UCLA Recruitment begins Wednesday!
 

Recruitment begins this Wednesday at University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA). Anyone have a pnm going through?? My daughter is a senior this year and she said that early numbers indicate that a huge number of girls are rushing this year, in the neighborhood of 900. UCLA does have a very competitive rush for first year girls, not really competitive at all for non-freshman. Each sorority at UCLA has a freshman quota and a non-freshman quota. For example, a chapter might have a quota of 45...but as many as 10 to 15 of those might be second or third year girls. I will say that the sororities generally do not like that they are required to take so many non-freshman because the drop rate after pledging or initiation of non-freshman is fairly high. UCLA sororities put on an impressive recruitment! Great chapters there! I will post what chapters are on campus in my next post.

Go Bruins!

So, UCLA has the following sororities on campus:

Alpha Phi
Delta Gamma
Kappa
Theta
Tri-Delt
Chi Omega
Pi Phi
Kappa Delta
AEPhi
Gamma Phi
ADPi
AChiO

I think that A Chi O recolonized a year or two ago, and they are doing great. All of the chapters at UCLA have strong sisterhoods and thriving numbers of members...well, with probably one exception...not going to say which one. Last night events kicked off on campus with the annual Bruin Bash, a huge open air concert for all new students and returning students. The sorority girls all try to look their most adorable by wearing special Bruin Bash t's designed specifically for their chapter. It is the pnm's first look at the sororities!!

BTW, the sun in out and shining in L.A.!! Classes begin on Thursday, recruitment on Wednesday. Pref is Sunday morning---Bid Day is Sunday night!!

Wow that's one busy day!!

So excited as all the UC's recruitment is basically this weekend. Going to be an exciting week.

The schedule for UCLA recruitment goes like this:

Wednesday (daytime) and Thursday (evening) are Conversation Days. PNM's visit all chapters.

Friday is House Tours/Philanthropy Day...each house gives a house tour (incl a few beautifully "primped" bedrooms!!) and the philanthropy is introduced. Each house is usually decorated with some kind of theme and the members dress accordingly.

Continuing....

Saturday is a very long day for the chapters!! This is "Entertainment Day". Most/alll chapters do some kind of cute and entertaining skit. This is the party where the individuality of the sorority really comes through! House decorations are usually fairly elaborate...The sorority members usually are up until 3:00 am decorating and getting ready!! Parties begin late morning and go all day.
This is when the fatigue for the PNM's and the members really sets in! Throat lozenge anyone?!

Sunday...PREFERENCE ROUNDS!!!

PNM's attend up to 2 Pref parties. Chapters have up to 3 pref parties, depending on how many PNM's are invited/coming back.

Pref parties begin at 9:00 am!!! Oh, those poor PNM's have to get up at the crack of dawn to shower, do their hair and walk across campus...in their cocktail dresses and heels!! Pref parties at UCLA are of course sentimental and serious events, but most sororities have moved away from wearing black dresses (a tradition started when pref round was at night), to wearing white dresses, and usually flowers or ivy wreaths in their hair...

The white dresses look so much lighter and fresh for morning ceremonies. And, being in Los Angeles, the sun is always predictably shining and warm! Pref parties conclude by around 1:00 pm. Bids are distributed at around 6:00 pm. Many sororities then takes their new pledges off (in big busses) to venues in and around L.A., such as the Santa Monica Pier, venues in Hollywood such as Universal Studios, or even to a private mansion in Beverly Hills for swimming and dinner! It is a crazy day, but always a wonderful day!!

BlueOwl, you read my mind!

865 PNMs are already registered. It looks like the PNM registration will easily hit 900 by Wednesday morning.

Add UCLA to the list of campuses hitting record registration numbers. Last year 715 women were registered.

Pepperdine also starts their recruitment on Wednesday, and they are looking at registration around 250.

I'm an active right now at UCLA. We have almost 900 signed up for recruitment as of now with a second sorority orientation tomorrow. We're bracing ourselves for MUCH larger parties than we're typically used to.

This is interesting to me, because at the SEC schools that have experience with, chapters are not required to take upperclassman quota, but are allowed to if they want to. It's more seen as a bonus number of girls you can take if you like. Many chapters don't, so it's still incredibly tough for the upperclassmen. Are the sororities at UCLA required to take the upperclassman quota or is it optional?

The upperclassmen quota in NOT optional. Each sorority is required to take quite a few, usually about one third of the new member class will be non- freshman women! This policy began about five years ago. As I said before, the sororities aren't exactly in love with this requirement. The drop rate for junior transfers runs particularly high. I think that it can be really hard for the junior transfers to develop the strong bonds of sisterhood within a group of girls that already shares a couple of years of experiences and "history" between them. The junior transfers tend to stick together, live together, and often drop together. The retention rate for girls who join as freshman, however, is very high.

