I'm not going to say much about membership selection, but suffice it to say that one woman with a bad impression of you can have a much greater effect than ten who think you are great. That one woman need not be an active collegian at this particular chapter.

Other possibilities:

1) You were dropped for grades
2) You didn't have recs at a school that requires recs
3) The chapter made a mistake in preparing their invite list

Getting dropped from all chapters is rare, in most formal recruitments, if you attended all parties to which you were invited and generally had good manners, etc. However, it does happen. I would have to assume that the Greek Advisor or someone like that double-checked the invite lists before you received the phone call.

ALL THAT SAID...sometimes women fall through the cracks, and chapters may have liked you, but just had more great girls than invites to give out. If you are truly just the unlucky PNM who didn't match this time around, nothing should preclude you from giving it another shot.

I know you are upset. You are asking questions that go into membership selection, and we do not discuss that here.

And we are not at your school, and we do not know every detail that might have entered into your being released from recruitment.

University of Miami is pretty competitive for a non-Southern school, isn't it? In my experience it isn't uncommon for several girls to get cross cut before preference at competitive schools.

And by "cross cut" you mean released from recruitment, right? It has another meaning which implies a mistake was made.

To skkx3, at many schools the biggest releases are made after the second party. I'm sorry you weren't given the opportunity to join a group. I know it's tough. Take the next few days to just be good to yourself. When it's not so painful, if you want to try again, try to examine what might have gone wrong. Examine your entire resume-- are your grades good, how was your appearance, reputation, extra-curricular activities, etc. If you want, contact the Greek Life Office to see if anyone is doing COB. Sometimes great girls really do just fall through the cracks, but sometimes they just need a little more polish. Good luck.

Yes. Cross cut = not invited back to any chapters in a round; completely released from recruitment.

OP was a sophomore so that could also have something to do with it if Miami has a bias toward freshmen.

Yeah, that's my point...it's not what cross cut means. Cross cut refers to bid matching. There was an old rumor that you could be "cross cut" from all chapters on your bid list if you didn't rank the chapters you pref'd in order of how badly they wanted you. It didn't work that way, but many people don't understand the bid matching concept.

I've never heard any other definition of cross cut than the one I used.

If you keep an open mind to EVERY chapter, it's pretty difficult to not get a bid at UM.

You haven't been around long enough.:D It's an old term and generally means a mistake was made with bid matching. Here's a link for you http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...light=crosscut

Hi thanks everyone for all of the advice. I am not sure what could have happened. I have a 3.3 gpa, I heard you don't need rec's at University of Miami, I am involved in three different organizatons, two which I hold positions in. I had an open mind and would have liked to get into any of them. I actually didn't have a preference like other girls, because I liked all of them. I am a sophomore so I do not know if that is why it happened.

One of the problems may be that you ranked two chapters lowest early on that may have been more likely to keep you. Who knows? The fact that the more desirable chapters kept you for that extra day may have been the kiss of death for your recruitment since you couldn't continue on with the other two. This is why we even have RFM now days to prevent this from happening, but sometimes it still does. Like I said, sometimes good girls still do fall through the cracks. Check after recruitment and see if any of the chapters are doing COB to fill any remaining spots. Please do not take this as an indictment of you. Decisions are made quickly on little information, and if you asked anyone in these chapters about you, they'd probably have something good to say about you. Recruitment can be tough, and decisions to release PNMs can be made by a razor's edge.

Pardon the lane swerve, but I know a girl this (almost) happened to. During rush she hadn't been cut at all and was invited back to every sorority she wanted. The day before pref you can go to five chapters, and then pref is two. She went to five, four of which are the classic "Top 4" at this campus, and one is a middle tier. Right before pref she was dropped from all four of the Top 4 but luckily did receive a bid to the middle tier. But if it was structured the way it had been the year before and the year after (4 to 2), she would have likely had the four most competitive sororities before pref and then not receive a single invite to pref despite not being cut prior.

So I can see situations where girls coast right on by the early rounds with no cuts, cut groups that actually might want to pledge her, and then be cut by their remaining groups.

Yeah, this really was a huge problem before RFM when chapters could keep as many women around until Pref, when anyone they invited had to be on their bid list. Even now, some women do still fall through the cracks and some chapters do too. I know some chapters that think they have a lock on the "top girls" in recruitment up to the day before prefs when those girls have to cut down to a minimum number and all the sudden those girls pick other groups. (They go from 99 or 100% returns to 60% returns when PNMs suddenly can only go back to 2 or 3 parties.) If the chapter wasn't smart enough to keep around safety picks, they may not have enough women to make quota. It goes both ways. I think PNMs and chapters should really think strategically when ranking because you really don't know where you stand against your competition and the margins can be really slim.

Yes your definition is the standard. I wonder if in the current RFM people are using it to mean being cut (a)cross the board.