LOL - At Bama, yes, anyplace outside of Alabama would be BFE.

(nice save ;) )

I guess this makes sense, but I never experienced it. Just the opposite. Not transferring, per se, but in-state ladies dropping for whatever reason (financial, etc...). Our OOS peeps seemed to stay all four, but admittedly they were a vast minority anyway.

Good...then I will ignore the fact that you attributed this quote to ME (freaking me out completely because I wouldn't ever say that) and not 33girl (who didn't even say that in the first place!!!) :D

I thought the assumption regarding age was quite logically drawn from the behavior on this thread.



Actually I do not know what you mean, so for the purposes of clarity, please pardon my dissection.



I wouldn't presume to know what experience other people have based on the cost of their group. My own GLO appears to fall into the "more expensive" category (though for the purposes of comparison, the information regarding costs at most chapters appears to be lacking in general). But I certainly wouldn't assume that girls in less expensive (if that is even the case) chapters have a diminished sorority experience, as you appear to be indicating.



When I went through "rush" (as was the terminology at the time) at Bama, the process was one of mutual selection.


When my daughter went through recruitment on a different SEC campus several years ago, it was also a process of mutual selection. At the conclusion of the party day, she "picked and chose" the houses she most wanted to return to based on the number of allowed parties in the next round, and then prioritized the houses beyond this number.


I was not at all aware that PNMs at Alabama are no longer involved in having some choice regarding where they return. I haven't received that feedback from girls for whom I have written recs or from other alums.



Well, that is true enough -- but difficult to determine the costs of what she has left, considering the unavailability of comparable cost information.

We've discussed AD NAUSEUM on this board that "Mutual Selection" is less than mutual.

She could rank sororities by cost, but if the least expensive ones all drop her, there'a nothing she can do about it. Also, if she prefs the two cheapest and the most expensive she needs to rank them all and could very easily end up in the most expensive.

Ranking sororities does not equal cutting sororities. If your daughter ranked, then she did not cut. It is not like it was back in the day when we got all of our invites back and accepted or declined them.

JESUS CHRIST YES.

PNMs do not CUT ANYONE.

Please read if you are confused.

http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...d.php?t=121739

Sorry to make you take the Lord's name in vain, but a noob with all of 8 posts talking about her daughter picking and choosing, I just couldn't bite my tongue.

No one reads threads and learns here, do they?

The sororities list who they want back - if she gets invited to all of the groups she visited, THEN they use her rankings to eliminate her lowest ranked groups so she'll go to the max number of parties. BUT ONLY THEN do they use her rankings.

So unless she is going back to the max number of parties every round and none of them are her lowest ranked, the sororities ARE choosing her and not the other way around.

Exactly. And then the houses that the pnm chose to rank at the bottom do not cycle back into her list of parties.

I get it folks -- I just don't agree that this negates the mutual part of mutual selection. I do agree that the mutual aspect is not evenly distributed, and that the houses have the advantage.

I do prefer this system, even if girls are required to attend some parties that they might decline otherwise. It keeps options open to girls that they may not have considered favorable earlier in the week.

Absolutely, but it also means that any PNM not having a near perfect recruitment with all the chapters inviting her back each round is going to have a VERY limited change to control which chapters she attends based on cost.

At the end, of course she can decline her bid if that chapter costs too much, but arguably if a PNM and her parents can't afford all the chapters, it's a pretty painful process to go through.

I don't fault the OP, and I'd hate to be in her shoes, letting her daughter go through and then telling her to rank or drop because of costs. I just wish she'd known earlier what she knows now and could have avoided this particularly emotional proposition.

So who on here wants to be the mom telling daughter #2: Well you chose a cheaper college than your older sister but the cost to be Greek for you is too high. So, even though we funded your sister's sorority bills, we aren't going to fund yours because it's too expensive at your school.

Really? You want to tell your already #2 daughter that you don't love her enough to do what you have to do so she can have what you've given her older sister? Wow! And I thought my mother was Momie Dearest personified.