CaliTransfer, what has your experience been?

Are you certain about this? I have a REALLY hard time believing that any chapter is required to take anyone.

I suspect the requirement is something more like "these are junior spots, if you don't take juniors, you may not take freshmen instead", which feels to the chapters like they must take juniors so as not to have the smallest pledge class.

I would think they'd be beyond "not in love" with it, considering this is infringing on each sorority's individual right to select its members.

Is it a flat number or a percentage? Or is is just capricious and arbitrary?

I'm surprised that any national organization would permit this.

Well, I am a parent, so I don't know all of the specifics, such as does the panhellenic office determine how many non-freshman a chapter must take, etc. But, I will say this for sure...non-freshman women get bids from houses that they would never get a bid from if they were rushing as freshman. Sure, my daughter's sorority has offered bids to some highly desirable non-freshman women. The competition for desirable non-freshman is intense! For example, student athletes generally do not join sororities due to their time commitments in their sport. If the girl no longer plays her sport, she may decide to rush. And, yes, there are lots of great girls who transfer in to UCLA from community college , etc. But, yes, it's absolutely true that chapters will have to extend bids to non-freshman girls who are less desirable to them in order to fill their non-freshman quota. Believe me, if it was not a requirement, they would not do it! No, the actives do not like having to do this one bit.

To clarify further...in a way, I think that chapters probably cut the transfer PNM's a little slack. Chapters know that they have a upperclassmen quota to fill, so they sort of have the mind set of "ok, she'll be fine, I guess we can take her, etc." But if a chapter is adamant that they do not want someone, they will not be forced to take her. But, has my daughter's chapter taken some older girls that would never have made it in if not for the fact that they helped fill the upperclassmen quota? Yup, you bet.

That shouldn't be. I'm guessing that most of the women do fulfill the requirements on paper, but a chapter should never be forced to take a woman for any reason - be it her GPA, her race, her class standing, whatever.

As DBB said, if they don't want to use those upperclass quota spots, that should be their prerogative - and with that prerogative comes the possibility of having fewer members. It seems that the "forcing" has already been shown to be a negative thing, as you mentioned the large amount of juniors who drop out.

I think that one thing that should be kept in mind about the UCs is the HUGE number of CC transfers. As I remember, back in the pre history times, the sororities didn't pay attention to the class standing of the pnms. If we wanted someone we took her. There was always a new crop of transfers to fill their spaces.

Yes, I know...I started at USC and graduated UCLA. The systems were very different

I can only speak from my experience from my own chapter, but I never felt like I was treated differently as an junior transfer new member from a freshman new member. Based on the transfers I know from my rush group, about a third now are die-hard for their sorority and incredibly active and have made great new members. A third have dropped out due to circumstances that happen to anyone regardless of class standing (finances, too busy with their workload/other extracurriculars, family problems, realize sorority life isn't for them). The last third are the ones who deal with the feelings of "not having a connection". I think this occurs because it's hard to find as much in common with freshman who are very "OMGZYAY COLLEGE!" when a lot of these girls have been independent for the past 2-3 years. For transfers it takes a lot more effort on their part to take initiative and get to know upperclassmen girls outside of the pledge class and not just wait for the sisterhood to happen.

Personally I felt this especially after my best friend (also a transfer) in my pledge class was planning on dropping. I didn't live on campus and couldn't bond as much with those in my pledge class who did. But it has gotten a lot better since I've taken on a little and have gotten more involved in the house (especially now during recruitment!).

Also, I just calculated the numbers right now and upperclassmen (sophomores and up) comprise 33% of those signed up for recruitment with almost 20% being junior transfers.

ElleBud and CaliTransfer are both correct. UCLA takes tons of transfer students, that's just the nature of the UC system. So, CaliTransfer is spot on that probably one third of the PNM's this year will be third year transfers or second years who are mostly girls who matriculated at UCLA as freshman but did not go thru recruitment then for whatever reason...or, they did rush but didn't "like" the sorority they got a bid from. Dum de dum dum...and guess what? Those very same young ladies will likely fair MUCH better the second time around because they are not in that competitive numbers pool with the freshman.

To reiterate, the sororities are not "forced" to take anyone. But they are required to fulfill a non-freshman quota. A sorority can't just say "we don't want to take any junior transfers". So, they do try to get the girls that they want from that pool of PNM's. Would they much rather fill those slots with freshman? For the most part, YES. Could most of the UCLA chapters fill all quota numbers with just freshman? YES! But, that is not how it works at UCLA. So, they just deal with it.

