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-   -   Sororities that don't have strong Formal rush? (https://greekchat.com/gcforums/showthread.php?t=26745)

James 11-28-2002 03:21 PM

Sororities that don't have strong Formal rush?
 
I was wondering. A lot of our emphasis here seems to be on chapters that are in big Greek systems.

Those sorority chapters mostly don't have to recruit, girls just flock to them. In fact, they usually have to cut heavily.

But what do the NPC nationals do for their chapters tha are on campuses with much smaller systems?

What is the strategy they give?

Becaue a lot of times on those campuses, Formal Rush is NOT a big deal at all. On those campuses deferred Rush is the standard.

ITs been my experience that the girls are as bad at Recruiting as the boys, so I was wondering exactly what each of your nationals has in place for chapters in smaller Greek systems.

In other words, how are they supposed to go about getting new members lol.

crystalline 11-28-2002 03:56 PM

In the words of our old recruitment chair, "Continuous Open Bidding is your friend!"

At my school, formal rush is more of a pain in the a$$ than anything else. Most freshmen don't want to go through the hassle. I've never been through it myself, and I was a Rho Chi last year, so this year will be my first on "the other side". But from what I've heard, it's just akward on both sides.

James 11-28-2002 04:12 PM

But what do they tell you to do?

I mean just posting signs for "info" nights can't be the end all be all.

Dorm Storm? What?

crystalline 11-28-2002 04:18 PM

We have wish lists, and then we have events and invite the people on our wish lists. I have no idea what dorm storm is. Most of our girls are involved in a lot of things, so it is easy to make the wish list full.

breathesgelatin 11-28-2002 04:36 PM

Well, I come from a small school with a rush that is just as huge (percentage-wise) and just as competitive as the big state schools. (See the thread Rush at Washington and Lee) Part of this stems from the fact that people who want a great liberal arts education and strong Greek life flock to the school.

Another thing is--every freshmen hall is automatically assigned to a Rho Chi. The Rho Chi holds informational rush meetings even BEFORE registration for rush. She'll get the hall together one night for pizza or something, invite everyone to come, and will just talk about how much fun rush is and how it's a great way to meet upperclassmen (because of rush rules and deferred rush, often hard to do at our school). By the time of registration there has already been a meeting or two and most women are getting sort of curious at least... The Rho Chis do a great job of presenting rush as fun and overlooking some of the stressful and competitive qualities of it... Mainly because very few woman are cut from all of the houses in rush; it's pretty easy to find a place if you are truly dedicated to it....

ilovemyglo 11-28-2002 04:46 PM

James,
My school was an in between. We weren't big, and Greek Life wasn't considered bad or good, it just was. At my campus there wasn't much Greek unity, I guess you could say, as a matter of fact formal recruitment is really hard because every one wants the same girls because not many go through (although our numbers are growing every year, this yaer quota was 40, the year I pledge 30). Anyway with only seven sororities you can imagine it is tough! Our nationals really just helped us with COB and improving our formal recruitment skills in order to be more competetive with the other chapters. It is tough, but we manage, even if we are a smaller chapter.

James 11-28-2002 04:50 PM

You have deferred Rush, and the rushees still stay interested into their second semester?

Is the arrangement of the Rho Chis in the Halls formal with the school? That's amazing.



Quote:

Originally posted by breathesgelatin
Well, I come from a small school with a rush that is just as huge (percentage-wise) and just as competitive as the big state schools. (See the thread Rush at Washington and Lee) Part of this stems from the fact that people who want a great liberal arts education and strong Greek life flock to the school.

Another thing is--every freshmen hall is automatically assigned to a Rho Chi. The Rho Chi holds informational rush meetings even BEFORE registration for rush. She'll get the hall together one night for pizza or something, invite everyone to come, and will just talk about how much fun rush is and how it's a great way to meet upperclassmen (because of rush rules and deferred rush, often hard to do at our school). By the time of registration there has already been a meeting or two and most women are getting sort of curious at least... The Rho Chis do a great job of presenting rush as fun and overlooking some of the stressful and competitive qualities of it... Mainly because very few woman are cut from all of the houses in rush; it's pretty easy to find a place if you are truly dedicated to it....


