Or 5 to 3.

Oh. My. Goodness.
At least it's California. The only thing that could be harder than such a long day is doing it all in the cold. When I rushed through formal recruitment, the windchill on sisterhood day was -18* F. On philanthropy day, -36*. It's a miracle I didn't drop out due to my face freezing off. :rolleyes:

One of my friends in LA said it hit the high 90s today and they're predicting it to be triple digits tomorrow.

I still don't know which is worse...freezing cold? or scorching heat?

Numbers from the Daily Trojan .....
 

An article from the Daily Trojan has the official numbers from Panhellenic. No numbers for a particular chapter are mentioned.

Officially registered.....842
Number who accepted bids......539

This was a 7% decrease from last year.

These numbers are from an article in the DT on Sept. 1, 2009.

There are about 1350 women in the SC freshmen class.

I would SO take freezing cold.

I think 5 to 2 can work effectively, but it is a tough cut for both PNMs and the chapters. My much bigger concerns are:

- Recruitment parties going until 1am in the morning! I'm sure that a TON of women were just too exhausted from the process and didn't have the emotional resiliency to deal with the bumps in the road of recruitment

- Upperclasswomen. If I'm not mistaken, USC accepts second-semester freshmen transfers as well as traditional transfer students. The freshman transfers typically have to wait until fall of their sophomore year to go through recruitment because not all chapters have COB spots available in the spring. I'm curious how many of the women who dropped out were upperclasswomen who received heavy cuts in the later rounds.

Last year UCLA started an upperclasswoman quota that was separate from freshman quota, with the hope of more sophomores and juniors being placed. The panhellenic advisor kept seeing a high drop out rate before preference of predominantly upperclasswomen. Retention increased last year and quota went from mid-30's in 2007 to mid-40's in 2008.

So, I tried to post, but it didn't go through. My daughter just finished rush at SC. It was unbelievably exhausting, both physically and emotionally. The drop from 5 to 2, along with very vague (at least as related to us) financial information caused alot of girls to panic and drop.

Yes, she gave me permission to post her story. I'll start that later. (And, unlike so many I will finish it as well.)

Not even remotely an issue at SC even though rush can be very competitive for a non SEC chapter. Juniors have an incredibly difficult time but sophomores are treated like freshmen. Usually they are placed in chapters proportionate to their percentage in rush...even the most competitive chapters will often have 2/3 freshmen, 1/3 sophomores and their 2 "free" juniors.

Well, let's hear it for all the girls who stuck it out through the heat! What is it about rush that takes a lovely cool summer into September heat wave syndrome? Recruitment at USC can be brutal. But so worth it!!!

Today I'm doing the happy dance because my son's adorable friend went....













Gamma Phi Beta!!!!

Those cuts are so hard for the PNM's. My daughter is rushing at Wisconsin and they went 11-7-3.

Are they getting any of the smoke from the fires in SoCal?

Ohhhh yes. The smoke isn't as bad as when we have Santa Ana conditions along with the fire, but there is definitely the smell and the oddly filtered sunlight. The fires themselves have been horrible -- can't even imagine what this would look like if we had the wind to go with it.

Hooray! :D

I remember the filtered sunlight from when we had fires my first year at Pepperdine. It is really odd...not dark, yet not light. Like a sepia photograph.

The smoke is really bad. And yes, the skies are grey. I remember many years ago when the fires were closer to us and the sky was almost red. I don't know how people who must work outside are doing. It is really quite uncomfortable. But we are safe. My heart goes out to those who are in the fire area.