Thanks to television and stereotypes everyone has this picture of what sororities are like. Most are negative, like the assumption that all sorority girls do is party. This is far from true. Sure, we enjoy going out every once in awhile, who doesn’t, but it’s not even close to being all we do.

Each sorority has some sort of philanthropy. I am in Delta Zeta and our philanthropy is Speech and Hearing, specifically the Starkey Hearing Foundation. Our philanthropic partner is The Painted Turtle Camp. We do things throughout the year to raise money for both of these causes.

Another big part of being in a sorority is academics. There are GPA requirements to be in a sorority. For mine it is 2.7 and if you do not have that there are consequences. We have a required amount of study hours for each week and attend study tables.

Being in a sorority also requires a lot of responsibility, especially if you hold a position. I am the vice president of new member education, so I am in charge of teaching new members all about Delta Zeta and get them ready to take their national exam. I am also in charge of big/little, which is very stressful, even when you only have one new member to give a Big to. My roommate is vice president of membership and, let me tell you, that position is extremely stressful and time-consuming. She is in charge of planning recruitment; picking the theme, decorations, organizing parties and COBs, etc. Since we are roommates we kind of tag team a lot of the work. There are several other positions such as president, treasurer, secretary, philanthropy, programming, etc. and everyone has their own responsibilities. We have meetings every week and they are run with Robert Rules just as a board meeting would be. This helps prepare you for when you have a job later in life.

One of the biggest things said about sororities is that you pay for your friends. This is nowhere near true! When I first got to college I didn’t really talk to anyone the first three weeks. Then I decided to go out for recruitment and when I joined Delta Zeta I met some of my best friends and my Big, but I have several friends outside my sorority as well. Two of my best friends are in another sorority (ZTA), but I honestly probably wouldn’t have met them if I hadn’t joined Delta Zeta.

So erase all of those sorority stereotypes from your head because while we may party on occasion and we do pay a lot to be in them, we do not pay for our friends, there's a lot that goes into being in one that many people don’t know. They teach you lifelong skills!