nauadpi 11-28-2002 04:53 PM

At my school there are certain years where rush is great and others where it just stinks. So we go for the wonders of cor. The main thing is that many of the time we setup a table in the union with info about an event. We also take the list of girls who dropped out of rush and try to contact them. Also we invite people we meet in our classes. Also we use our chapter website as a way to get interested people to one look at us and too have info to contact us with. Other ways that we get girls is just the whole signs factor. I personally did not go through formal recruitment, but adpi was having a recruitment weekend where they just ran a bunch of events all in one weekend. So I saw signs around then went by the table at the union and desided to sign up as in an interest in going. So that friday night I went to an event and then just started hanging out with adpi's. After a bit I was offered a bid. I know much of the time on my campus we will take perspective members out to just whereever we decide to hang out.

breathesgelatin 11-28-2002 10:23 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by James
You have deferred Rush, and the rushees still stay interested into their second semester?

Is the arrangement of the Rho Chis in the Halls formal with the school? That's amazing.


For the first question, yes, most definately. I think it increases interest, because although many people do come to the school with the express purpose of pledging, a lot of people who never saw themselves as Greek warm up to it when they see how friendly the Greek system is and all the advantages it brings. I probably wouldn't have rushed first thing fall term myself. I think it's a big advantage, because it gives us time to break down bad Greek stereotypes.

And yes, the arrangement of Rho Chis in the halls is formal with the school. Set up through the Panhel advisor and the Dean of Freshmen's Office. Way cool, eh? It helps to encourage Greek life as the typical and fun thing to do.

James 11-29-2002 12:58 AM

Thats a fricking brilliant idea. Especially if it could be co-run with fraternities. (If us guys can get our collective stuff together).

Is that all the Rho Chi's do? Are they just there to promote Greek Life? Or do they have another function also?

How long do they stay with the Freshmen Hall? As in days, weeks, the semester?

Fill us in with more details as you get a chance. Thanks.



Quote:

Originally posted by breathesgelatin

And yes, the arrangement of Rho Chis in the halls is formal with the school. Set up through the Panhel advisor and the Dean of Freshmen's Office. Way cool, eh? It helps to encourage Greek life as the typical and fun thing to do.


crystalline 11-29-2002 05:44 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by breathesgelatin


Another thing is--every freshmen hall is automatically assigned to a Rho Chi. The Rho Chi holds informational rush meetings even BEFORE registration for rush. She'll get the hall together one night for pizza or something, invite everyone to come, and will just talk about how much fun rush is and how it's a great way to meet upperclassmen (because of rush rules and deferred rush, often hard to do at our school). By the time of registration there has already been a meeting or two and most women are getting sort of curious at least... The Rho Chis do a great job of presenting rush as fun and overlooking some of the stressful and competitive qualities of it... Mainly because very few woman are cut from all of the houses in rush; it's pretty easy to find a place if you are truly dedicated to it....

That is such a great idea!

breathesgelatin 11-29-2002 01:28 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by James
Thats a fricking brilliant idea. Especially if it could be co-run with fraternities. (If us guys can get our collective stuff together).

Is that all the Rho Chi's do? Are they just there to promote Greek Life? Or do they have another function also?

How long do they stay with the Freshmen Hall? As in days, weeks, the semester?

Fill us in with more details as you get a chance. Thanks.

The Rho Chi's are basically there to provide all the information about rush. Let me try to describe my experience with my Rho Chi's freshmen year. BTW, all of the W&L dorms are co-ed by floor, so on my hall there were only females.

I had two Rho Chi's. One was actually my Dorm Counselor, because the DCs are strongly encouraged to also be PXs. A few weeks into the semester, my DC/PX let us know thru email that we would be having a meeting to find out more about rush. (During the summer, we'd already received a mailing about summer and fall rush rules.) We had the meeting at a local pizza shop that's really popular with the college crowd (great idea--escape from the dining hall!). The whole hall came (after this meeting, a few of the people who decided they were not going to rush did not come to the meetings). The PXs gave us info sheets about the dates of rush and some of the things that would happen. They described how it was a great way to meet people and other things. They described what was needed to register for rush--5 pictures, simple form, and $25. The low fee is a big thing because you get a nice long-sleeved t-shirt. A lot of girls look at it like "Well, if I don't pledge, it's a free shirt!"

