NGLA

Meetings Recap (continued): Northeastern Greek Leadership Association

NGLA 2021 Representatives

Molly Closinski, Kappa Alpha Xi • Kayla Nicholson, Kappa Alpha Gamma Kirsten Ranieri, Kappa Alpha Gamma • Jillian Myers, Kappa Alpha Gamma Trinity Cortes, Kappa Chi • Amy Davis, Kappa Iota • Lily LeBlond, Kappa Iota Elizabeth Shannon, Kappa Alpha Omicron Emerging Chapter

NGLA was a great experience and I learned so much that I would love to bring back to my chapter and implement! A few of the sessions that impacted me the most and that I am planning ways to impact my chapter with were called “Hazing Makes You A Better Greek, and other stupid myths!,” “OK, Boomer. Gen Z Says Racism and Classism are Cancelled,” “Recruiting and Retaining Gen Z in Uncertain Times,” “Shut up, You’re Not Fat,” and “Motivation Begins With You: The Alpha/Beta/Gamma Theory and Why You Need to Accept Addition By Subtraction.” These sessions all discussed different topics that collaborated together to help me put together ideas to implement to help grow my chapter in a positive direction. As a sorority that has a strong zero-tolerance hazing policy, I made sure to attend a hazing session to ensure our policies continue to protect our potential new members and affiliates. In this session, I learned about myths people say to justify hazing and now I will be able to keep my eyes and ears open so that if I hear anyone saying these myths to try to push hazing policies, I can stand up and prove that it is wrong. Other sessions highly focused on inclusion in our recruitment process. One of the main policies I learned in these sessions was how to highlight our diversity and inclusion efforts without tokenizing our sisters of color. One of the best ways to do this is to engage more heavily with cultural organizations. If we reach out to have a stronger relationship with more cultural organizations we will have a greater chance of finding a more diverse group to recruit from as well as demonstrating to potential new members how we make efforts to highlight inclusion and expand diversity to make more people feel comfortable. The “Shut Up, You’re Not Fat” session impacted me greatly as body image issues are something I have struggled greatly with as well as many other sisters, if not all. After attending this session, I decided to discuss this topic at a meeting with all the sisters to teach and raise awareness about how our individual actions and language have such important effects on how we view ourselves. There are many phrases that sisters may view as a compliment when they say them but to the sister receiving them, they may have more negative impacts than positive. This is something I will bring up so that we can build each other up in meaningful ways rather than superficial “compliments.” The Alpha/Beta/Gamma Theory session taught me about the different levels of engagement found among sisters and how we can use our energy to engage more sisters. The Beta level is the middle level of participation and the Gamma level is for sisters very uninvolved and at risk of dropping. I learned that I should focus attention on these levels to engage these sisters more while also praising and working in favor of the Alpha level sisters who are highly involved and motivated. By attending these meetings, I have gained a sense of leadership and knowledge so that I can feel more comfortable with my leadership capabilities within my chapter!

—Jillian Myers,, Kappa Alpha Gamma