What surprised you most on the other side of rush/recruitment?
 

I noticed a few people mentioning the stress and such of participating in recruitment on the other side for the first time. What surprised you the most about recruitment the first time you were participating as an active? Obviously I'm not asking for secrets about membership selection and such. But pretty much anything else...

A couple of things come to mind for me...

How disappointed I could be when a rush crush didn't come back. I mean you only meet these women for a few minutes a few times, but it can be really disappointing when they don't return.

How incredibly rude some rushees could be when they obviously did not want to be at your house. My mother taught me good manners and being rude is just wrong. Obviously not everyone feels the same way! :rolleyes:

What do you remember? :)

Just how CRAZY it is in between parties..at least at USF it was a MAD DASH inside the sorority houses lol. I remember being so chill when I was a PNM in between houses, I just assumed the sororities were takin it easy!

^YESSS that, we only had 10-15 minutes between parties but it felt like 30 seconds to get everything done!

In general, it is wayyyyy harder going through recruitment as an active than as a PNM, in my opinion. You're up from 7 AM-3 AM the following morning, decorating, cleaning up, talking to girls, in heels for hours with basically no breaks... it's exhausting! They make it look easy when you're a PNM!

How freaking nervous people were. I thought the rushees were the only nervous ones. :)

I know this is going to sound cheesy, but I'm going to say it anyway!

I was amazed how much closer I became to other Sisters -- especially those who I wasn't as close to. Many times it seemed that we would support each other if we felt strongly about a rushee, regardless if we were in the same clique.

I was surprised at how good I was as a rusher! :D I was painfully shy as a PNM and recruitment for me turned into a major ordeal. Once I was on the inside I had learned what it took to make a PNM feel at ease.

I was also surprised at how much fun it was. Feet aching, up until 4 am doing MS, decorating and getting all dolled up, finding a rush crush...good and bad, I loved every minute of it!

Yes, the time between parties. As a rushee on a big campus, I thought it was tight getting from house to house, but nothing like having to do all the stuff, get reorganized, kill the occasional bat (yes, it happened, but ONLY during rush. Why? bad karma?), and then look like it's your first party of the day when it might be the 8th. At least we didn't have the all night hashing session the house behind us had. I don't know if they knew we sat and listened to them fight.

But yes, rush was also the time that you got so much closer with your sisters. When you've been through war together...

I don't think that's cheesy at all!

I think it is probably true for many women, including myself. The prep week before formal rush was a lot of work, but it was also an opportunity to spend chunks of time with sisters with whom you might not have always hung out or had a great deal in common.

I thought it was also fun to just have time to do sorority stuff without having to worry about classes. Many of us worked so we did have to fit that in, but at least there were no classes during rush prep week. Once classes started we were juggling classes, work and rush for the better part of two to three weeks (depending on how football games and the September Jewish holidays fell each year). So doing fun sorority prep was a good time! :)

I was amazed when I realized what the active members knew about the pnms (of course, they were rushees back in my day). I had no idea they spent days and days flashing pictures on a screen and learning all that stuff.

Also, I had no idea as a pnm that all of those girls coming up to me were doing it in an organized and purposeful fashion. Who knew??! I remember thinking that was totally cool and very spy-novel-ish when I found out.

As an active with my chapter I was surprised at exactly how much work went into each party and at exactly how short fuses got by the end, including my own (though everyone was back to normal by Bid Day, after getting that much needed night of real sleep after Pref).

As a Recruitment Counselor I was surprised at how many PNMs were straight up bitches. I didn't remember girls from my group being so rude about chapters when I went through. And there was a super diva PNM both years I was a RC. Just one, but god almighty they were horrible. (Nothing was good enough, the schedule didn't fit their own, they were offended that XYZ asked them back because they were so obviously too good for them, etc.). On the other hand, the majority of PNMs were sweet, excited, and nervous and it was fun to hear their impressions of the chapters after parties. I was also surprised at how good it felt when a PNM was talked into going to a party after she was dropped by her favorite chapter...and discovered her second or third choice could become her first.

What surprised me most was that other people weren't as excited as I was for Recruitment! I loved Recruitment (still do) and was actually quite shocked to learn that some people can't stand it. Just not their cup of tea.