So throughout the semester we had meetings. One right before our fall break, because registration is right afterward. Then there was another meeting before Thanksgiving to discuss clothes in detail. After Thanksgiving there was a meeting to explain strict silence over Christmas and during rush week. They gave us lots of sheets explaining everything and answered any questions we had about how it all worked, what to be scared about. Then during rush week we would all meet on hall and walk over together to sorority row. It definately worked very well because you already knew and trusted your PXs long before rush. Plus, my DC/PX was very very close because she lived on hall with us and was always there for us.

Hope that helps.

shadokat 12-02-2002 11:27 AM

We have deferred recruitment, and to keep the interest of Greek Life for freshmen throughout the fall, we have social events with the Rho Chis and the freshmen women. Sometimes they are more educationally type things, others are just coffee and bagels as a study break during mid-terms. Cards and emails are sent out to keep freshmen informed of Greek Life and to keep the idea fresh in their minds. It's led to a slight increase in recruitment.

FuzzieAlum 12-02-2002 12:33 PM

Just to point out ... deferred rush is not the opposite of formal rush. Deferred refers to when you have it; formal just means you have at least two NPC groups on campus to do rush together instead of on their own. You can have mega-strong deferred formal rushes, as Breathes from Washington & Lee suggests. And you can have fall formal rush and still have an abysmal turnout.

sdidavide 12-02-2002 12:50 PM

I come from a very big school with a very small greek system. There are 3 NPC sororities on campus. Fall Formal rush is a big deal for us because we get the women power of 60 girls recruiting and the money form Pan Hell. BUT... only half of our fall pledge class comes from Formal rush... we get the other half during COB when the girls who knew they wanted to be in our sorority come out or when the new girls bring thier friends.

Little E 12-02-2002 12:56 PM

I can not fathom having Rush work so well. We work so hard to get only 10 women. Anti-Greek sentiments are so strong here that it makes it very hard. Unfortunatly getting adivce is equally as hard. Beta Theta Pi recently tried to re-colonize here and until their Traveling Counselor came they didn't realize how much of a struggle it was going to be. National has a difficult time because many of the tried and true method seem to fall short here. (We are the only NPC) And now a third group wants to form, but the local and us are already struggling below 30.
Sorry lost the point
More support from the school would be great. But it takes a lot of heart to get the numbers every year. We get stressed and we have to rush ALL YEAR LONG. Anyone with ideas please let us know! It is just so hard to get passed the sterotype and get an image that is positive (esp with the hazing the local does)
Sorry if it was incoherent, but we work hard and don't stop.

RUSH=365 days, 24/7

Tau Love
Lil E

33girl 12-02-2002 01:18 PM

Sometimes I think we would get better numbers if we weren't so worried about numbers.

When rush is just a big stress and the fun of welcoming new sisters gets lost in worrying over the girls you DIDN'T get, I think it shows and really turns a lot of people off to Greek life in general. If you don't have a big house to fill and you are happy with having 12 sisters, you should be allowed to have 12 sisters and not get a lot of crap about it.

At small schools, there are years where the rushee pool just sucks and there is no one who would fit with your chapter. It happens. You shouldn't be forced to take women you don't want just to get numbers up. Clashing personalities the chapter more than small numbers. I think the nationals would like to believe that once we give women bids they're magically transformed, but that just is not the case.

Glitter650 12-02-2002 02:24 PM

My school has a VERY small greek system..(3 npc soror) and rush ISN'T a huge deal AT ALL... we're lucky to get 100 girls going through. So we do LOTS of COB... we post signs, hold events, and table by the student union. It's ALOT of word of mouth, and it definitely is harder since the girls defintely don't "flock" to us at my school.
My sorority actually has a plan called Vision which is a system for COBing.. I won't get into the details because it's a half day presentation when nationals come a do it for you... but it includes wish lists and such. My chapter hasn't really ever used it since the way it works doesn't really fit with formal rush, but for spring we're definitely going to implement it.

FuzzieAlum 12-02-2002 02:30 PM

I agree with 33girl in sentiment, but I think that sadly most of the time there is a house (or equivalent) to worry about. Even if the advisors and nationals weren't putting on pressure, even if all the other chapters weren't that much larger, you'd still have to make the mortgage, or get the money together for repairs, or have X number of sisters to keep your university-designated space. Chapters can and do say "screw the space," but experience has shown time and time again that it does not work to be unhoused when the other sororities are - whether that's fair or not. You have to work three times as hard to be half the size of the other chapters.

