Well, it was certainly a shock to hear that UGa was doing a formal spring recruitment and the rumors are flying as to why. A lot of people feel like maybe some really prominent alums want their kids to get a "fair" shot at recruitment. I wonder if the PNMs will mostly be ones who dropped in the fall, new transfers, or women who have never rushed.

My only concern would be that if there are 2 formal recruitments every year, fall PNMs who don't like their returns will simply drop out and wait for spring, which could affect quota and such.

Like I said above, it honestly sounds like it is a second formal rush with quota just like it would be in the fall.

Groups below total can give bids up to total any old time. They don't need all the groups (or any groups) rushing to do that. If a group was 40 below total after fall rush and 20 women came up to them in October and wanted to pledge, they could take a second class if they wanted.

Oh, and I think it would create quite the PR disaster if PNMs (especially legacies) were told that all groups were participating, signed up w/ that in mind, and at the first event for Big Popular House were basically told "we did this because we had to, but we don't have any open spots so we're dropping out now. Sorry. Go look at the other groups."

FWIW, and I don't pretend to have any inside information at UGA, we used to have a "formal" spring recruitment. It was formal in that every group presented, and held a first round. From there, any of the GLOs who had already made quota/total dropped out, and the others kept going recruiting. We considered quota/total a reward for getting it down the first time, and not having to repeat recruitment!

I understand what you are saying, but even if these big groups do have openings, they are likely to be so many fewer than other groups that for most participants, it's probably going to be a pretty similar message.

The "participation" of these groups will get the total number of PNMs up even if it's just because these group encourage girls to come out to meet them before formal in the fall. And a lot of the PNMs will probably find groups they like enough to pledge in the spring because, as I mentioned earlier, the total number vs. general reputation for popularity isn't running that tight throughout the whole 17 IMO.

I wish we knew how they planned to do it with a quota or whatever. I wonder if they are waiting to really see groups second semester numbers before they make a call.

Oh, I found this http://www.onlineathens.com/stories/...81200167.shtml

Late in the article, we come to this paragraph:

"About 200 more students are expected to enroll for spring semester beginning in January. Most of those names will be drawn from a waiting list of students not admitted for the fall semester, McDuff said."

Unless as Carnation mentioned that among these 200 are parents so influential that they can restructure the system for their kids, I'm guessing spring recruitment 2009 is just a good thing they are finally trying to make work.

LOL! And we know they exist! I was thinking that the kids with the influential parents might come more from the group of PNMs who rushed unsuccessfully in the fall. We know of several families who don't contribute to their alma maters anymore because their children were zapped in fraternity or sorority recruitment. These were good kids too, not wild ones whose parents thought they were angels.

Yep, but it seems that there'd be ways to keep it from getting out of control. If the spring quota is always relatively small, and I'm guessing it would be, PNMs will probably realize the best time to pledge is in the fall.

This might sound kind of nutty, but I don't think the groups themselves want to get too much bigger than they are. I would think that most of them would want to perpetuate a system that got about 50 PNMs in the fall and allowed them to pick up 5-10 in the spring to compensate for anyone who didn't come back, etc.

I can't imagine what interest XYZ with close to 100% return rates in recruitment really has in being a chapter of 250 or 300 even if they could be.

Wow, they quit giving to the college because of unsuccessful recruitment? I could kind of understand not giving to a chapter who cut your kid, but the whole university just seems a little scorched earth to me.

I don't know that UGA is suddenly more responsive to these type folks, really, but of course I could be wrong. People who thought they were UGA big wigs have always been there, and we're only seeing the big spring recruitment now.

My guess is that it's the long term effects of release figures making spring recruitment seem more desirable to more groups. And it seems that retention isn't what it used to be throughout the whole system.

Well, if parents ARE a driving force behind this and Lucy Lambda encourages her daughter to sign up, only to find out that Lambda is full and only taking one girl and it's not her little Lila Legacy, Lambda AND UGA will both be sorry they're living, I'm sure. The last thing they want to do is pull a bait & switch.

