Maybe yes, maybe no. A lot of Duke students early apply.

I think for type A high achievers recruitment is a different kind of failure; you don't know what you did "wrong" and you can't just work harder or smarter to fix it.

Yes, and that could apply to just about anyone. If you are trying out for a sports team and don't make it, you can usually figure out why not -- you didn't have the necessary skill set or numbers. If you apply for a job, you can often tell during an interview how things are going. Or if you don't get it, you figure that someone else's resume was stronger and more to the point than yours. Besides, there are tons of other jobs out there. If you try to befriend another girl in a dorm, you find out rather quickly who wants to spend time with you and who doesn't.

But in recruitment, you are made to feel welcome most everywhere. The sorority members are friendly and interested in you. Conversations go well. And then...rejection. For no reason that you can figure out, or may ever figure out. It takes someone with a strong sense of self to pick herself up, dust herself off, and look at her remaining choices. And a brand-new to college freshman may be at her most vulnerable. Her high school social safety net is gone, and her place at her new school is uncertain.

I think that Katie Becker made some good points in her opinion piece. I agree with her statement that, "We are all prone to overestimate our own attractiveness, intelligence and charm, and therefore our chances of obtaining a coveted social status." Sorority recruitment can be a painful reality check in that manner.

Giving an honest, realistic, yet kind assessment of the recruitment process would be doing a service to many girls.