And by the way CaliTransfer, I want to wish you and your chapter a wonderful recruitment! With 900 girls registered for recruitment at a school with 12 chapters, there is certainly a place for every girl and plenty of girls to satisfy the wants and needs of every sorority!

Let us know how the week is progressing and what the mood on the row is!

Good Luck!

As the RFM Specialist and NPC Area Advisor for UCLA, I can tell you that this is not true. It is up to each national organization to determine whether or not their chapter wants to fulfill their upperclass Quota, just like every other campus that has an upperclass Quota. It is my understanding that each of the national organizations on campus have decided to participate in the upperclass Quota. The upperclass Quota is determined using the same Quota Range system that is used for freshmen women. There are no mandatory carry figures.

The chapters themselves voted to have an upperclass Quota, as the demographics of UCLA PNMs had shifted and we were losing great women from recruitment because chapters wanted to affiliate freshmen to maintain their class balance.

Thank you so much for the clarification! :) That makes sense.

Just a clarification, because I find sorority rush so interesting compared to fraternity rush, then would that mean that the national organization is dictating to the individual chapter what to do? If it's up to the national organization to determine whether the individual chapter fulfills the separate quota, then I think the spirit of BlueOwl's post could still ring true in that chapters could feel like they are forced to take women they may not necessarily want. If it's the individual chapters making the decision then BlueOwl's point is moot though.

Also, you say the chapters voted for it, but would that mean that only a simple majority would have had to vote yes? I could see many chapters loving this policy, but I could also see how certain chapters that are used to being really selective may be frustrated that they "have" to give bids to a group of girls who may not have made the cut as freshmen. Once again, that only applies if the individual chapters are being told to take the full separate quota, whether from their nationals, their adviser or Panhellenic.

I cannot profess to know the inner workings of the various NPC groups. My guess is that most groups get their chapters to understand that it is advantageous to them to participate fully in the upperclass Quota, since these women make up 33% of the women going through recruitment. BlueOwl's point was that the college panhellenic was forcing groups to take women. This is incorrect.

Actually, a sorority can say "we don't want to take any junior transfers." No group is forced to affiliate anyone by the college panhellenic. And the reason why we have an upperclass quota is that most of the UCLA chapters cannot fill their Quota numbers with freshmen, that is why the numbers are separated out.

With respect to retention of juniors, I am not sure some of the "data" on here is accurate, but I also don't get class year breakdowns of chapter sizes. There was higher than usual attrition last year, but not the year before.

I'm Panhellenic Advisor at a chapter at UCLA (okay, kinda obvious which one from my GreekChat name) plus get asked to assist with Recruitment each year. In order to help with Recruitment, you have to know the rules (or you're not a lot of help), so I'm happy to provide info specific to UCLA.

I'd have to check the overall drop rate of non-freshman NMs (before initiation), but the All-Row deactivation rate (after initiation) is a much higher % for women who join their 1st year than those that join as Upperclassmen on the Row. If wonderful women are deactivating, a 2nd question (for a new thread) would be: After receiving an invitation to join and a Member/NM deactivates, where does the responsibility lie? Enhancing Retention Skills within the sisterhood, or was being in a sorority just not a fit for that Member/NM or didn't meet her expectations? Only 13% of UCLA students are in Greek organizations. That # includes these Greek letter organizations: multi-ethnic, traditionally ethnic, multicultural, religious and field-of-study based fraternities and sororities. The average Greek percentage at most universities is 15% of undergrad enrollment. One interesting note is that UCLA, & several other west coast schools, have more 1st generation college students and many more 1st generation Greek members (if his/her parents also went to college).

Back to topic -- yes, the UCLA non-Freshman quota is 1/3 of total PMNs (that go to Pref), so the Freshmen quota is double (unless you want more upperclass NMs.) No house is required to take any upperclassmen, but you'd have a smaller chapter . Two years ago, 1 of the largest sororities didn't take quota because they felt like their NM class were THE select women who met their ideals. If PNMs don't meet the requirements of a chapter, no matter what class year, no house is forced to give out as many invitations as quota allows. Since the competition for non-freshmen is intense, chapters need to be either be more competitive during Recruitment or give invitations to only the upperclassmen your organization deems deserving and participate in Winter & Spring Recruitment for additional worthy members (... or if you go to a college where there is only 1 sorority, then you're the only game in town).