Wasn't there at UF KD Alum mom a few rushes ago who said she would no longer support the chapter because they cut her daughter? I could've sworn she said she'd quit giving to UF as well, but I could be making that up.

But if Lucy and Lila are nearly as connected as they think they are, they know it already. It's only a bait and switch for people who think they have a equal shot at all the houses in the fall too. Sure, in theory you do; in actual practice, not so much. And since many traditionally strong houses will be giving bids if the numbers are based on anything other than just being below total, I think that most of the PNMS will be happy, or at least more PNMS than would typically get bids to groups they want in the spring.

On a slightly contrary note: I have no idea how recruitment will really go down this spring, but I have a hard time imagining that the Greek Life office is going to embrace a method that allows chapters over 200 to pick up a bunch more girls and just allows chapters below total (which as far as we know is still 170) just to pick up quota additions if they can get them. This will still need to be gamed to favor the smaller chapters or there's not much point in doing it from the system's perspective.

A chapter of 200+ isn't dying to pick up a big spring class under normal circumstances even if we assumed for some reason that there's an exceptional pool of PNMs available this spring for some reason, which we actually have no reason to assume.

I want this put in caps on the front of the UGa rush booklet. :( The other SEC schools' booklets too. You see all those happy, expectant faces the first 2 days and then...

This is why this thread was started because for the first time (and I go back a long time) Spring Rush included all sororities. This was very surprising to me and I wanted to know if anyone had information as to why they would do this. The answers that I have seen have been great and hopefully will allow so many great girls to be included in Greek Life if they so choose.

how many houses are below at Uga

uga spring recruitment
 

How many houses would be low on numbers I can only think of 2?

Ding ding ding ding ding! Welcome to Maryland. We don't have 2 formal recruitments per se, but I think because everyone participates (and PNMs know it) and each chapter has anywhere from 4-25+ spots to fill in the fall (most around 10 give or take), most PNMs who don't like their options come pref (spring FMR) would rather drop out than be bound to a chapter for a year and therefore ineligible for fall informal.

Quota has been slowly but steadily increasing, which means that fall pledge classes are shrinking. I believe all chapters participated still this fall, but I think across the board everyone took fewer. Hopefully this trend will continue.

ETA: I can't imagine why UGA thinks it's a good idea to have two quota based recruitments (assuming they are planning to use quota this spring instead of everyone bid what they need to reach total). There needs to be balance, because if every chapter is allowed to take whatever quota is every semester, the small chapters will get smaller. A Campus Panhellenic needs a semester to give the smaller chapters a chance to "catch up".

I think, if it's due to extenuating circumstances, then it's probably okay if it's only for one semester. But if this happens in the next few years- well, there'll be trouble.

But the thing is, if UGA keeps admitting more students in the spring due to winter graduations, they'll be in the same boat next year.

does anyone know what total is at uga? the chapters at georgia are huge, and i cannot imagine that all the sororities have openings, when so many have been way above total.

someone had mentioned that they heard that uga total was raised. does anyone know that for sure, and if so, what the new total figure is?

I believe the campus total from this past recruitment 2008 was 170...

The 170 figure is the last one I heard. And FSUZeta is right in her assessment of most chapter size, according to the last numbers released. Unless there's been an unprecedented loss of membership from fall to spring, most groups won't drop below total in the spring.

I'm also, as I said before, really curious about this spring recruitment because it's hard to figure out "why now?"

Sure, the January admits might be new, but if the linked article was accurate, the numbers for students starting in January this year are nowhere near big enough to justify a whole new policy. If we assume that these new students want to go Greek at the same rate as is typical at UGA, which I kind of doubt, we'd be talking about between 25-50 PNMs depending on how many of the 200 students are women.

There were that number of openings in just the two groups below total at 170 in the fall. (Sure, I know that all PNMs don't necessarily want to go where the openings are, but it's hard to see a need for a whole new recruitment instead of just letting groups below total participate, like has been the case for a long time at UGA)

Trying to get rid of the stigma of COB/COR is a great idea, but if it works against the opportunities of groups below total to catch up, and there's no reason to think there's an unprecedented demand for more placements, what's up, UGA?