If we take the OP at her word, the family doesn't have the money. I personally don't have any reason to doubt her. The costs she was told to expect turned out to be double at some chapters, and she just can't swing the higher cost.

I suspect she regrets not budgeting differently or whatever, but I'm not sure why you are so quick to conclude that she can "do whatever she has to do" to finance the sorority or that people who love their kids enough can afford anything the kid wants badly enough.

That's not my experience with money. Sometimes, I'm maxed out in terms of what I can spend and with rising concerns about student debt, one could conceivable be maxed out in terms of what you could safely borrow.

Your post here just seems mean spirited to me. I suspect she hates being in the position but can't magically produce the money to change the situation.

UGAAlum94: You know, my Momie Dearest told me one time that what she hated the most about me was that I could do whatever I had to do. I took it as a compliment.

I would never have put my child in this position. I would rather have exercised more control over her choice of school than to tell her she couldn't have what her sibling had. My next door neighbors have 3 daughters. Father has a PhD in chemistry. Mother was no slouch either (she has passed away). All 3 girls were told from their youngest years that they would go to school wherever they got the best offer. ALL 3 got full rides - one getting early Med School acceptance too. And the parents paid for the extras. But all 3 danced, entered Miss Alabama, etc to get scholarships. All 3 made above 32 on their ACTs. So no one was short changed. And all 3 have gotten advanced degrees.. One is working on her THIRD masters. I'm just saying that as a parent you do what you have to do. You don't play favorites because you are going to lose that child if you do.

Well, ideally all parents would plan it out that much and the kids would work hard and be talented enough to earn the full ride, but often people's circumstances change through no fault of their own. Other kids don't have the raw material or testing skills to pull down 32+ ACTs, etc.

And I think what the OP here is experiencing is a sense of bait and switch. She thought she understood the costs based on the averages and believed she could pay them, and in good faith, she encourage the daughter to rush. But in the middle of the process, she began to understand that for some groups, the cost were virtually double what she could afford.

Personally, I don't think I would have gone the route of telling the daughter to rank based on cost. It puts the kid in a weird position of being at fault if she ends up with a group that costs too much. But the OP is just doing the best she can with the position she's in now, IMO.

I hope the daughter ends up happy with one of the less expensive groups and all will be well.

[QUOTE=UGAalum94;2168269]Well, ideally all parents would plan it out that much and the kids would work hard and be talented enough to earn the full ride, but often people's circumstances change through no fault of their own. Other kids don't have the raw material or testing skills to pull down 32+ ACTs, etc.

QUOTE]

My intent was to say that the girls did things to find scholarship money like dancing, etc so that coupled with their grades they would be better positioned to get scholarships. You have to work all the angles because you don't know what's going to happen.

Ya know - sometimes life's not fair and one sibling doesn't get what another one does.

These kids are not ENTITLED for their parents to pay for ANYTHING anymore - school, sorority, and the clothes on their back are THEIR responsibility as legal adults. If this girl wants to be in a sorority bad enough, she may need to get a job (regardless of whether her major prescribes), take out a loan, or forgo this year and work and save all summer and take her chances as a sophomore.

Quit acting like this sorority is this mom's obligation. It's not. She's not a bad mom for choosing to be able to make her mortgage payments rather than fund her daughter's social life.

!!!!!

^^^This.^^^
Sometimes things happen financially - a job loss, a recession, that bonus you thought you were getting - your company can no longer afford, unforeseen medical costs. These "kids" are adults and these are real problems that many many families face. While parents might want to give their kids everything, sometimes, other things come first - like having a roof over their head, or medical insurance.
Maybe if kids understood that they are part of the family and that they may have to make sacrifices too sometimes, we wouldn't have a generation of super special snowflakes.
I've been watching this thread and I'm angered by what some people are implying and clearly some people are projecting their own family issues on this woman who is trying to do right by her daughter. And I'm sorry, shame on any Panhellenic who does not outline approximate (notice I said "approximate" so don't get all over me by saying you can't compare the costs because every chapter includes different things) costs prior to recruitment beginning so families can make a decision about what works for them and what their adult child should be responsible for. Someone give me a good reason why Panhellenic does not require all sororities to make their financial responsibilities (and what it includes/doesn't include) available prior to recruitment registration? (And don't say "thats how it is and always been in the SEC").

