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you have valid complaints. i cannot answer why your chapter did not invite back such a stellar young woman. i hope that she went on to have a good recruitment and did receive a bid.

perhaps this experience could be turned into a positive by sharing your thoughts with the appropriate officer of your sorority-at least make a request that all chapters acknowledge receipt of a rec. so that the alum. does not worry that it got lost in the mail. with the preprinted post cards most sororities have avaliable for order, all the recipient has to do is check the appropriate box , address the postcard , place a stamp on it and drop it in the mail.

First let me say that I agree with you 100% that alumnae need to be better informed by chapters, especially regarding PNMs that they write recs for.

As far as I know, most of the PNMs that go through at UGA are stellar (like the girl you described). They also have recs (most of them). Some of them even have multiple ones. A sorortiy has to release a certain # of girls each round. With most girls having recs, they can't give them ALL the rec related courtesies that you describe. So alot of girls with recs get released, some of whom might be really great.

It's the same issue with legacies. Legacies do receive certain courtesies (whatever your legacy policy says), but when there are so many legacies going through that a chapter could fill quota plus with legacies, you just can't keep them all. Because of this, alot of legacy ladies are released that might be very accomplished, smart, etc.

Do you know if she got a bid to another sorority or is that also part of your vent (that they didn't let you know if ot where she did end up getting a bid)?

Quote:

Originally Posted by leesek (Post 1504495)

Do you mean any house that did not reach "total", not quota. You can reach quota and still COB if you are not at "Total"

she meant quota. if a house does not pledge quota, whether they are already over total or not, they may pledge girls until they reach quota. similarly, if a chapter pledges quota, but is still under campus total, they too may continue to pledge girls until they reach campus total.

it can be very confusing!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by estherjb (Post 1504642)

At last I can post! My registration request never reached my work email so I couldn't post last week as I read all the entries and replies

Esther, check your private messages.

Quote:

Originally Posted by estherjb (Post 1504642)

At last I can post! My registration request never reached my work email so I couldn't post last week as I read all the entries and replies Wow, what a difference almost thirty years makes.

Now to the pent up vent. What has happened to courtesy during rush? I wrote a rec for a girl who was outstanding academically, was captain of a varsity team and 4 year team member, greek family, cute, great wardrobe, no tats or piercings, blah blah blah, and she was cut after first round by my sorority. Are there so many girls going through rush now that sororities have their favorites picked out before rush begins? I wonder now if I should have sent her rec in the Spring.

Had a very different experience with a rec I sent to MSU (which is smaller, granted). Sent the rec, had a nice postcard from the reference chairman saying it had been received, and they would extend her every courtesy. She actually got a bid from them. Snaps to their system, and advisors.

If alum advisors are reading this, this experience makes me wonder why I bother to write references at all. The other girls I have sent them in for all pledged other sororities but I assumed it was because they didn't want mine. From this girl, who is a friend, I find out she was cut after first round? How many times has this happened before? My sorority was good at Georgia, but when I was there we would never have had the luxury of cutting a girl like this unless she had a QR (you old timers know that phrase, I don't think there's any such thing now) and this girl did not have a bad reputation.

If chapters want alums to respond when they send requests for financial support they should extend the courtesy of keeping us in the loop of chapter activities like rush. No contact about if they received my rec, who was pledged, who was a legacy, anything. And this in the day of email.

I warned you in the title this was a vent and I'm sorry to be so negative but I'm irritated and disappointed with what this girl has experienced and the longing she has to "belong" when her other friends are going off on sorority weekends and wearing their sorority gear and she is left out. What a great way to start your freshman year of college.

I think Georgia should do what many other schools have done and put rush off till Winter Semester so these rushees have their feet on the ground before experiencing the rejection of rush.

Amen!!! I agree, especially about the part that these girls already know who they want before rush even begins. I had a friend whose daughter went through rush a few years back where the daughter was a strong legacy. They cut her after second round after giving her all kinds of encouragement. When my friend contacted the president as to why her daughter was cut (she never received a phone call that her daughter had been released.) The president replied that they had 90 legacies going through and just couldn't have everyone back. My friend replied to her "How many legacies did you have whose Mother was president of that chapter?" The president had no answer to that so my friend contacted the Chapter Advisor who sided with my friend. Needless to say, my friend is never going to write another rec for that chapter

I have to agree so much with what you have said here. My daughter was a 4 time legacy to my sorority. All except 1 were UGA members. She was cut after 2nd round. While I agree there were probably many legacies ,I still feel that they could have shown a little more interest in getting to know her. We are from out of state and I realize no one knew her in the chapter, but she had 3 family members before who gave so much to this sorority both in time and as alums financially. She dropped out of rush. Hoefully things will work out for her. By the way my sorority did not extend the courtesy of akknowleding the recs that were sent in for my daughter. Only 2 of the other house recs (she had 9 recs total) were aknowledged to my friends who sent them.