Sorry for the double post, especially when the last one was so long, but. . .

I think I mentioned this before someplace but it might play in here: some of the groups that are smaller today in relative size, but still above total, at UGA are groups that are regarded as being pretty desirable in terms of traditionally being popular in formal recruitment. (At least I think: I'm not privy to actual return rates, of course, but in terms of PNM/rushee hype from current students that I know telling me about how recruitment went, these aren't "struggling" chapters.)

So, if they are raising total or allowing groups to give bids above total, but in some method that looked at chapter size rather than just a straight quota, rather than a "bait and switch" the PNMS might be pleasantly surprised at where some of the openings turn out to be.

Chapter Total has not really been discussed as far as setting a "quota", that I recall. Houses under "total" (170) might receive special consideration as far as assistance from alums, etc. Orientation at UGA was Monday, Jan. 5, so sign-up's for this event should start climbing.

Aren't there some campuses where chapters are allowed to COB up to average chapter size, rather than to total (thus, by definition, half the houses are allowed to COB)? Would 50% participation be enough to counter the stigma of COB at UGA?
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Avandia side effects

That 50% participation would be if they were bidding to median chapter size, not averare. Very large or small groups will skew the mean, leaving either more or less than half the groups below average size.

According the most recent sizes published on the Greek Life page, the average chapter size was 185 in fall of 2007. There's not much point in even noting this because things have almost certainly changed in a year, but I think I counted five groups below 185, but I wasn't really careful.

http://www.uga.edu/panhellenic/forms/Rank.pdf

(Do you think the reason that they don't seem to be posting the grade report is that people like me link them publicly on sites about Greek Life to document chapter size? Should I remove the link?)

Sorry to respond so late into this thread! From the posts I've read, most are correct in their assumptions, but I just wanted to clear up/reiterate a few things:

The reason UGA has decided to allow a Spring Recruitment this year is because for the first time, UGA has admitted incoming freshmen for the Spring semester. Since going through recruitment as a sophomore has its known disadvantages, UGA decided to level the playing field for PNM's admitted for Spring semester (as well as any girls who didn't go through recruitment or dropped out in the Fall).

For this reason, every sorority will be required to participate. There were very few sororities who didn't reach quota for the Fall, in fact. Nevertheless, there will be a set quota for each sorority that they will be required to meet to the best of their ability.

That being said, quota has yet to be set. The sororities won't know what quota is until all the numbers are in (registration ends Jan. 24th). Depending on the number of girls who choose to participate in recruitment, along with the number of open spots in the sorority, determines quota. So far the numbers being thrown around and expected is anywhere from around as little as 10 to as much as 25. No one will know for sure until all PNM's have registered.

Since this is the first time UGA has held Spring Recruitment, none of the sororities really know what to expect because it's set up quite differently from Fall recruitment.

Hope this helps! And wish all the UGA sororities and Spring PNM's good luck! :)

Why not just go with a separate sophomore quota next year for the students who entered in January?

Maybe to take the stigma away from COB. Think about it, 1) the chapters that will be taking higher quotas due to missing quota in formal recruitment will look like they are simply participating in recruitment, rather than COBing, and therefore take away the negative stigma about COBing chapters since it can be viewed negatively at a school like UGA. A PNMs spot may essentially be there because the chapter would have had to COB normally, but it allows the campus to think that Patty PNM got her bid through recruitment rather than COB.

2) The separate quotas will make it very hard to figure out if a group missed their quota or not...say ABC matches their quota of 10, and struggling chapter XYZ misses their quota of 25 but still gets 15 women. The stigma about them being a struggling chapter is gone because nobody else knew what their quota was and they, comparatively, still got a large class. Maybe they would have had to COB those 15 women anyways, and now they only have 10 spots open for COB. They can do a much more private COB or snap bid to fill those spots rather than advertising COB to get the 25 women they needed. I imagine that to get 25 women through COB they would have had to advertise a lot, and the UGA stigma would paint their chapter as undesirable, but now they can just secretly COB and add those girls to their quota from spring recruitment.

