Tau Beta Sigma’s Theta Lambda: Growing in Style by Emily Heitman Meet Your New Chapter Field Representatives by Derrick Mills and Dollie

by Emily Heitman Former President, Theta Lambda, Tau Beta Sigma

So you followed all the suggestions and ideas for recruitment, Tau Beta Sigma is now the hippest organization to join on your campus, and your membership numbers are nearing 100. What do you do now? The Theta Lambda chapter of Tau Beta Sigma at Auburn University recently had to face this very complex situation. From 1996, when I was initiated, to spring of 2000, our chapter grew from thirtytwo to ninety members, forcing several changes in our organization. From a management standpoint, there are several things that must be dealt with in order to run a large sorority successfully.

First of all, how do you optimize your manpower? Ninety girls can do a lot more service than 30. However, there are not many projects that require that large a group; our typical band service project takes around 35 people. Obviously, a sign-up sheet for this project is full before it even gets halfway around the chapter room. So, we’ve had to take a different approach to service activities. With a large sorority, we can divide our membership up into seven committees, so we assign our service projects to different committees. These subgroups of the chapter can perform their assigned function individually and also work with other committees on different service projects. This way, everyone in our sorority can still contribute to the service projects, and our organization can accomplish much more, with the management of the projects being spread out among committee heads.

Our chapter still needs to do a few things together, but finding projects that require almost a hundred people can be a difficult task. After thinking creatively, we came up with a community service project this year for underprivileged children. A university-sponsored program called Project Uplift pairs children with big sisters and brothers, and our Tau Beta Sigma chapter sponsored a “Field Day at the Band Field” event for the children. We reserved the band field and set up different booths and activities that taught the children about music. Having a musical theme, we could then provide a service to the community that both educates children and encourages an appreciation of music, while supporting the Tau Beta Sigma Vision Statement, in which we are charged “to promote band music as an integral part of the American cultural experience.”

We were able to employ every one of our members in this project Sisters either set up equipment for the field day, ran a booth, led a parade of sisters and children around the field, or managed the overall project. The event was a great chance to prove our “sisterpower” capacity and our ability to run a large-scale project entirely by ourselves.

A second dilemma of a large chapter is making every member feel important to the sorority. You can do this by getting the sisters involved in their committees. This is the key to membership retention. It can no longer be the executive council’s responsibility to keep up with every individual member. It is now time for the other student leaders, the committee heads, to be in contact with their committee members. They have to be the ones to give their members that individual attention, they have to be the ones to call a

Janelle Seigert passes out balloons in Auburn colors at the recent Theta Lambda “Field Day at the Band Field.” Theta Lambda sister Laura Spivey paints a future sister’s face at a recent “Field Day at the Band Field.”

Sisters Camie Young and Kelli White help a youngster at an arts and crafts booth at the “Field Day at the Band Field.” Therta Lambda sisters all wear their jerseys to Band Camp to identify themselves to prospective members.

sister when she doesn’t show up for a meeting, and they have to be the ones to pat the members on the back and make them feel like a vital part of the organization. These small subgroups of the sorority become the member’s outlet for involvement. The sisters now feel important to their committee, and in turn important to the whole sorority.

A third issue with which a large sorority must deal is maintaining closeness. When a sorority becomes large it forfeits that tight, sisterly bond that exists between members of small chapters. No longer do you know exactly what’s going on in every sister’s life, and no longer can you plan a social event that fits everyone’s schedule. This means you must plan more sister events, such as sister retreats, Girls’ Night Out, and pajama parties. Through the different social events of the chapter, the sisters can get to know each other better and develop a strong sisterly bond. Without closeness, your members start to feel lost in the crowd, so you must work a little harder to maintain this aspect of the sisterhood.

A final dilemma is our meeting efficiency. In a chapter of 90, each sister cannot speak at the meetings, or it would last a couple hours. In order to keep our meetings at an hour, we have had to improve our ability to speak concisely and effectively. With seven officers and seven committees, we must move quickly through each announcement in order to cover all business at hand. We have become an aggressive sorority, and our meetings reflect the ambition of our sisters. But how do we keep the meetings interesting? We keep sisters entertained

with skits, in which many of them get to participate. We get the sisters involved by singing sorority songs. We give out a Dr. Johnnie Vinson Service Award (named for our band director) at every meeting to someone who has shown excellence in service. And we start every meeting with a devotion followed by prayer requests, so that we can hear and pray for some of the things sisters are dealing with. Through all of these changes, the Theta Lambda chapter has learned how to adapt to its new membership size. We had no idea, five years ago, that we would be growing exponentially in the next few years. We also did not realize the impact it would have on chapter operations. Nonetheless, this growth has occurred, and we have had to make some adjustments. We are breaking The women of Theta Lambda prior to an alumni new ground, and we don’t have breakfast, spring 2000. These hard-working band women many chapters to call on for comprise one of ΤΒΣ’s largest chapters. advice in this area. Therefore, we have to continuously try new things to see what works and what doesn’t work. However, we are learning the many advantages of having a large chapter. We are capable of large amounts of service, we are never lacking in leaders and chances to develop leaders, we have a variety of ideas and energy within the membership, and we have become a powerful force in the Auburn band (we make up 30% of it). Although running a large sorority has turned out to be very complex, we have learned how to make it work to both the sorority and the band program’s benefit. The reported increase in Tau Beta Sigma’s membership, both on our chapter level and around the nation, confirms that TBS remains the most successful band sorority!