i'm sure it's very sketchy, but all i know is that it definitely happens. perhaps they just don't enforce it, to assuage the PNMs and their often-complaining parents, or it's just under the office's radar.

Yipes...I'm surprised that none of the groups have ever filed a formal complaint. Parental interference isn't an excuse for breaking rules.

AF - guaranteeing a bid really doesn't make much difference if there's a chapter or 2 that's smaller than the rest and needs to keep bidding after quota is filled to get to total. It is, after all, A bid (just not the one the PNM wants).

I just found this thread and am wondering about this pref night paper vs bid card dilemma. Which carries the final binding agreement? I have seen it happen MANY times that a pnm does not end up pledging her 2nd choice, simply because it wasn't really what she wanted. So the pnm ends up pledging nothing and returns to go through rush again the next year.

Could it be that different rules regarding this issue vary from campus to campus? Where would I find out the last word on this?

There is nothing against the rules that disallows a girl who turned down a bid one year from rerushing the following year.

I didn't think so...it happens all the time and really usually works out to the pnm's advantage. I have also seen a pnm take her bid card, run to the house (the one she did not pref first) and then the next day decide this was really not what she wanted to do, decline the bid and go through again next year.

On preference night, when a PNM ranks her remaining chapters, she signs a MRAA (Membership Recruitment Acceptance Agreement). She can be matched to any chapter that she listed on the card. If she matches and chooses not to take the bid she received, she is ineligible to join another chapter for another year. The "bid card" on XYZ stationary is merely a formality. Don't list a chapter on your MRAA (pref card) if you would not accept a bid from them.

This only applies to formal recruitment. During informal recruitment, a PNM can be offered as many bids as there are chapters participating, but she is not bound to any if she chooses not to accept any.