As for voting, there are 2 blocks of voting on PNMs: Freshmen voting and Upperclassmen voting. To be clear, voting members do not decide between a 1st year vs. a 3rd year, but vote on the Freshmen women, then vote on the Soph/Jr/Sr women separately. So, they are inviting back THEIR top number of Freshmen and THEIR top amount of Upperclassmen they're allowed to ask back each day (& the PNMs who accept those invitations are the ones who come back, then there's a "float" list since 100% return rate isn't achievable for any sorority). UCLA's Greek system is an opportunity for all years to go Greek -- not exclusive to just 1st years -- otherwise, fantastic women would be disadvantaged at all sororities, merely for being a Sophomore/Junior/Senior. There's a word for that: Ageism (def. -a tendency to regard older persons as debilitated, unworthy of attention, or unsuitable for employment).

When I became involved at my chapter at UCLA seven years ago (& moving from The South where Rush is intense & was a Chapter Advisor, City Alumnae Officer & Regional Officer there), the UCLA quota was low-to-mid 20s, just over 300 participating and only about 6 sororities made quota out of 11. Panhellenic total was around 100 and there was a huge disparity in the numbers of the big chapters and small chapters -- a definite Recruitment Advantage or Disadvantage, depending on what house you were in. Then the university got new Panhell. & IFC Directors and quota started increasing. The Greek Life Directors have done (& continue to do) an AWESOME job of building the Greek system. (It's not a job for them, it's a lifestyle. LOL) Last year, 715 women going thru, quota was 43, and most chapters took more (details below). The increase in Recruitment numbers is how Alpha Chi Omega was able to recolonize (they still had a chapter house), and the 2 other chapters that still own houses on the row and want to recolonize, get excited when they see this success. In the early 1980s, UCLA had 23 sororities with physical sorority houses on The Row extending south of The W Hotel -- now it's 12, with the addition of AChiO 2 years ago.

With nearly 900 women registered, it looks like quota will be even bigger. In addition to Recruitment Quota, if a chapter is not yet to Panhellenic total, those groups can take the amount of NMs to get to Row total ON Bid Day, who have gone thru all of Rush. (No crushing disappointment on bid day, then the stress of going thru the COB process.) I think (hope) this is becoming the standard at more schools (though I know a few large universities where it is not.) So, PNM classes can have 1 more, 2 more, 10 more (etc) than Recruitment Quota. Last year, I believe about 8 or 9 sororities took over total due to this and the International student NMs.

International students who are studying abroad and only at UCLA for 1 year have a chance to be a part of Greek Life as well. International students are not counted in Recruitment Total, and you can have even more new sisters from London, Paris, Brazil or Hong Kong (for example). These are women with top GPAs and non-Freshmen.

After Spring 2011 Recruitment, I believe 10 out of 12 sororities were either at total, above total or were just slightly under Chapter Total (10 members or less under overall total). Panhellenic actually lowered total before Spring Recruitment to even the playing field and 8 sororities participated. The amount of women going thru was the highest in Spring than in several past years. If anyone has actually #s of how many participated and how many accepted invitations, please add those stats. As you can see, the Greek Life Directors have worked hard to grow the Greek system every year and help make ALL the chapters stronger.

If the non-Freshmen women who become members are "extras" or women who wouldn't get in normally or less than desirable -- don't give out invitations and participate in COB/Continuous Open Bidding. (It's difficult for transfers to get accepted at UCLA without at least a 3.0GPA. It does happen, but definitely not the norm.) UCLA has tough entrance standards (#25 on U.S. News & World Report's list of top universities, just released last week), and it is has a large transfer student population. Since it's tough for transfers to get in to UCLA, the university actually assists in the Recruitment process -- PNMs must have high grades, volunteering, leadership and involvement in organizations (in high school &/or from their transfer college) just to gain admission.

The Recruitment attrition rate (decrease in participating women from start to finish) at UCLA is less than 15%! This school is looked at by other university Greek Life offices with envy. If the quality of women a chapter is seeking is not going through Recruitment & only 13% of undergrads are Greek, there's 87% who didn't go through the process. That's a lot of potential if you want to look outside the box.

Didn't initially intend to write this much, but wanted to give more information on UCLA Recruitment and Greek Life. Okay now -- can I get an "8 clap"???!!!

That was an incredibly informative post! I have some friends who joined the chapter you advise here at UCLA as upperclassmen actually.

I had no idea we had 23 sororities at one point! It's unfortunate that they are no longer around. I know that we use the old Phi Mu house as home base for the PNMs and Rho Gammas during recruitment.

It's getting late here on Hilgard Avenue but we're all excited for the start of Round 1 parties tomorrow!

