The president of Northwestern’s Multicultural Greek Council has said he wants the five multicultural chapters to be allowed to recruit in the fall to make recruitment more balanced between umbrella organizations.

The small size of Multicultural Greek Council chapters makes it hard for them to compete with the larger chapters of the Panhellenic Association and of the Interfraternity Council, said Benjamin Hernandez, Multicultural Greek Council president. Allowing groups to recruit during Fall Quarter would help alleviate this problem, he said.

But Greek officials said existing recruitment policies create a fair standard. They said reforming policies for some Greek chapters would be unfair. Current university policy does not allow any fraternity or sorority to recruit or pledge freshmen during Fall Quarter. Multicultural Greek Council, an alliance of non-traditional and culturally focused Greek groups, is one of four Greek governing bodies bound to these rules.

“It would not be fair to allow one fraternity or sorority to recruit at a time that others are not,” said Kyle Pendleton, director of fraternity and sorority life.

The council’s chapters also compete with NU’s cultural and service groups that start recruiting freshmen as soon as they get to campus, Hernandez said.

“They want to have a one-shoe-fits-all policy,” said Hernandez, a McCormick senior, “but the reality is that one shoe does not fit all.”

Hernandez said most Multicultural Greek Council pledge classes contain two to three people and rarely exceed 10 students. If they were to recruit in the fall, he said, Multicultural Greek Council chapters would barely make an indentation on the large group of students who are recruited by Panhel and IFC.

The problem is, “we’re competing with them, but they’re not competing with us,” Hernandez said.

Although Multicultural Greek Council groups need more members to sustain themselves, they do not want to sacrifice a tight-knit community for more members.

“(There is) a level of intimacy you don’t get with other fraternities that are larger,” said Omar Akbik, a Weinberg senior and member of the Latino-based fraternity Omega Delta Phi.

Having smaller numbers means every member is a leader, Hernandez said. Because of this additional responsibility, he said it is especially important to recruit members who will be actively engaged. By being allowed to recruit in the fall, Multicultural Greek Council groups have a chance to improve their numbers and attract motivated freshmen who would not have otherwise heard of the culturally-oriented houses, he said.

But Pendleton said many smaller organizations in Panhel and IFC, some of which have fewer than 30 members, could offer the same complaints.

“Regardless, the more members you have, the more resources you have,” Pendleton said.

Pendleton said Fraternity and Sorority Life works with all Greek organizations to help them publicize themselves and their experience equally. For example, at the Fraternity and Sorority Life Experience in September, organizations from all four Greek councils are represented alphabetically to avoid any favoritism.

Panhel president Ashley Lorenz said it is important to remember that deferred recruitment was instituted so freshmen can focus on their academics.

“(Deferred recruitment) is something that the university is set on and will not change,” said Lorenz, a Communication senior.

To help raise Multicultural Greek Council’s profile, Panhel has invited the group’s chapters to its Recruitment Kick-Off event taking place today and will sponsor an ad for the council in The Daily, Lorenz said.

Pendleton also said semantics is part of the reason Multicultural Greek Council chapters get less attention than IFC and Panhel chapters. The popular practice of calling chapters “houses” misrepresents the groups that don’t have actual houses.

“You take that house away and you still have a fraternity or sorority experience,” Pendleton said.

Reach Deepa Seetharaman at [email protected].