Yes, yes, yes!!! There were plenty of things I wanted in college but couldn't have because my parents couldn't afford it. I didn't fault them for it. I understood that they did the best they could with the money they had, and if I wanted more, I worked for it and earned the money myself. If this mom honestly thought that the cost of being in a sorority was X and it turned out to be X*2, she's not the worst mom on the planet and shouldn't be expected to go into all kinds of debt. We aren't talking about an extra $100, we're talking about thousands. I gather that some people in this thread have never really lived on a tight budget, but for some families, thousands of dollars a year can mean the difference between eating or not eating.

I always had savings as a teenager. I saved allowance, babysitting money, job money etc, and went to college with a savings account to pay for the things I wanted to do.

I'm kind of flabbergasted that the parents are expected to (or offer to!) pay for everything. Life will be a shock after college for these kids that have a free ride. Although maybe mom and dad are expected to pay for life after college too?

In agreement. Tichou, I think you're being harsh. Not everyone has the same opportunities. Not everyone has the same talents. Not everyone has the same smarts. Things like competative dance or pagaents are an expensive investment themselves. I've been unemployed. So has my husband. We know what it's like to make sacrifices. I had to make sacrifices so our kids could play soccer or take swim lessons. Soccer and swim are much more affordable for us versus gymnastics, dance or riding lessons. So we opt for the cheaper. We still are re-prioritizing a few hundred. Thousands are a much bigger deal. If I offered to ay for my daughters sorority dues, and I found out that the average was not indeed representative of the groups she had remaining as recruitment wore on, I would indeed encourage her to consider the cost. And if she still ended up with the most expensive group, I would offer to pay the amount that I originally had in mind. My daughter would be respnsible for the rest.

I also had a major where my advisors and professors said I wouldn't have time to have a job. We often took weekend field trips that ate into prime work hours. I still had 3. Two of them were only 3 hours a week each and I was able to study while I was working (computer lab monitor and dorm desk attendent). I would still encourage the OPs daughter to find something simple so she is able to contribute. (Oh, and my jobs are what paid for my dues. My parents offered nothing.)

How dare you...
 

Wish I could honestly say what I think of you Titchou. But honestly it is so painfully obvious that you are not a parent and I for one say 'Amen' to that.

I have received many PM's from wonderful posters telling me that they understand my position. Several from UA parents directly. The system is flawed. No one should have to guess on the costs. We are not talking about +/- 10% or 20%, we are talking thousands of dollars.

Love has nothing to do with it...and how dare you to even think that love is apart of this. I will not justify my love for my kids to you Titchou...You are nothing but a bully, who is judgemental without having looked in the mirror.

I have three kids in college. ALL have stellar stats and large scholarships that allowed them to go where they pleased. However, my youngest decided to go to UA knowing that we may not be able to fund sorority life, like we did her sister. We thought that we knew the costs, and that we could afford it, with some sacrifice...unfortunately, even after calling Greek Life, the individual National sorority boards and asking Rho Chi's NO ONE can give us the costs of the first year for the basics for many of the houses. I am not looking for exact, but a ballpark figure would help. Not talking T's and zaps...just the fee's, etc.

Older D goes to a LARGE, competitive, well known University with a very large strong greek life. EVERY sorority has the cost to live in and live out posted on their website. EVERY chapter. I think that because of that most houses were very close in cost. No more than a $750 variance for the year between the lowest and highest of those w/ houses. We did not have to even consider cost because we knew we could afford it no matter what house she pledged.