To ChioLu!!! Thank you for so much great information!! I confess that I do get my information in bits and pieces from my daughter, and her view may be a tad skewed at times! She did call me this evening and said that the first round parties will be the biggest ever due to the huge recruitment enrollment this year. I think that is the sign of a great recruitment week to come for all of the sororities!
ChioLu...the Chi Omega chapter at UCLA is just amazing! You must be so proud of those girls! Good luck to them this week!!

My daughter's sorority is prepared, polished and ready to go! So excited for them all!!

And finally, here's your 8-Clap (minus the claps!):p:

U
C
LLLLLLLLL
A

UCLA FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT!!

I'm a Trojan, but I still have to wish you all an awesome recruitment. :) You may be our cross-town rivals, but you're also our neighbors and some of my very close HS friends are about to start recruitment there. Best of luck!

I have no idea what a float list is.

[QUOTE=BlueOwl;2092563]Recruitment begins this Wednesday at University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA). Anyone have a pnm going through?? My daughter is a senior this year and she said that early numbers indicate that a huge number of girls are rushing this year, in the neighborhood of 900.


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I can't stop thinking about UCLA as Beauxbatons after the wonderful Hogwarts recruitment story!

But, before this one goes further: shouldn't this thread be relocated to the Sorority Recruitment forum?

You are right, it should be in a recruitment forum. How do I move the thread? Help, anyone?

Does anyone knowledgeable about UCLA recruitment have any advice for continuous open bidding? I'm a transfer looking to join Greek life through this method. It was mentioned that some of the larger chapters have some dropouts of upperclassmen after initiation and so have spots to fill with other desirable women.

If a chapter is over total, even if they have some drop-outs they won't be able to add new girls. They have to fall below chapter total in order to do so. If you are looking for a COB opportunity, I'd probably be aiming at the smaller chapters, not the larger ones.

Campus Total=115
Quota last year=27+16=43

If this information is accurate and quota this year is similar to last, I would hazard a guess that most of the houses will NOT be doing COB. Consider the houses that didn't make quota this year, not the "top house" that doesn't have great retention.

Total at UCLA is median chapter size rounded down at the conclusion of bid matching. It was set at 150 at the conclusion of today's bid matching.

Quota this year was 38+16.

Putting aside that all of the chapters at UCLA, regardless of size, are strong, there will be opportunities for 1/2 of the chapters to COB. If you are interested in COB you should let the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Relations know and they will pass your name on to chapters who are COB'ing.

Happy news! My UCLA rec girl (who my sister and I have known since she was in elementary school) went Kappa! So happy that she and my sister get to be sisters.

Here are the final numbers for Fall 2011 Recruitment at UCLA

Basic Quota: 54 (Freshmen 38 + Upperclassmen 16)
GRPs Matching Quota: Fr: 10, Up: 9
Alpha Chi Omega 39+6
Alpha Delta Pi 40+18
Alpha Epsilon Phi n/a
Alpha Phi 38+17
Chi Omega 41+18
Delta Delta Delta 29+ 16
Delta Gamma 39+18
Gamma Phi Beta 40+17
Kappa Alpha Theta 39+17
Kappa Delta 39+18
Kappa Kappa Gamma 40+16
Pi Beta Phi 40+18

NINE of the 11 houses participating took MORE than New Member quota. AEPhi did not participate in formal rush. (Chapter Quota is now 150. In Spring 2011, chapter quota was 135.)

Number of women receiving bids 603, out of 787 that went completely thru 1st round. 908 initially registered (some never showed to 1st day, some dropped out after the 1st day of Open Houses or before the 2nd day of Open Houses finished. And some may have just registered for Recruitment to go to the Greek event after Bruin Bash.)

77% of the women who went through Recruitment received bids on Bid Day. 87% of those women received their 1st choice and 99% of PNMs who went to Pref received bids (in 2010, it was 93% receiving bids).

Chapter Initiates New Members Total
Alpha Chi Omega 60 45 105
Alpha Delta Pi 108 58 166
Alpha Epsilon Phi* 12 0 12
Alpha Phi 96 55 151
Chi Omega 105 59 164
Delta Gamma 103 57 160
Delta Delta Delta 76 45 121
Gamma Phi Beta 101 57 158
Kappa Alpha Theta 108 56 164
Kappa Delta 89 57 146
Kappa Kappa Gamma 95 56 151
Pi Beta Phi 76 58 134
Totals: 1118 603 1632

AMAZING Recruitment for UCLA! Fantastic #s! The usual addition of new members is at/almost 1/4 -- this year it's over 1/3.
Five fantastic chapters are participating in Continuous Open Bidding (COB). If you know someone at UCLA who's interested in Greek Life, have them contact the Office of Greek Life at 310-825-6322 or fsr@ucla.edu
Website is www.greeklife.ucla.edu