Written by: Amy Gardinier, Co-Founder, Givefinity
Many different images come to mind when you hear the word fraternity or sorority. One thing you may not know unless you were a fraternity or sorority member is that they have a long history of giving back to their communities and developing leadership skills. This next fact may even surprise you:
“The Greek system is the largest network of volunteers in the United States, as they raise over 7 million dollars each year and donate over 10 million hours of volunteer service!”
— According to SUNY
When looking at the impact of the Greek system on leaders in our country the statistics are impressive. The Atlantic states that, “Fraternity men make up 85% of the US Supreme Court Justices since 1910, 63% of all US Presidential cabinet members since 1900, 76% of US Senators, 85% of Fortune 500 executives and 71% of the men in “Who’s Who in America.” In addition, according to the North American Interfraternity Conference over 19 United States Presidents were a part of a fraternity.
What Makes Greek Life So Great?
It’s Simple: Their Impact on the Community
One of the first and foremost impacts that the Greek system can have on a community is the relationships they form through the various service project interactions. Some of these interactions may be purely helping those in need but it can also come from a more collaborative approach where the helpers and those being helped work with each other for the betterment of the community. This collaboration can have a more lasting effect since everyone involved has taken a vested interest in making a situation or life in-general better.
Volunteering can help both the Greek organizations and the community experience diversity and inclusion. There are potentially numerous opportunities to have people of different backgrounds, beliefs, cultures, races, and genders work together for a common purpose. Serving others helps break down misperceptions and other blockers that may otherwise exist. It can also help everyone learn to appreciate and respect those different from us.
Why Track Volunteer Activities?
While we know there are good things happening through the Greek system, it is important that the community service and volunteer hours are being tracked and recorded to better understand what they have been doing.
The old adage “Anything worth doing is worth tracking” rings true here.
By tracking volunteer hours, fraternities and sororities can demonstrate their commitment to giving back to their communities and better understand the direct impact they’re having. As more volunteer activity data is obtained, it can be reviewed to determine where there may be other opportunities to serve or refine how you’re directing efforts to volunteer. For example, if a particular chapter is not volunteering as much as others, it may be helpful to provide them with additional training or resources. There are a plethora of ways to analyze and modify what you’re doing to improve your impact even more.
How to Track Volunteer Activities – The Essential Guide
If you’ve never tracked volunteer activities or considered doing so, it’s not too late to start. While volunteer hours can be tracked with pen and paper or online spreadsheets and documents, some relevant information may be missing. These methods make it exponentially harder to understand how the group is collectively making a difference. They are also very time consuming.
Givefinity is the most advantageous way of tracking, reporting, and understanding. It helps the organization streamline processes, saves time and effort, and also promotes integrity and accountability.
Givefinity’s Organizational Dashboard makes it so easy for administrative staff and leadership to manage volunteer activities and view data in real time. At a high level, your sorority and fraternity member will link to the organization through the Givefinity mobile app. They will then track their volunteering time and efforts in the Givefinity mobile app and as they complete activities, they can be viewed and reported on in the Organizational Dashboard. Having an electronic, centralized process streamlines and makes the management more efficient.
Making Your Chapter Stronger
The information you collect in the Givefinity Organizational Dashboard can be used in powerful ways including:
- Create and Develop Strategic Partnerships. With the organizational level metrics you can more easily identify areas where you can collaborate and partner more with other organizations to serve the community even better. Aggregating the data allows you to see where your members are volunteering which could lead to strategic partnerships and joint fundraising efforts.
- Celebration and Recognition. Upon reviewing your chapters’ volunteer efforts in one place you will quickly see who in the chapter is volunteering the most and you can celebrate and recognize their efforts.
- Connect with Alumni. Share with the alumni the good things that your chapter is doing and invite them to join your volunteer initiatives.
- Bragging Rights. Share the data with others. This could include your university, your community, or your national organization, even the news channels.
- Recruitment Tool. This information will serve as excellent information as you are recruiting new members and highlight how your greek chapter makes a difference in the community.
Schedule a demo today to see how GivefinityⓇ can help you create a thriving volunteer culture in your organization.
