Sigma Sigma Sigma and Alpha Xi Delta. These names have not been heard on campus since the late 80s and mid-90s, when the sororities closed at the University, but each could be back in the fall.

The University of Illinois Panhellenic Council is interested in adding a new sorority to the campus. Currently, there are 23 sororities, and the Panhellenic Council believes that they need another to accommodate the growing number of women interested in Greek life.

Sigma Sigma Sigma, Alpha Xi Delta and newcomer Alpha Sigma Tau are the three contenders for a spot.

Assistant Dean of Students Lisa Moore said the new sorority is greatly needed as the size of some of the current groups exceeds 200 people.

“There’s a lot of work that goes into maintaining a close-knit group of girls you call your sisters, and you find that juggling 200 people is a lot,” Moore said.

The capacity for the sorority houses is between 55 to 70 people, and there is not enough room for all of the officers, the women already living in the house, and the incoming pledge classes. Moore said it was especially difficult for sororities to house their live-in pledge classes in the more recent years with more and more girls joining the Greek system.

Panhellenic Council is currently going through a formal process that ends on Thursday in which they will hear presentations from the three interested sororities about why they feel they should be a part of the campus.

Jessica Sopko, the vice president of recruitment for Panhellenic Council and junior in LAS, said the Panhellenic delegates from each sorority house along with sorority presidents are supposed to attend the presentations. After, they will take the information they have to their respective chapters, and the girls will vote on which sorority they would like to see on campus. The delegate will then take the sorority vote back to Panhellenic Council.

Moore said once the sorority is chosen, the actual recruitment process would begin this semester. The sororities each have a national headquarters. Staff members, along with volunteer alumni, make the decisions on who will be members of the new sorority.

The sorority would recruit girls through interviews and then would determine who its officers would be, effective immediately.

“Anyone who wants to join can,” Moore said.

“Even a senior who thought about going Greek but never did for some reason. These girls get to establish what the sorority is about for the first time,” Moore said, adding that some sororities have been at the University for more than 100 years.

The new sorority would begin recruiting members in the fall of 2008, and no girls would live in the house until the fall of 2009. During the first year, some sort of staff person from the sorority would live in the house with the newest members to guide everything along.

Moore said that the new members would have the chance to determine the rules of the house, would have input on how they would handle things internally with the chapter, and would establish all the things taken for granted in an already established group.

Sopko said that the addition of a new house is in the best interest of the Panhellenic community and that expanding that community to have as many people as possible to join is the best thing for it.

She chose not to give any disadvantages of adding a new sorority because she did not want to say negative things as a member of Panhellenic Council and felt that overall it was the best thing to do.

Jackie Wincek, the Alpha Phi Panhellenic delegate and sophomore in Business, said that at first, some girls in her sorority were worried about whether or not the new sorority would interfere with their recruitment process because of the added competition. Eventually, the girls were reassured that because the formal recruitment process would not take place until the fall of 2008, they would have plenty of time to prepare.

“The new sorority is a really good thing,” Wincek said. “It will be useful for all of Panhellenic, and anyone who would want to be involved with the Greek system that maybe didn’t get a chance to be in a sorority before.”