Other things (which I think most have probably been mentioned here):
- How close you get to people you didn't know before. I made some really great friendships with people I previously barely knew before Recruitment
- How many "rush crushes" I would have. I loved most girls I spoke with. Except for a couple who were just biatches, which brings me to...
- How rude some people can be. I get that girls may not have felt like my chapter was the right place for them, but seriously, there was no reason for the glares and refusals to provide more than one word answers. That part was gut-wrenching.
- How much cleaning is involved! We were constantly cleaning the house - it had to be spotless! And with 60+ girls in it 24/7, it got messy quickly.
- How door chants/songs worked. I always wondered how all those people fit into a tiny doorway, and how they piled up so high in it. It never occured to me that people were using chairs - duh!

This last one is a realization that came from being an advisor - I remember there being a lot of what, as a collegian, I thought was "wasted" time, where I would just be sitting around pretending to talk to an imaginary PNM while the membership team would be talking amongst themselves. Only when I was part of the team did I realize that there are a lot of logistics to figure out and you need the bodies in place to figure out those logistics.

These types are lots of fun wherever you encounter them. I had one in my group when I was an orientation leader. Did they pledge?
________

I have to add another one. The PNM that got mad at myself and fellow RCs that led her group because we told her to be herself. She got dropped from recruitment, and felt our advice was why.

Even when we asked why she would want to belong to a chapter that didn't love her for her...

Definitely a slap-forehead-with-palm moment.

Nope. Dropped out and are not Greek because the chapter they thought they were good enough for apparently didn't agree. And I'm glad, because it was a good lesson to learn. I did give them information on COBs, but for whatever reason, they were never given a bid. Though I'm sure they could've gotten one from other chapters on campus if they hadn't been so snotty. (One example came in to get her invites on Pref and just left. She had two parties, the max. She apparently said something to the effect of, "Are you kidding me? This is insulting." None of the RCs in her group were from those two chapters, but she didn't know that...to be that insensitive is ridiculous.)

I was surprised by just how much goes on behind the scenes. I kind of figured the sorority members weren't just sitting around with their feet up when there wasn't a party going on, but I didn't quite realize that my sisters and I would be running around like chickens without heads, changing out decorations, making sure snacks and drinks were set, doing membership selection, etc.

I didn't realize how SICK AND TIRED I would be of certain songs by the end of rush!! The songs stuck in the PNMs' heads, which was a good thing, but I did NOT need "Hey Look Us Over" running through my head while desperately trying to get some sleep in the 4 or 5 hours I had.

I surprised myself with my conversation skills. I've always been an introvert, and I had to overcome that during rush and carry on convos with all kinds of different PNMs (including a straight-up psycho) - and I did it! This experience really helped me outside the rush room too.

I third this. I can add that to the list of things I learned from joining my sorority...how to talk to strangers. It's still not my favorite thing, but I can definitely handle it now.

Fourth it. I used to HATE talking to strangers. I would do anything not to be the one to call the pizza delivery place. Now it's no big deal at all.

I agree with the orchestrations behind the scenes. I had no idea how intentional meeting certain people was. From the PNM perspective, I thought we just happened to find sisters who weren't talking to other people or who the rusher thought would have something in common. I was also surprised at how much I learned to trust my recruitment group. We helped each other remember things and were a great support for each other.

Ha, I had no choice growing up- my older brother wouldn't make a phone call to save his life, so I was the official phone person. I distinctly recall making a call to inquire about subwoofers at age 10. However- phone's always been easy, in person is another story!

I was also surprised at how much harder it was to talk to people when I was an active. When you're a clueless PNM, it's not as big of a deal. But when you are an active, everything you do & say is being evaluated (or so you think), you have to share information about the chapter without crossing any lines, you have to steer the conversation away from the Bs, you have to get to know the person, form a quick personal rapport... There's just so much that goes into every single aspect of recruitment from the active's point of view.

120 is around our max, and I couldn't remember them all even as a RC. I would know everyone in my group by name and then we'd change it up for Theme and Pref and I'd have to start all over.

In the "Reply to Thread" box, there are number and bullet list buttons available.

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I'm not savvy enough for sub-bullets though.

/great big hijack

Doh! I was replying in the regular view and obviously it didn't even occur to me to check the advanced view. Which, now that I'm in it, the bullet part looks way too familiar and I'm sure I've used them before. Ha. Chalk that up to a brain fart. Thanks :o I'm going to fix the post so it's prettier then...

ETA, just so I don't feel like a complete failure today... to do sub-bullets indent the tab using that little icon. Now everyone is savvy enough for sub-bullets!

As a Recruitment Counselor I was surprised at how many PNMs were straight up bitches.

Oh my gosh yes! I remember girls like this all 3 years coming int oour house like they owned the place. Crazy!

LOL I was one of those people that didn't realized bumping was a planned thing!!