Married PNMs/Age for rush
 

So I'm wondering, what do most chapters do with girls going through who are married? I would not think that marrige & Greek life would work well together for the most part, but I'd like your opinions.

Also, what age is the unofficial 'cut off' for your chapter not pledging someone? Like if someone was signed up for 2011 formal recruitment and listed a high school graduation date of 2004... (because of military training, a medical condition, or some other thing) Would you seriously consider someone who would be an incoming pledge at age 25+?? :confused:

Thanks in advance for your thoughtful comments!

No one can tell you about ages to pledge, etc. because those factors vary widely from campus to campus. Those would be good questions for current members or the greek life office at the specific school.

Just food for thought: If a 25+ year old pledged a sorority, the majority of her pledge class would be 17-19. What would that person have in common with girls that much younger? They would not be in the same life place, and I would think that the older girl might feel a little left out and not able to relate to the whole 18 year old freshman world. Similar thoughts for the married girl. Is she going to have the time to dedicate to the sorority events if she has school and a family to manage? How well will she be able to fit in and relate to her pledge class?

This is a sorority focused thing, so I'm not going to stick around beyond this little swerve, but...

I don't dispute anything you said there necessarily. I would just not like to see the sorority make that decision for the girl and not bid her because of it.

I say that because I recently saw a similar situation with my fraternity chapter in which they voted not to bid a guy that was about 25 I think and recently out of the military. Being in the military myself, I was kind of pissed about that. If you're going to hold military service against people, then we have a problem. Yeah, the guy is a few years older and in some ways is going to be different, but he also brings a lot of leadership and life experience to the table that 18-19yo pledges don't. Yeah, in some respects he may look or feel a little bit out of place in social settings with 18-19yo freshmen, but at the same time he gave up his chance at that college experience to be in the fight overseas, and now he's here going through rush trying to get a little bit of that back. I just don't think it's right for the organization to tell him he isn't entitled to that chance. I'd take a few guys like that over a few traditional freshmen any day. It's different, but they make the chapter better. I would want to see my org do the right thing in that situation rather than just be superficial.

Sorry. That's all I wanted to say. Back to your regularly scheduled program.

Like you said, this varies from campus to campus. If Greeks make up 10% or more of the student body, there is Greek housing, the university itself is mainly residential (instead of commuter) and most students are 17-23, chances are that the Greek community is fairly traditional and a married 25-year-old might not fare well in recruitment.

However, there are schools with a larger percentage of non-traditional students where the Greeks are representative of the student body. At such a school, being married and 25 would probably not be a negative.

It's different for NPC groups, though, because we have quota/total. If you bid a guy, he doesn't fit in, and drops out in a week, no biggie. If we bid a woman, she doesn't fit in, and drops out in a week, that's a spot that could have gone to someone else.

In that respect, I think I'd feel much more comfortable pledging a 25-year-old woman in a COB situation, where she wasn't taking a spot from someone else.

My school falls into the category where we have some non-traditional students. For the most part, students are traditional age, but we have many commuters. My chapter has taken older women, and they were able to fit in because they didn't think they were better than everyone else and because they didn't take themselves too seriously. In my NM class, we had girls from 17 all the way up to 22. Once we got to know each other, age wasn't really an issue.

As for the married girl question, I guess it depends on the girl. I can see it being a problem if she had kids and/or a needy/controlling husband. If she and her husband were both young with no kids, I don't think it would be a problem as long as they communicated openly about time expectations, ect.

THIS is where you should have stopped.

^^^^ This!


This topic comes up every year during formal recruitment because we always have a handful of non-traditional students who show interest. WE DO NOT DESCRIMINATE. Age is not an issue, having a child is not an issue, being married is not an issue. What is at issue is whether you can commit the time and the money to attending chapter events and being an active member of the sorority. Chapter is not a baby sitting service, your hubby can't attend initiation and there are dues and a badge to purchase.

I completely respect that. It would probably be good for the orgs to tell her that up front during rush.

I think just looking from the outside it seems like sororities sometimes over think things. In this case, gaming the girl's ability to fit in or get the same enjoyment out of the experience. It seems like they sometimes make decisions for other people based on what they think that person might want but not actually giving them a chance.

That's a guy trying to understand women, so doomed to failure, but it just seems unfair sometimes. :(

As a chapter advisor in my late 30s, I'm able to walk into a chapter where I don't really know anyone and very quickly establish strong lasting friendships with a wide range of guys from pledge to president. I know that's a different situation. Clearly we have our love of the org in common and I'm there to help them advance that, but still on an interpersonal level the age/life-stage/experience stuff really isn't much of a factor. It's more of a difference; in the way one active is from England and no one else is.

By that I just mean it's a very individual thing if someone will fit in or not. I understand the concerns, but if the girl and the org can successfully overcome those, then it seems like everyone would be better for it in the end. It would just be nice for the girl to get a fair shot, in the same way I wanted the guy in my example to get a fair shot and was mad when he didn't with a lot of the same concerns expressed.

Seriously?

The whole place can come post in a thread in the ATO section specifically about ATO expansion and assume everything a personal attack on their own non-ATO org & chapter in every possible state, but I can't post something in an intro thread that tells a related story about fraternity recruitment or state a perspective that says all over it that it's outside looking in?

Really? Get over it. It's an intro thread.

