Okay, I'll try to make this easy...

At the university, students must have a 2.0 to RUSH period (because any lower and you probably should spend more time studying anyway).

ABC, DE, and FGH all require 2.0's to "pledge"

IJ, KL, MNO, and PQ all require 2.5's to "pledge"

and RST and UV require a 3.0 to "pledge"

Usually, that minimum is the whole sorority min (all sisters must maintain at least that GPA to stay in good standing).

So if you had a 2.55 GPA and you wanted to RUSH, you would automatically be dropped form RST and UV because your GPA isn't high enough. And IJ, KL, MNO, and PQ might take a close look at you to figure out if they can risk taking you since usually the first semester in a sorority isn't the best for one's grades...but they can take you if they want because you do meet the requirement.

Remember, sororities compete for highest GPA on campus...I know at my school at least it's very competitive!! We love to have bragging rights about best grades (which right now DG does!! yay!).

Also, to my understanding, each chapter can set whatever minimum they want, as long as it is or is above the national set one. For example, DG nationally requires a 2.5 to "pledge", but at my chapter, if you are coming from High School we require a 3.0 high school GPA, or a 2.5 University GPA.

Just by the way, our chapters average GPA is right around a 3.2 (last semester).

I know at the University of Arizona, at least, that is not the case. None of the sororities here maintain that sort of policy (including Delta Gamma). If it were true then there would be far fewer sorotity women walking around campus, sad to say.

When I rushed at my previous university, I knew nothing about sororities. I didn't know there was an emphasis on GPA; I didn't even know there was a required GPA. I didn't even know until after rush that I would not have even been able to join anything because of my GPA. I would have been crushed if I had signed my bid card and had not received a bid, only to find out that I didn't have the GPA requirement. (I didn't sign a bid card.)
At MTSU, the minimum to rush is 2.5. That is the minimum for at least 2 sororities - I don't know what the others are. I know one is lower, but I chalk it up to they are giving you a lesser chance to be cut because of grades by setting it higher than the bare minimum. I would think that would cut back on the disappointment that some may experience by being cut heavily for no reason other than grades.

I would definitely check with your school's policy on grades to rush. in canada, no one is allowed access to your grades except you, so sororities can't even factor your GPA in.
i can't even imagine letting something like grades affect whether or not you join a sorority, especially since some schools are harder than others. (ie. a C at university of toronto- considered an ivy league school- would probably be a A at most other schools in Ontario!!) i'm sure this is the same in the states, no?

Yeah... here at Lawrence, the joke is that the Dean will bust you for grades before any of the sororities will.

Well as far as some universities being harder, you must remember that all the girls rushing and all the actives are part of the same university and got in to the same university. The GPA for the chapter might just be lower, or the rush requirement might be a little lower according to university grading being harder. In any case, everyone is on the same scale. I know that here, where the freshman class profile lists a 4.2 (on a 4.0 scale) as the average HS GPA, so we want girls with high GPA's so we can be confident that they can juggle sorority life, academic life, and their own social lives...and possible work life!

As far as students rushing that are currently students, we require them to have 2.5's. That is below the all woman average on campus (3.01)...with anything below a 3.0 in our chapter you have to do study hours, etc.

Guess grades are important here...maybe they aren't as important at other universities.

At my school to be able to rush you have to have a 2.0.

But i know for Sigma Kappa you have to have 2.7 from HS and and 2.5 from college. There may make execptions sometimes if you GPA is under the requirement. I will again stress MAY MAKE THE EXECPTION.

This is just my opinion, if you want you don't have to rush this fall, you can always rush the following semester so that you can work on improving your GPA, if you think that it is too low.

I wish you the best.

One heart, One way

I'm curious as to what you guys do about our scholarship requirements then, because this seems like you could take a whole new member class that doesn't meet our standards.

hey GeekyPenguin,
i'm not sure what our chapter does in terms of int'l scholarships, i think int'ls was making amendments for the Canadian chapters, but i'm not sure of the details. but the scholarships given out within our chapter- if you want to be eligible for the scholarship you have to hand in your transcript.
that way it's voluntary, if you want a shot at the scholarship, they must make the choice of whether to give up the privacy of their grades.

Oh, I wasn't talking about scholarships, but scholarship in general. What do you do about our rules for minimum GPAs? I know IHQ makes a lot of exceptions and changes for you guys, which is good, because you're going off of a totally different base than we are.

These our the national GPA's, but for our chapter, it is a 3.0 for HS and a 2.8 for college. As was stated before, there are always exceptions, but for the most part, at our school, this is not unreasonable at all. Grades are very important and there are few chapters that are willing to take someone who may become a potential "grade risk," mainly because that grade risk can drag the chapter GPA down much farther than it might be. But like I said before, there are always exceptions, and usually, if you do pledge, the scholarship chair will work closely with you to make sure that you make better grades.

see, the point I am trying to make is that it would be nice if all sororities had the same minimum gpa requirement. That way, the school GPA requirement would correspond with the sororities on campus. I think its not fair for the university to say "you have to have a ___ gpa to rush" and then in reality most sororities have a higher minimum. That is not really fair for the rushees, and gets more complicated. Anyhow, that is not reality. My question now, is.....

What is the sorority minimum for each sorority? I have searched the national webpages of some, but I wasnt very lucky. I know it varies from chapter to chapter, but the national GPA is the minimum that is allowed.... so if you are in a sorority and know the bare miniumu, it would help some of the rushees, just so they know (me included).

Kappa's is a C+, which at my school is a 2.25.

ETA: Whoops, that's from college-- we have a deferred recruitment. I have no idea what it is coming out of high school, but my guess is somewhere in the B range.