Dr. Richard A. Crosby, National President of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity, announced today the withdrawal of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia from membership in the Professional Fraternity Association (PFA).
After several years of work in attempting to reconcile the conflict of Sinfonia’s classification as a social organization with its membership in PFA, the Fraternity’s National Executive Committee has decided that Sinfonia is on a divergent path from PFA, according to the official letter of withdrawal.
“Our withdrawal is cordial,” said Crosby. “As a founding member of PFA in 1978, it was very important to the Fraternity’s leadership to make every effort to find a mutually agreeable solution. When those attempts failed, it took very thorough and thoughtful consideration before we decided to part ways with PFA.”
The Fraternity sponsored two legislative initiatives within PFA in 2005 and 2006 to attempt to find a solution to its conflict, but both were defeated in votes of PFA’s membership.
The Fraternity’s withdrawal was based on two primary factors. First, the Fraternity faced scrutiny from universities’ student affairs professionals due to the incongruous appearance of a non-professional fraternity holding membership in the Professional Fraternity Association. Second, the Fraternity’s justification for ongoing PFA membership eroded as it undertook enhanced programs to educate the membership on the Fraternity’s true, social mission. Within the last decade, the Fraternity has experienced a resurging interest in the founding mission of the organization—so much so that the mission statement was restored to its original form in 2003. As Sinfonians’ understanding of the Fraternity’s mission grew through these new programs, membership in an association serving professional fraternities appeared increasingly discordant.
Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia is not joining the North-American Interfraternity Conference (NIC) because doing so would not be in the best interest of the Fraternity’s members and chapters at this time. The Fraternity plans to operate outside the umbrella of any primary association, though it will continue its affiliation with the Association of Fraternity Advisors, College Fraternity Editors Association, National Interfraternal Music Council and other interfraternal collaborative groups.
Established in 1898, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia is a men’s music fraternity with 215 collegiate chapters and 11 colonies at colleges and universities across the United States. Founded at the New England Conservatory in Boston, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia is the nation’s oldest and largest music fraternity. The Fraternity has more than 100,000 living alumni around the world.
For more information and resources on the topic of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia’s withdrawal from PFA, please visit www.sinfonia.org/pfa.