As far as the original question - my campus is one of those where as many people join via informal rush as formal. They've swapped formal rush back and forth between fall and spring without much impact.

Generally here's what the chapters do: The semester formal rush isn't being held, most sororities will have maybe three weeks of casual events - movie nights, coffeehouse hangouts, ice skating. They'll poster like mad. They get a big class that way. Also, they give out "reading days" bids. These are the days at the end of the year between classes and exams, and chapters, even the at ceiling ones, can give out bids to replace their graduating seniors.

The chapters that are smaller will really put the CONTINUOUS into Continuous Open Bidding. I'm not kidding, events month after month ... it's really wearying for the sisters, and I'm not sure the results justify it.

The thing is, the way most girls join is that they hadn't considered Greek life, but their friend Susie joins Mu Mu. They hang out with Susie and her sisters sometime and think, "Hey, they're cool. Maybe I'll rush. I'll look at Mu Mu, since they're cool, and I'll check our Nu Nu since they have this great reputation." The only way a girl looks at smaller Pi Pi is if a friend is a member, and with fewer members there are just fewer friends to draw in that way.

adduncan 12-02-2002 02:30 PM

Can alumni help?
 
I'm wondering if the Greek alumni can exert any pressure or influence on the school to facilitate Greek life on campus. Just an idea I had. BU has similar issues: low rush turnout, membership numbers WAY below the artificially-imposed ceiling, and the SAO treating all clubs (including Greeks) like an assembly line. FWIW, this is NOT a small school, but anti-Greek sentiment (or just plain apathy) are very high.

The thought crossed my mind that if any Greek alumni, (in the case of BU, particularly DDD and LXA, since they were founded there) decided to put their collective foot down and demand support for a traditional Greek system, the school might pay attention. It's amazing what the suggestion of witholding donations can do......

Maybe calling in the cavalry in the form of alumni organizations and getting them involved at the school's admin level could improve things.

Just a thought from left field. :p
Adrienne

shadokat 12-04-2002 11:07 AM

If you're an alum and can afford to make nice donations to your school, they won't have such a bad attitude about greeks. And as alums of your organization, make sure that you keep contact with your chapters and know what's going on and if there are issues that need to be worked on to reduce risk management, hazing and other issues.

gazta02 12-04-2002 11:54 PM

i come from a school where there is only one NPC sorority, yet we have the hardest time getting girls to join. our chapter is very strong and has a good image on campus with most people, except for an organization(which happen to get the girls we want) who put crazy thoughts into their heads about how greeks are the devil!
another problem is that our school is what you would call a commuter college. we have no campus housing or dorms. most students that attend are from the surrounding areas, and despise going there. they also have part time jobs and live with parents.
our chapter only has 23 members, but we continue to stay alive. our international office continues to be amazed with the amount of things we accomplish.
formal rush on our campus is considered a big deal to us. we recruit like crazy and sometimes we'll have 7 or 8 girls come to our parties. sidewalks are usually covered in chalk, posters and flyers are everywhere, and sheet banners are hung in various places. we even attend a freshman orientation and hand out information to incoming students. during spring, we have more recruitment parties, and if we want more girls we have crown parties.
in august we had 20 girls come through recruitment, and we extended bids to 9. our numbers are starting to go up, but it's just taking time and a lot of effort. we unfortunately do not have the luxury of girls flocking to us, we have to get out on campus and do a lot of leg work.

EGDeepher 12-18-2002 09:34 PM

Our school is very small with only 3 sororities. It's an engineering school so there are only 450 women at max. The campus prohibits pledging freshman in the fall, so our formal rush takes place. We usually get about 70 girls that go through rush and about 12 get bids fromeach house.

FuzzieAlum 12-19-2002 12:34 PM

I've wondered this before ... at schools where the Greek system is smaller and/or not as competitive, why do so few girls who go through rush end up with bids? It's not as if there wouldn't be places for almost all of them.

I understand some women will be cut for grades and that there is always a psycho to weed out. But in EGDeepher's example, 36 out of 70 women got bids, and I doubt the other 34 all had crappy grades. At my school, it was something like 70 girls sign up, 50 actually show up for first party, quota is 8 or 9, and at most 25 girls get bids.