Our business is deciding what is right for our chapter and our sisters.

You have proven to be an uniformed opinionated lane swerving jerk. This is about NPC recruitment. STFU already.

I don't dispute that. When I walk in as an advisor, like I did in the example I gave, and disapprove of a bid decision they make, I can't do anything about that. I can yell at them and make them feel like shit for what they just did, but it's their decision. I have no problem with that. I just said from an outside perspective it looks over thought and unfair. If it actually is or not isn't for me to say, and I'm not. I'm just stating a perspective. Moving on.

You should ref the fact you're quoting some JI lashing out (inappropriately no doubt) on your signature line and maybe figure out if I'm the only opinionated jerk around here. But, if you'd care to continue that conversation, it might a little classier of us to do so by PM.

Well, if the chapter has a house, I think it's fair to assume that a married woman isn't going to live there. That could be a deal-breaker for a group that has a mortgage to pay.

If you seriously want an answer to the two questions you posed above (one of which is actually your opinion, worded as a statement, but I can rewrite it as a question), wouldn't you need to set up a survey to obtain that data?

In my opinion, you're getting into membership selection with the bolded question and follow up comment.

And I don't necessarily agree with DeltaBetaBaby that a married woman wouldn't live in. I can think of any of a number of scenarios in which a married woman would consider living in. ;)

Stop judging the chapters of these NPC sororities' practices. What your fraternity does is what works for your fraternity. It is not what works for every fraternity and sorority.

This is not an issue of gender. This is not an issue of sororities vs. fraternities.

If you consider a 30+ noncollegiate forming strong lasting friendships with college students to be a good thing. I do not.

The difference in these situations?

When I posted in the ATO section, I was correcting non-ATO business.

When you posted here, you gave information that's not relevant. This is like someone asking about the job market in Texas and you filling them in on the job market in Michigan. Cool story, but it's not relevant.

I'm still curious why you come to a discussion board but tell people to "get over it" when they begin discussing.

There are always exceptions to the rules.

Obviously the norms are known.

I will say, on my campus, a 24 year old pledged what is considered the top sorority on campus and is extremely involved.

Serious answer: military wife not living on base.

Joke answer: annoying husband.

Pineapple, dnall, pineapple.

Oh, interesting.

It really does depend on the campus. That being said, I've not yet had the privilege to meet someone else in a similar situation as I was. I was 23, a navy vet, when I helped colonize AXiD on my campus, which at the time, only had 1 other sorority. Would a 23 year old navy vet have the same shot at joining my chapter today? Realistically, maybe, but probably not. The culture has changed. I'm thankful for the experience I had because I know it was unique.... There's NO WAY I could have ever become a member at a more competitive university. Not to mention that I was completely against the idea of joining a sorority and conforming to rules and structure after I had just finished doing that in the navy. That's why the colony appealed to me so much - I didn't have to follow someone else's rules and traditions - I got to help start them.


Benzgirl hit the nail on the head though.....

So, if being married is going to prevent you from being a committed member who can actually come to chapter events, then don't bother....

What about same-sex marriage? If they both want to pledge? Talk about a package deal!

What would be classy would be your not giving opinions and incorrect information about things you don't know about nor will ever understand.

Sorority membership selection =/= one fraternity's membership selection lorded over by some old guy who wants to be their friend

I never said anything about holding military service against anyone, and not giving them a chance. What I said was, I do not know how someone who is at that stage in their life could find a way to really relate to people 7+ years their junior. What would someone who has been out in the world, probably lived and worked on their own for a little while, really have in common with a bunch of younger people who (mostly) are away from home for the first time, getting their first real taste of freedom?

As for the right thing in that situation, what is that exactly? Should we bid all non trads purely because they are non trads and everyone should get to be greek? That's not how it works. Not everyone gets the chance to be Greek for a multitude of reasons. A chapter should bid a non trad for the same reason they should bid a traditional student; they feel that that woman would fit well in their chapter, and make a valuable member, regardless of age.

When I was in school, virtually every fraternity had a non-trad or two hanging around creeping out the freshman girls.

Yup, my a couple of the fraternities at my school have some non-traditional students. But they definitely aren't creepy. They're some of the funniest guys around. Only a handful of the non-trads are the kind to creep on the freshmen, and believe me, we warn our freshmen!

Can't. stop. laughing.

Someone get dnall, we found something that is exactly the same on every campus!

Yup, sure enough. Usually during fraternity rush week or around Halloween...

There was an interesting thread here last fall about an "older" woman who was interested in pledging. I personally thought she was nuts but the non-traditional campus thing was brought up so I kept my opinions to myself. She did end up pledging and it seemed that it was working out just fine.

I got married old so I have as big a problem wrapping my mind around being married and in college as married and in a sorority. But one thing GC has taught me is Greek systems and personal experiences vary WIDELY and making judgments about "normal" or "acceptable" is just an invitation for disaster or ridicule.

Swerving on my own post: one of my biggest peeves in the world is "prices may vary." Is there a chance that every store WILL have the same price? Then prices WILL vary, not may.

Actually, this makes sense.

"Super Tampax 40% off this week at Target. Prices may vary."

Target (or rather the company making up their ads in tandem with the legal dept) has no idea what every single one of its stores charges for Super Tampax. It could be that somehow, every single store is charging the same thing. But they don't know that. Hence, "prices may vary."