A recruitment scandal has sparked tensions within the Alpha Phi sorority at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), after members raised concerns about decisions made during the selection process.
The trouble began in late September, when sisters noticed that many prospective members were missing from the recruitment pool.
Highlights
- Alpha Phi members at the University of California, Santa Barbara, raised concerns after the recruitment pool dropped.
- Black members and other sisters alleged that women of color were excluded from recruitment activities.
- The volunteer recruitment adviser was removed from her position at the UCSB house.
Soon, they realized that the issue went beyond the women hoping to join the sorority.
Existing members were also questioning why some of them had been left out of recruitment activities. As tensions grew, sisters came together to demand answers.
“It was not just one. It was not just a few. It was not just the women of color. It was all of us,” chapter president Alana Nielsen said.
Alpha Phi members were left shocked when hundreds of prospective members disappeared from the selection pool
The controversy began on September 26, when around 1,200 potential new members participated in Alpha Phi’s Open House recruitment round.
During this stage, members spoke with prospective recruits and recorded their impressions, including whom they wanted to invite back.
The sisters said they believed their evaluations would help determine which candidates advanced to the next round.
However, after submitting their scores and comments, members were told to go home while three representatives from Alpha Phi International handled the selections.
When recruitment resumed on September 27, the pool had dropped to around 250 candidates. Members quickly noticed that many women from diverse backgrounds were missing.
“There was a large and noticeably diverse group of women who were missing from the pool of potential new members that had returned,” Nielsen told The Daily Nexus.
She added that the missing candidates did not reflect the women members had evaluated and wanted to see again.
The situation confused the chapter because members had reportedly been told that a record-breaking number of prospective recruits, roughly 90%, mutually wanted to return to Alpha Phi.
The concerns extended to black sorority members who alleged they were left out of recruitment activities too
Achola, a Black third-year political science major, arrived at the sorority house on September 27 expecting to participate in recruitment. Instead, she found that her name was missing from the schedule for almost every round.
At first, Achola thought it was a mistake. But after comparing schedules with other sisters, she noticed a pattern among women in her sorority family, a mentorship network connecting members.
“Pretty much all the women of color in my family system, except for my ‘little,’ who was white, were pulled from all the rounds,” Achola said.
She initially struggled to understand why she and other members had been left out. As more women compared their experiences, the concerns became harder to dismiss as scheduling errors.
Nielsen also said women of color in the chapter appeared to have fewer opportunities to speak with potential new members than many of their white counterparts.
Achola said the experience left her in shock for several days. She also recalled seeing another woman of color become emotional as they discussed what had happened.
The incident was particularly upsetting because Achola had chosen the chapter partly because she believed it valued diversity. She said she wanted younger members who were experiencing discrimination to know they had support.
“We were extremely hurt by this entire thing. We were discriminated against. We were tokenized. We were used,” she said.
The sorority house soon turned into an emotional showdown as members demanded answers
As frustration grew, Nielsen approached one of the outside representatives and requested a chapter-wide meeting.
According to The Daily Nexus, she was told that a meeting was unnecessary and that the members should end the day on a “happy note.”
But the sisters wanted answers, and the issue was not going away.
Nielsen recalled walking through the house and encouraging members to stay rather than leave without a chance to speak. Eventually, the sisters gathered in the chapter room, where members began sharing their experiences.
Emerson Novosel, the chapter’s director of primary recruitment and a third-year chemistry major, described the gathering as an emotional turning point.
“Girls [were] standing up screaming... It [was] like a revolution happening right now. Like standing up, crying, screaming, and I had never felt so empowered,” Novosel said.
Achola also remembered members crying and shouting as they spoke about their experiences. She said the support from white sisters stood out, as they also spoke up about what had happened to their fellow members.
The outside recruiters were reportedly removed from her position following the scandal
Alpha Phi International had sent three representatives to help run the UCSB chapter’s recruitment: two educational leadership consultants and a volunteer recruitment adviser. The adviser was a UCSB alumna who had helped with recruitment for the previous two years.
Following the confrontation, the chapter’s recruitment directors met with the remaining representatives to discuss the decisions made during the process.
According to Nielsen, members learned that the volunteer adviser had made key decisions about which prospective recruits advanced and which existing sisters could participate in recruitment groups. Members said the adviser made these decisions without their knowledge or approval.
The adviser was subsequently reported to Alpha Phi International and removed from her position at the UCSB house that night. The other two representatives remained to assist the chapter as members took greater control of the remaining recruitment process.
Novosel said the members believed the process had been manipulated.
“It had [become] so disgustingly clear how it was just manipulation, just blatant manipulation to every part of the process with whatever her hidden agenda is,” she said.
The allegations soon spread across campus as students demanded accountability
The controversy soon spread beyond the sorority house. Anonymous posts about the allegations appeared on Yik Yak, a social media app popular on college campuses. Some posts received hundreds of upvotes, while others reportedly attracted more than 1,000.
The online discussion brought further attention to the allegations and calls for accountability. However, members also faced criticism from students who viewed the entire chapter as responsible.
Achola said the focus on the sorority as a whole sometimes overlooked the experiences of women of color within it.
She also said the situation was painful because members had been trying to challenge the alleged discrimination themselves.
After the confrontation, the chapter faced a difficult decision on whether to continue recruitment or stop the process
The sisters ultimately chose to continue.
Nielsen said withdrawing would not undo what had happened, and the chapter wanted members to take control of the remaining rounds rather than let the incident determine the rest of the process.
Recruitment at UCSB also involved a mutual selection system between prospective members and sororities. As a result, Alpha Phi could not simply bring back every candidate eliminated earlier.
The chapter took greater control of the remaining decisions and eventually filled its recruitment quota.
However, the outcome left questions about the prospective members who had allegedly been excluded.
One possible route for candidates who still wanted to join was Continuous Open Bidding, or COB, an informal recruitment process that depends on available spaces in the chapter.
The number of available COB spots would depend on the spaces remaining after formal recruitment and the campus Panhellenic organization’s decisions.
Following the scandal, the sisters released a statement and pushed for changes to recruitment
On October 1, the chapter shared a statement on Instagram explaining why members had decided to continue the recruitment process.
“We have chosen to remain in the recruitment process because we believe that our members have the power to create meaningful change from within,” the statement read.
The chapter also acknowledged that it had made critical decisions without the knowledge or approval of its members or executive board.
It expressed sadness for prospective recruits who had allegedly lost the opportunity to join because of the outside representative’s decisions.
Alpha Phi International later sent representatives from its Health, Wellness and Accountability Department to meet with chapter members. Representatives met with Nielsen and attended a chapter meeting on October 5 to discuss the incident.
Nielsen said members planned to collect statements documenting their experiences and send them to the national organization. They also wanted changes to recruitment procedures to ensure that chapter members had greater oversight and transparency in future selection decisions.
The fallout also affected the chapter’s relationship with Alpha Phi International.
Nielsen said rebuilding trust would take time, and she did not expect the national organization to play the same role in the chapter’s recruitment next year.
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