Why do so many girls drop (or bother to pay $ and sign up and not even show)? At my school we always suspected it was the high ceiling of 50 - you can do the math and see that even if you always get quota you can do COB, too - which led PNMs to drop out without consequences and rush their first choice informally rather than take their chances and get their second choice. But surely that can't be the case everywhere.

Are we turning off girls by the formal rush system? Are they really deciding Greek life isn't for them? What gives?

MoxieGrrl 12-19-2002 02:27 PM

FuzzieAlum: In my experience, it seems that at the smaller schools who have only 3 or 4 sororites and Greek Life tends to be popular, people are buzzing more about recruitment and sadly, the sororities' stereotypes/reputations. When the student body is small and everyone knows everyone and will know you as "Kristi the XYZ", it seems very important to some girls to get the "right" house. They don't necessarily want to be Greek....they want to be popular.

Edited to add: Oh yeah, and every house seems to want the same 10/20 girls. The "it" houses know that they can not bid some girls during formal b/c those same girls will be hanging around waiting for COB. Seen it happen a million times. :rolleyes:

kiqualey12 12-19-2002 02:58 PM

EWU is a kinda small school and we have 4 sororities and 4 frats and formal recruitment is a big deal. I just went through it this fall and there are so many girls, like hundreds who go through it. It's so overwhelming, but it's a great experience. We do it in 2 weeks, 4 parties on Saturday and Sunday then the following weekend 3 on Friday and then Preference. There are Alpha Chi's (they won't let us call them Rho Chi's anymore because it's the same symbol as some pharmaceutical company) that go around the dorms, because that's how I learned about it. I think that that helps spark interest in Greeks and helps with getting people to rush. Greek Life on campus is a big thing and for the most part we have a really good reputation on campus. Yeah, not very many girls didn't get a bid and you would think out of hundreds, that there would be more that didn't. The only thing that annoyed me was that I heard that a certain sorority on campus made girls go alum because they wanted more new girls. We get the majority of our girls during fall formal recruitment and very few during cob'ing. Our sorority is the only one on campus without a house, but I don't think that that puts us at a disadvantage, in fact, I sometimes think that it's a plus because we don't have to give out bids just to make sure that we pay the mortgage, we give out bids to girls that are truly AOII. :D

APhiAngel 12-19-2002 03:09 PM

At my school, we have a very small greek system as well. We only have 2 NPC sororities, and it is very hard for us to even get 50 girsl to go through fromal rush. Are we doing something wrong? We have tried so many different things. It is very hard for us to get people interested in comming to meetings, we even post flyers all over campus. We get some replys, but mostly people just disreguard them. Do you guys have any suggestions for us?

FuzzieAlum 12-19-2002 03:47 PM

I would discount that rumor about making girls go alum! For one thing, it wouldn't make them any larger, and it might even make them smaller.

Ceiling (or total) limits the total number of girls that can be a member of any chapter. The only way to go over that is through formal rush. Let's say total is 50, and quota is 15. Even if the chapter has 49 girls going in, they can still get quota and go over to 64, but then they are "stuck" until their numbers drop below 50 or the next formal comes around.

But let's say they "force" someone to go alum, however that is done. Let's say they make ten girls do it before formal. They're down to 39 then, and they get 15 through formal (which would be harder to do anyway with fewer girls to rush), they would end up with 54 - still big, but not as big.

Even if the best scenario they could at best replace the girls they alummed, so they wouldn't end up larger but the same size. And why would they prefer "new" girls over "old" ones? That doesn't make sense.

This sounds like the kind of rumor some unkind sorority started to hurt another, or an misunderstanding of an explanation. It's entirely possible a chapter lost several girls. However, as an outsider you'll probably never find out why, and if you do that's bad PR on their part, since chapter troubles should be chapter business.

EGDeepher 12-19-2002 08:50 PM

In response to Fuzzy Alum the reason so few girls get bids is because of the houses. Only 1 of our sororities has a house, so it tends to be most popular. It's sad but you would be surprised how many people would pledge for a house. The other sorority is local and many girls do not want to be a part of a local sorority so their numbers tend to be smaller. Because of cieling each house is allowed to give out the SAME number of bids. Therefore a lot of girls get cut simply because the house they want to be in has no room for them.


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