The Collegiate Panhellenic Council on Central Michigan University’s campus was designed to enhance the experiences of college women through sisterhood and personal development.
CPC is the governing council that advises the 11 NPC (National Panhellenic Conference) sororities on CMU’s campus.
Eleven members serve on CPC’s Executive Board and become influential leaders of sorority life on campus. Each position is crucial to creating a flourishing environment for sorority life. Molly Schuneman, the assistant director of Fraternity and Sorority Life said “Each woman on this council should recognize how influential their presence in this community is. You are the face and voice representing more than 800 members.”
2018’s Executive Board was eager to begin their efforts to further develop Panhellenic life to its fullest potential.
The council decided the best place to begin improvement was raising retention during recruitment. “Recruitment retention in 2017 was very low and we saw that as a big problem”, said Panhellenic President, Katie Hass.
The Panhellenic Council decided to create a marketing plan to promote recruitment. They wanted to give women ample opportunities to ask questions and feel comfortable throughout the whole process. “I remember being very intimidated by the formal recruitment process.” said junior Vanessa Suarez, who is a member of Sigma Sigma Sigma. I wasn’t properly informed which made me incredibly nervous throughout the whole two weeks.”
The marketing teams priority was to decrease women’s doubts by providing information about recruitment that showed how welcoming the Panhellenic community is and that they were joining a community that wants to see each individual woman thrive
The theme decided for CPC’s marketing campaign was girl power and women’s empowerment.
All the graphics, flyers, and promotional items such as stickers, laptop wallpapers, and posters were created to promote women’s empowerment.
The recruitment and marketing team thought it was crucial to show the Panhellenic community was and is created to uplift one another. “Women may all belong to other sororities but at the end of the day we all joined the same community looking to further our personal and professional growth”, Hass said.
NPC was first created to advocate for women’s rights and CMU’s Panhellenic Council was determined to showcase those values throughout recruitment.
Multiple Q&A’s were held where participants could get any questions they had about formal recruitment answered. “It was great because we had a live stream Q&A on our Instagram,” said Hass. “This allowed people who could not attend the events the opportunity to watch and ask questions from where ever they were.”
Meet and greets were also arranged so potential new members could meet multiple different women from all the sororities. Some of the events held were Sororities on the Lawn, Lemonade with the Greeks, Coffee with the Greeks, a Welcome Back BBQ, and an open Panhellenic meeting.
All of these pre-recruitment events were designed to give women thinking about going through recruitment as much information as possible. “We wanted to make sure women felt prepared about what being a sorority woman on Central’s campus entailed, said Schuneman, and I think our marketing and recruitment team achieved that.”
“We had one of the most successful retention rates during recruitment this past fall”, said Hass. “Our enrollment rate was down, but in the end we kept the majority of women and lead them to their new homes.” One factor to enrollment being lower for recruitment could also have been due to enrollment at CMU being down, Hass mentioned.
All together CPC rated their fall formal recruitment a success.
For the first time CPC created an open channel of communication through their social media, responding to member needs and building an ongoing conversation with members and potential members.
CPC implemented marketing strategies which helped to recruit new members for the organization. This included printed materials such as posters, stickers, and graphics as well as online event advertising advocating for women’s empowerment. Portraying the main reason why all these sororities on Central Michigan’s campus began in the first place.
Interested in learning more about the events CPC put on this year? Follow the links to their social media to see each event in more detail.
Below are a few photo galleries that showcase activities that women could partake in during the Relax, Refresh, & Renew Sisterhood.
The event took place Dec. 2nd in the U.C. Auditorium.
The event consisted of service projects, holiday card decorating, a photo booth, massage therapists, a caricature artist, DIY body scrubs, snacks, and insomnia cookies.
CPC puts on two sisterhoods a year. One in the Spring semester and one the following Fall semester.
The event is put on to create an inclusive community, build Panhellenic sisterhood bonds, and to show appreciation to each sorority for all the effort and hard work they put into their chapter’s and the CPC community each semester.
Becca Kerry, VP of Events for the Panhellenic Council, decided she wanted each chapter to have a part in creating blessing bags for the Isabella County Restoration House. Each chapter was given a box to their designated house to fill with basic hygiene items. The boxes were then picked up and organized so women could put together a blessing bag at the sisterhood.
A photo booth was open at the Panhellenic sisterhood so women could create memories with one another. Hats, masks, funky sunglasses, and signs with funny saying were available for women to use as props. “I thought having a photo booth would be fun and a great sister bonding activity.” “Plus, who couldn’t use a good laugh during these last few stressful weeks”, said Kerry.
Coby Blem, an artist who lives in Mt. Pleasant, was hired to create caricature portraits at the Panhellenic sisterhood. He started drawing caricatures to draw people to his booth during the art fair and it developed into a fun and well paying hobby. He had a great time seeing the reactions on women’s faces when he turned his art work around.
One of the main activities durning the Relax, Refresh, Renew Sisterhood was creating a DIY body scrub. Essential oils, brown sugar, sea salt, sage, dried lavender, and almond oil were the natural ingredients women could use to make their scrubs. Women even got the chance to decorate the package they put their scrub into with ribbon, burlap, tags, and yarn making a beautiful finished product.
The B word 