Eek - I hope you meant that more along the lines of "less excited but still happy/grateful to be invited back to the houses she liked less than others".

Wow, lighten up, everyone! I wasn't offended but am sorry that you were. My comment wasn't directed to any person but to the process. As you might guess from my username, this is all new to me - I went to a school that had no Greek organizations.

From what I've read here, IU's recruitment is known for being particularly hard on the girls. So I was looking for information that could help allay hurt feelings should they arise. The recruitment website says some chapters may have a higher GPA minimum and I naively assumed those would be available somewhere. I now understand why they aren't (thank you IndianaSigKap!).

Thank you to those who wished my daughter well, and I wish the same for all moms and daughters going through this very interesting but very difficult process.

You have to understand that this…

..sounded extremely condescending and sarcastic. Whether you were directing it at AZTheta or not, I don't know, but putting down a process that you yourself have admitted you know nothing about is not exactly going to make you friends here. Every NPC sorority at every campus has private membership selection criteria. That's just how it is.

I'm guessing the chapter-specific GPA requirements are still included in the information the PNMs get when they sign up for recruitment and/or attend information sessions.

ItsGreektoMe
 

Two things to keep in mind -

1. Recruitment is competitive, in that the pnms are, in a way, competing against each other. If your daughter had all the objective criteria needed, and others did also, the chapter might have to decide amongst themselves which to issue their limited invitations to - did you realize that chapters have only a certain number of invitations they can issue to each round? Once you have the objective criteria, it's down to the subjective criteria. It is entirely possible that, could you know the objective criteria for every chapter, you STILL would not know why your daughter did not get invitations to all the sororities she was interested in, but it may well have been because they simply did not have enough spaces in their parties for all those who were qualified.

2. There really isn't anything you can say to allay hurt feelings very much. Rejection - for whatever reason -is going to hurt. Those who have a successful recruitment KEEP AN OPEN MIND and realize that every chapter has something to offer, and those who have invited them are really INTERESTED IN HAVING THEM AS SISTERS. Don't agonize over what might have been - look at what could be!

Good luck to her

And should you daughter experience disappointment with the invitations she receives, it may be helpful to point out that ABC, XYZ, and iJ(or however many do invite her back)DID want to see her again and talk that angle up. If your daughter can put aside any disappointment and face the day with a smile and a positive attitude she stands a much better chance of continuing to impress those who issued the invites. If the least favored sororities pick up on her displeasure, they may feel that issuing her an invitation to the next round would be a wasted effort and give that invitation to someone else.

As an outsider to the process, having your daughter go through rush at IU is kind of like graduating high school and going straight to PhD work, with no understanding of the course work.

There are about 1600 girls going through rush this year. For each chapter there are probably not 100 girls who don't meet their objective criteria. After that they have to go from 1500 to about 55 in 4 rounds of parties and about an hour and a half of total talk time. Objectively you can't take this process seriously, but in real life it feels an awful like being judged and found unworthy.

Let me see if I can explain the process a bit. The girls they want to cut are easy - the ones who were rude, the ones who are seriously weird, the no shows - so that eliminates 100 girls. (Making up numbers here since each house will be different AND I'm not privy to this information) The chapter hasto cut to 700 girls. So let's go back and cut the girls who someone had heard something bad about, had a rude post on Facebook, seemed like she might be too quiet for us. Ok, that's another 100 girls. They're now at 1400, every girl left is worthy of an invitation. But they are still required to cut to 700. They have to invite back all of their legacies (many sororities have this rule for after round 1) and there are 200 legacies going through, so that uses up nearly 1/3 of their spots. So they start cutting based on goals they have for the chapter. Need to work on our chapter GPA? Cut anyone below a 2.9. Whatever. Then they finally get to the 700 plus whatever number gets to be on their "flex list," let's say another 100 girls. They have their 700 plus 100 girls who will be added in if anyone of the top 700 don't accept their invitation. Your daughter is number 710. She made it past 590 girls! And really, when you factor out the legacies, she made it past 790 girls! And the flex list made it to 709 before the list was full. That is going to feel like they hated her but it simply isn't the case. And that could happen for every single chapter. It's not likely to; the vast majority of girls find a sorority home but there are perfectly nice perfectly qualified girls every year who just simply had bad luck.

Does that help or make it worse?

That's a good explanation.

I'm not an IU expert, but in all sorority recruitments there is always the element of having friends on the inside pulling for you as well. That's not going to show up in a quantifiable way, but it's a factor.

Let me try and see if I can get it right this time.


First, I sincerely apologize for the post that gave offense. To repeat, my issue was with the rush process, not any individual. FWIW, yesterday I felt physically lousy as well as stressed by several difficult situations in my life. I'm sure all of that contributed to my poor choice of words. I hope you will forgive that lapse.

Second, I freely admit to ignorance about everything connected with sorority life. I thank those who explained the "criteria" issue; I'm now better informed.

Third, I of course recognize that the numbers at IU are overwhelming. Similar to college admissions, many wonderful candidates must be eliminated, and they won't know why they didn't make the cut.

Finally, my daughter (whose general m.o. is to keep a positive attitude) is handling the process extremely well. After feeling tense the first day, she decided to "chill" and enjoy the experience. She was fortunate to receive a large number of second round invitations and is in no way dwelling on "favorites" that weren't on the list. I've encouraged her to keep an open mind about all of the houses, and I have complete faith in her ability to intuit the best places for her – recognizing the decision is ultimately out of her hands.

Also, as far as the grade issue, please be aware that the minimum GPA required to go through formal rush is often if not usually lower than that of individual chapters.

And we DO understand what you're getting at - grades are an important factor so therefore there must be a line of demarkation. There really isn't. At the headquarters level there is a number below which the chapter cannot cross. But that is usually WELL lower than their functional minimum GPA. For instance, I believe my sorority's national minimum is a 2.5. At IU I think you have to have a 2.8 to even participate, and the chapters who are really making grade cuts are probably cutting above to well above that number. But if there's that perfect girl, many girls in the chapter know and love her, she's a legacy, her resume is 9 miles long, and she has a 2.8? Yeah, they might let that one slip through. It depends on chapter and inter/national rules of the sorority, the needs of a particular chapter, etc. and is not consistent across all sororities. This is a very confusing business. Keep your head up, keep the wine corked and ready, and try to stay positive and chapter-neutral with your daughter as the process progresses.

Just as a FYI, an ice storm is predicted for this afternoon and into tomorrow. Bloomington is on the southern edge, so hopefully will be spared. But this does mean I might be spending an extra day in Bloomington if I can't get home to Indy tonight/ tomorrow morning.

I have been watching the storm. I was at our chapter house at Purdue all day checking in girls to move in and left early to get home before the ice storm comes.

Safe travels!!!!

I have two daughters at IU, a sophomore active and a senior who had little success with the process and never joined a sorority. So, I have gone through this as a mom with a PNM daughter in 2012, 2013 and 2014. In our experience, the info that DubaiSis is giving is very realistic and accurate. Having wine on hand for mom is also a very good idea.

I just scraped the ice off of my windshield so I can leave bright and early tomorrow. Ugggghhhhh.