I was house president of my UGA sorority and my sister was President. Both of which were on my daughters rec. The soroity took 40 minutes ( 20 each round) to decide that this legacy was not for them. I will think very hard as well before I write any more recs.

In partial defense of the chapters, there were 1200+ pnms and frequently, the rec. acknowledgment will take the form of a post card after recruitment is over thanking you for the recommendation and letting you know where the girl ended up.

And please remember that not writing recommendation is more likely to harm the young woman than the chapter. So unless, you are trying to send the girls you know elsewhere, I'd be careful with that strategy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KSUViolet06 (Post 1504662)

Do you know if she got a bid to another sorority or is that also part of your vent (that they didn't let you know if ot where she did end up getting a bid)?

She didn't. She went all the way to prefs and didn't recieve a bid. And I'm telling you I know this girl. She is cute,dresses well, and is an achiever. I think she was just very nervous during rush and didn't come across well. And she's not the glammed out kind of cute. But come on, no bids? It makes be nervous for my daughter who will be going through rush (Not at uga, thank God) next year.

Sometimes there are girls that you wonder how they slipped through and got a bid and sometimes there are darling girls who don't get a bid. Unfortunatey, she's in the latter category.

Yes I guess you are right. I think it just may take awhile to get over the disappointment that I feel over my own sorority right know. It was great that my daughter was such a solid legacy, but that unfortunately that did her more harm than good. I believe that after round one she was cut from some houses due to the strong legacy she held elsewhere. All rec forms ask what Greek affiliations the PNM has. With 1300 girls I guess they assumed she would be partial to her legacy house and dropped her.

I've made clear in other posts that I really think it's terrible when groups cut legacies. I've also said that if it happened to me and my theoretical legacy, I'd probably wash my hands of that chapter too (not that they could tell because I'm not that involved:o). So I'm very sympathetic to how you all feel.

And when I hear the stories of women who have given years of alumna service to a chapter and the group cuts the kid, I completely understand why the alumna would then help her daughter's chapter more than her own.

But you just want to be careful that if your goal is to punish someone, rather than just refocus your efforts where they seem to matter, that you don't punish the wrong people.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jwright25 (Post 1504379)

This is where the concept of Quota Range comes into play. Under the old matching methods, quota was set usually by the number of women attending the round before preference OR the number of women receiving preference invitations. And it rarely changed. Now that we use Quota Range, we can run quota at several different numbers and see which one achieves the greatest parity. Oftentimes that makes quota on the lower end of the range. That leaves more women unmatched. So they wind up as QAs. But the tradeoff is that more chapters make quota with women who get their first choice.

And you make a point about chapters doing better than expected. That always happens - and that's good! We want chapters to improve their operations. If the campus uses priority ranking rather than accept/regret, those situations can usually be addressed with flex lists.

The bottom line is that while there may still be quota additions, weaker chapters are pledging quota or very close.

Gotcha. So mathematically, probably about the same total overall # of PNMs will get bids, they'll just be spread around more evenly, with the possibility of one or two chapters pledging a very large number of QAs pretty much eliminated .

As far as the chapters go, under the new system, what incentive do they have to play fair with each other as far as sticking to their max recommended invite #?

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Originally Posted by bejazd (Post 1504693)

Exactly.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bejazd (Post 1504693)

As far as the chapters go, under the new system, what incentive do they have to play fair with each other as far as sticking to their max recommended invite #?

Well, the Panhellenic spirit first and foremost. If everyone espouses the "you're only as strong as your weakest link" mentality, everyone will want all chapters to succeed. There really hasn't been an issue with one chapter trying to hurt another through release figures. Additionally, if they are using ICS, the maximum number of invites is programmed into the system, and it will not allow them to exceed it. They can underinvite, but they can't overinvite. Underinviting only hurts them - and the PNMs to some extent. But it can't hurt another chapter.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bejazd (Post 1504693)

I was wondering this too. If it's only eligibility to receive girls as quota additions, it seems strange that it's motivating enough, especially since the really big chapters already only seem to get one or two. But I guess if you end up with great results, it's not a hardship.

(I'm really thinking of the middle chapters who have been so traditionally solid who have much more at stake if they cut the wrong girls; they might find themselves having to snap because they had to release so many in previous rounds. I think I might rather keep more and forgo the possibility of QAs.)

ETA: But if it's programmed in, I guess you can't.

I don't believe my goal is to punish anyone..not sure why that was interperted. I am disappointed..big difference. I could write my chapter a letter, but what purpose would that serve. It really is just water under the bridge now. It is over and done and there is no turning back. I know that whatever my daughter does greek or not that it will be ultimately the best for her. It will be what was meant to be for her.