YES, we should have done more research and asked questions earlier and we did think that we had enough info from the UA website, but that is sadly inaccurate. But hindsite is not doing me any good now. Hence my asking for guidance.

I asked a simple question in good faith and very honestly I would do it again because of the wonderful amazing support and information I have gotten from those wise enough to understand.

Titchou you are everything that is sadly stereotypical about sorority life with none of the good. You really should stop posting because if you are representative of sorority life and what it upholds, then no one would join. I sincerely hope that whatever house my D pledges tomorrow it is not one where she would share membership with you.

Moderators...I apologize for my rant. I am done.

Agree. FSU publishes this on their Greek Life Page under parent information. Why is it so difficult for all Panhellenics to do the same?

http://greeklife.fsu.edu/Documents/r...20Finances.pdf

jll, while my daughter was working on her masters at Bama she had a part time job thru the university. She telephoned people from a list of names and asked them questions for a poll that I think a Social Science professor was conducting. The telephone bank manager was very flexible about working around each pollster's time constraints. It was an on campus job. That poll might still be being conducted. PM me if you might be interested in more info.

It had been recommended to my daughter that she not get a job, but it was necessary. I realize that there is a big difference in maturation and time management skills of a freshman and a first year graduate student, but it worked for my girl.

jll,

Fortunately, the hard-working and knowledgeable alums, actually serving as chapter advisors and assistants during the past two weeks, are busy with constructive tasks related to a successful recruitment, not heckling mothers online while telling new members what Jesus would do.

Speaking for my own chapter anyway. :)

Hope your daughter has a glorious bid day. All the best.

As a parent of three kids, who were born 4 years apart, I want to weigh in. Life changes and sometimes we just can't help that. We brought our oldest home from the hospital to a sweet starter house. Our second to a very nice house in suburbia with a housekeeper. And our third to the house we live in now which is flights above the prior homes. (Not a step or two). Life changes. And kids don't get the "same" stuff. My son freely says that while the three siblings were raised by the same people he was an "only" which neither of his sisters were and he had no idea that we once lived in a small sweet house with only 2 bathrooms. Their early childhood was different...not better not worse...different.

It saddens me that people assume that a family can just cut down on lattes and then can afford something else. That being said: OP schools often recommend that kids not work their first year. Save for medical school...totally untrue. People waste time..a lot. To view that as a done deal, be it for money for a sorority of a nicer dorm room or a trip to Cabo is nonsense. Many houses have scholarships and award money. (At least they do here).

Life can be unfair. But parents (good parents, and I believe the OP is a good parent) find a way of thinking out of the box. Your child is not a "child". She can help sort this out and NOT by dropping houses. (I will say that after my daughter's recruitment I was kind of happy that my daughter didn't like the uber expensive house.)

Let her rush her heart. Let her find the way to help out.

Well if YOU are old, then that makes ME old as well and I simply refuse to accept that! :)

I'm just quoting again, because this is SO true. Ours were all in the recruitment booklet itself.

Seriously though, that document is fabulous. Off topic:I am amazed by some of the amenities. The parking lots for all members?

We had that at my alma mater (several chapters, but not "huge" chapters).

I did chuckle at ADPi new member out-of-house dues being listed as $12,099 for fall semester. Hope that's a typo lol

I'm perfectly fine with not having a house on my campus but some of those amenities are quite tempting...a frozen yogurt machine IN HOUSE!? :eek: Also my stomach is grumbling looking at some of those meal plans and snacks they offer.

As for dues, they were given to us during recruitment broken down item-by-item during each sorority's open house presentation. At any point after that, if we forgot, I'm pretty sure our gamma chis had that information readily available. I don't understand why anyone would want to hide fees from PNMs and their families, especially during this economy.

That being said, I'm pretty sure most groups offer scholarships for sisters should financial need arise. Looking at the FSU pdf, some of the chapters on campus even list scholarship offerings and monetary amounts that sisters can apply for right there (i.e. Theta, ZTA).

