Pi Beta Phi to colonize in Fall 2014, Alpha Xi Delta in 2016
After months of preparation and voting, Sorority Council’s extension committee has decided to invite Pi Beta Phi and Alpha Xi Delta sororities to colonize at USC.
Pi Beta Phi will recolonize its South Carolina Alpha chapter in Fall 2014, and Alpha Xi Delta will be coming to USC for the first time in Fall 2016.
“The push behind bringing additional Panhellenic groups to campus is obviously the desire and need to lower our chapter sizes,” said Chelsea Ostebo, the committee’s chairperson. “The addition of other groups also brings the welcome opportunity for such a large group of incoming women to find a home that really meshes with their values.”
The addition of Pi Beta Phi means every Southeastern Conference school will have a chapter of the sorority come Fall 2014.
Alpha Xi Delta’s chapter at USC will be its third in South Carolina, and the addition of the two organizations will bring the total number of National Panhellenic Conference sororities at the university to 13.
The colonization of Pi Beta Phi is contingent upon the availability of land to build a house in the upcoming expansion of the Greek Village, most likely onto the land where the Carolina Coliseum parking lots currently sit. According to the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life, Pi Beta Phi hopes to have a house built in late 2015 or early 2016 — right before Alpha Xi Delta colonizes.
While Pi Beta Phi will be the only sorority without an on-campus house until its is built, Ostebo does not think it will hurt its chances during recruitment.
“I do not think they will be at a disadvantage in terms of recruiting women, as we saw Phi Mu [recruit without a house] with incredible results,” Ostebo said.
Ostebo said she and other committee members began preparing for expansion over the summer.
Several groups came to campus to visit with staff and presented packets filled with decorative boxes, personalized envelopes and other goodies. The committee then invited three sororities to have lunch and make their pitch for colonization.
The committee then voted on which to let on campus.
“The extension process can be compared to courting a potential boyfriend or girlfriend,” Ostebo said. “You want to impress them with what you have to offer but also want to make sure it’s a good fit and will be a long-term partnership.”
But students shouldn’t expect the sizes of pledge classes to decrease significantly anytime soon.
“You don’t expect numbers to level out until you have added at least two and maybe three groups to the recruitment mix,” Ostebo said. “So in the immediate future, 2014, Pi Beta Phi will initially probably bring more women into recruitment and thus raise quota.”
Other SEC schools such as the University of Alabama and the University of Georgia have as many as 17 National Panhellenic Conference sororities, while USC only currently has 11, just under the SEC average of 12.
“We would like to continue adding groups, but it would not benefit us to look so far into the future and predict a need for 16 or 17 groups,” Ostebo said.
Enrollment numbers and demographics don’t always change consistently, Ostebo said, but USC will need to avoid growing the size of Fraternity and Sorority Life faster than demand.
“The more we foster [the idea of promoting Greek unity] within our women, the more groups will want to come and the more successful those groups will be at recruiting and leveling out numbers and lowering chapter totals,” she said.