I'm totally cool with both those reasons, but the official word suggests that it's all about the January admits and I think framing it like that is less than above board. And for some reason, it bugs me.

spring recruitment
 

I agree that it seems a bit unusual to just have spring recruitment because of the new admits. The Red and Black article today posts the number of new freshmen at 202, but says that UGA accepted 950 transfers with 60 hours or more if I read it correctly. I know that there are currently about 70 women who have signed up for Spring recruitment, but I think they have the whole month of January so the number could go up a good bit. I think Spring recruitment is a great thing - much more relaxed for those girls who might struggle with the very formal Fall recruitment, but it will be interesting to see if it becomes a yearly event.

UGAalum94 - I think APhiAnna hit the nail on the head. They are killing 2 birds with one stone. The thing is, if you bring up that it's to take away the stigma, it just reminds everyone of the stigma.

Exactly...I'm sure that the sorority women from both ends ("top" and "struggling" chapters) recognize this, but it will, effectively, go over the heads of PNMs. I think it's actually a good move...if they made a sophomore quota, then what PNM would COB when they thought they would have a chance at every chapter next fall? The struggling chapters COB efforts would be practically useless...that would make it even harder for them to COB, thus strengthening the stigma.

So if someone went through as freshman dropped out then when through as sophomore and was cut would they have a chance at all with spring rush?

I'm completely happy about the spring recruitment itself. And I agree with the "two birds with one stone" assessment as well.

I just don't like it when people sort of pretend they are doing something for a kind of selfless reason (Oh, we're so responsive to the new January admits) when it's really something they've wanted/needed to do for a long time. It's not something I would even mention if I were an adviser or anything; it's just the kind of stuff that annoys me enough to mention repeatedly here.

My guess if they really wanted to serve the transfer students well, that a separate upperclassmen quota would be the way to do it. It will be interesting to see who most of the PNMs are in terms of class standing and when they were admitted. I hope UGA gives out some data at the end or that someone posts it here.

And as far as KSUviolent's response and the question that provoked it, I'm going to be a little raincloud here and suggest that if you had two unsuccessful recruitments, something will probably have had to change about you as a candidate to get a successful result this time. It's possible that groups will be more open to you as a non-freshman in informal or depending on the number of openings and the number of girls rushing (yeah, I said it, rushing), but it's probably kind of unrealistic to think if you went through formal just this fall and got dropped by everyone, that recruitment this January will be awesome. I certainly hope that I'm wrong. I'd love to see all PNMs happy in groups that love them.

Oh, I never expected them to say, "we're trying to take the stigma out of spring recruitment." I just think that the January admit stuff is a particularly silly way to couch the discussion.

And I'm not sure that a separate spring quota recruitment is going to really help the smaller groups that much. What PNM will COB a smaller group if the big groups are wide open with a separate spring recruitment quota? What freshman will take a bid to a "lesser" group in the fall if all groups are open in the spring? There are separate issues no matter how you do it, assuming that this form of spring recruitment continues.

But I'm pretty happy that UGA is trying something new, and I hope that the results are great. I seriously doubt it's going to do any harm to the smaller groups this spring.

A second rush with fewer people can be beneficial to smaller groups in that they don't have to double and triple rush. In that environment, it may be easier for them to shine earlier on.

I think we're forgetting the advantage that "struggling" chapter have over top chapters this spring. That is that informal spring recruitment is old hat to "struggling" chapters. They already have various events that work and 3/4 of their girls already have experience with informal recruiting (which *is* different that formal recruiting). "Struggling" chapters are going to shine to PNMs simply because they've had more practice than chapters who haven't had to informally recruit in decades.

That being said, good luck to everyone this spring! Enjoy the rush! Recruitment is still recruitment and it's still a blast!

I hope that you all are right. Maybe the numbers after recruitment will reflect that.