This is the crux of it. Everyone saying "oh, everyone lost money in the last few years, things are not secure anymore, life changes blah blah blah...." that has nothing to do with it, and I don't think jll ever tried to play that card. She simply didn't inform herself well enough in advance, and/or misinterpreted the info she was given (to quote one of my "becoming a woman" books, normal isn't the same thing as average). As a result, she is stuck in an impossible situation.

My original answer still stands. If you have to tell your daughter that she can't afford certain chapters, and her working is really not an option, she should drop out of rush altogether ASAP. It will be much more heartbreaking for her - not to mention her sisters to be - if she grows to love sorority life and then 5 weeks into pledging, realizes she has to drop out because of the fees.

It would be one thing if she was choosing a dorm, and some were more expensive than others, and you had to say "you can live in dorm a or b but not c, d, or e." Sorority rush simply does not work that way.

I can totally understand the frustration from the moms on here. I know how this can come about where the Panhellenic didn't put the dues into the handbook. They don't want someone to make the costs their deciding factor or to judge one sorority as better than another based on the dues.

Aside from that, one of the problems these very large chapters have is that they are dealing with really big budgets and a membership that is constantly in flux. They could be told as late as pref night that well quota will be 60 + or - 20. They don't want to write a budget and then change what they said to higher - and then NMs feel misled, and they don't want to put to change it to lower later and has someone make their choice based on what they saw in the handbook.

Its hard enough in a strong chapter where people want to take advantage of the house, but its even harder when you have to spread costs of the house to unhoused members, to encourage people to stay in the house. On our campus dues are actually pretty close to the same, but some chapters are constantly having to use a crystal ball to predict how many women will decide not to initiate or how many will resign before senior year. (All of a sudden I can see how bed quota sounds like a good idea....) We try to provide an estimate before recruitment.

The finance director should sit down at the first new member meeting and lay out 1) what the dues are 2) what they cover 3) estimated costs of everything they don't cover 4) how much is due before initiation 5) how much is due by the end of the semester 6) what the policy on the payment plan or a promise note is.
If the exact amount of dues is not available - because of a crazy recruitment or not blessed by the international office - a list from last years amounts should be available.

jll, I look forward to hearing how it all washes out for you and your daughter and I'm hoping for the best. And maybe this firestorm will serve some good, ie. getting some of these schools to be more up front about their costs and showing how it can be done effectively by example. I'm hoping this was all moot and her choices at preference were among the more mid-market options and you weren't forced to do any of the negatives that were mentioned. It did occur to me if what you received were averages and what you learned was WAY higher, then that must mean (by the law of averages) that some of them were substantially lower and you really had nothing to worry about. Here's hoping this was all much ado about nothing.

You have no idea what you are talking about here or who you are talking about. Just keep that in mind.

This. Yes, this.

Please keep in mind that I was speaking for my own chapter (as I noted). I would be embarrassed if one of our chapter advisors, for instance, represented us publicly in such a mean-spirited manner, even if via a seemingly anonymous screenname. This is just my opinion, of course.

As for who I am talking about – obviously I cannot read every previous post on this forum, but did check enough to know that she is not a member of my GLO at Bama. It appears that she was affiliated with a sorority that had dwindled so that it eventually folded (while I was in school there, in fact). I do remember the little house on the stadium-side corner – those girls surely could have used help from committed alums.

If she is active in the re-colonization of her chapter, or in other positions of importance within her GLO, then that’s lovely. Still, I can completely understand jll’s sentiment, considering the hurtful manner in which she was treated.

I think I may have a little insight on the behavior now, at least -- but thanks for the warning.

I didn't think of it as a warning of anything. There's nothing bad to come, except maybe your embarrassment when you realize how far you are off about at lot of stuff in that comment.

HQWest, you nailed it. This is the problem with quoting costs! I'd bold everything you wrote, but that would defeat the purpose, so I'm just quoting your entire post and saying "ditto." It is SO HARD to figure out financials, and at best it is an estimate because there are so many variables from year to year.

Pot, meet kettle.