
Repeat after me: Our Greek community does not have a PR
problem. And keep repeating it until you
believe it, because it’s true. Bad PR is
the most frequent misdiagnosis for the problems we face in Greek life. And thus, we put way too much emphasis on
good PR as a solution. If you have the
time, write a press release. It probably
won’t get printed. If it’s cathartic for
you to fire off a letter to the campus newspaper, go for it. But, if you want to use your time more
wisely, ignore the campus newspaper and pledge to do things that are worthy of notice. Even if you don’t get the
media attention you desire, you’ll move further away from getting the unwanted kind. Nonetheless, the battle for
our future as Greek organizations will not be waged in the op-ed sections or on
the magazine racks. Don’t get sucked in.
This one is for the IFC’s and the senior campus administrators. When faced with problems, the knee-jerk response is to exert more and more control over recruitment. The old adage of “if all you have is a hammer, then everything is a nail” applies here. Recruitment is the hammer. Campus administrators wield it as a carrot, and stick, and everything in between. The fact is – pervasive issues in Greek life are pervasive on campuses where recruitment happens year-round, recruitment is deferred a semester, deferred a year, deferred two years, loose, controlled, etc. Why do we go – even as student leaders – to the recruitment card so often? Again, it’s about control. Open recruitment feels like the giant bin of mismatched legos, and we can struggle with that much chaos. So, we instead seek to create instructions for what to build with the legos and Krazy Glue to hold it together once it’s built (referencing the Lego Movie here, which you may not have seen but you NEED to). It certainly appears more orderly, and we appear more in control, but what we’ve lost is the creative energy that fuels grassroots inertia for change.
When a Greek community is facing challenges, it’s natural
for those involved to want to huddle up, hunker down, and stop business until
the problems are solved. As mentioned, recruitment
is often a way this manifests itself.
Yet another is fraternity expansion.
We tend to think that a system in turmoil cannot withstand any
disruptions, and so we stand still.
However, a disruption may be exactly what’s needed. A new player, a new model for others to
observe, and new energy infused into the system. If you are looking at a Greek community that
needs to be fixed, don’t put up a fence.
Don’t shut out the rest of the world and believe that you can go into a
cave, make repairs, and emerge brand new.
You may get some temporary relief from that, but more often than not,
the system will revert back to its previous state. The best thing for you to say, at a moment of
consequence for your Greek community, could be “let’s bring on some new groups.” Keep moving.
Don’t stand still.
What did I miss?
Where am I wrong?
And in a couple of weeks, look for the 5 things that CAN
fix your Greek community.
Nelson Ambeau. University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Being apart of greek life has taught me many things throughout my college career. One of the main things that I have learned is that greek life on many college campuses has a mind of their own. Usually what one group decides the other groups will also follow. I do agree with these concepts listed above. They will most likely not work, but they just might put a thought in an individuals head. The question is, will that one individual have the power to step up and make a difference in his or her organization?
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