Summer Rush Begins!!!
 

Just got the first batch of rush applications in today...some absolute monster studs, and of course some major duds.

I'm really super excited to actually see these guys are!

I'll post here regularly, "rush from the other side", and since it's summer rush, it's probably different from what most of you are used to.

right on....
 

first rush story of the new season...
can't wait.

Its like watching a TV show... lol

I think at one time we did summer rush... and a winter rush... but now we dont...

Wondering when the best time is for my son to send in his application. They haven't even had graduation yet.

I want him to keep an open mind, but one fraternity is in constant contact and inviting him (and his friends) to every single activity allowed. I am afraid he will make up his mind before he gets a chance to meet and feel comfortable with other fraternities.

Any suggestions???

I sure would appeciate some help from the guys.
Pretty please with a cherry on top!
PMs are good!

Hey Beta
I just got a call from your house
ill definatly check you guys out this summer!

Okay, just to let you guys know this thread will be updated by me, probably once a week throughout the rush season, and that update will occur likely on sundays when I get back from Nebraska and actually have stories to tell.

So far, all that is new that rushees have started getting phone calls, as sthpolrd mentioned. The process of going through the rush applications is by no means simple. My house tries to set minimum guidelines of who we will call based on ACT score and GPA. Some rushees based on this info will not be contacted by our house. Other rushees who may have similar scores will be called b/c they know someone in the house. It really is a subjective process. I know that the first major decision for the rush chairs will be whether or not we will have a barbeque on thursday night, whether enough rushees will make it into town for it to be worthwhile.

First big rush event is out in Western Nebraska on May 24th, Ogallala to be exact. Only three rushees came to it last year but we signed one of them, plus all the brothers had a great time after the rush party, I wasn't able to make it there, but heard the stories.



JAM, my advice would be to look over the application. If there is a space for the applicant to say they do/do not want to be contacted before graduation, then make your selection and send that app in! If there's not a space to make your preference known, and you want to wait to be contacted, then wait until graduation has passed. I'm not sure exactly how summer fraternity rush goes in the South, so I don't know how it will affect your son's ability to meet with all the houses (which I agree is important). For us here in NE, summer rush is for the most part the only time that houses sign guys and rush ends before school starts. But on the whole I'd say it would be better to get info in sooner rather than later. I'm assuming that by getting the app in then other house will begin to call since they will have his info.

Good luck guys! Betarulz, I will enjoy reading another side of recruitment. Thank you for sharing your experiences.

DITTO


Thanks Betarulz. I have NO IDEA how fraternity rush really works.
I appreciate all the help I can get. I'll check out the application today!

yeah Betarulz, I think we all appreciate hearing a guy's version of rush! Especially since summer rush is unfamiliar territory for so many of us. Good luck to your chapter and keep us updated!

LOL, I read the title of this thread and I think "sorority boy" all the ay.


hahahahahahahaahah "YAY SUMMER RUSH!" I'm not drinking haterade or anything but that's funny.

Ok, trying to study more now.

Rush has been in full swing for a solid week now, and last night was the first rush event of the summer, and pretty much the first time the brothers were able to meet the rushees.

Had a Barbeque at the house, which is a weekly Thursday night event. I couldn't make it b/c I still haven't found a job here in KC, so to make to Lincoln wasn't a possibility. All the information I'm getting is from our chapter's message board, which is a great tool for the rush chairs in getting the word out about guys.

8 rushees came out for the BBQ. Pretty good numbers for this early, considering a lot of the rushees have yet to graduate. (Some rushees ask to not be contacted until they have graduated, so the % of rushees going through rush is only partial).

2 of those 8 guys were given bid cards, so we may have our first signings sometime this week. Most of the reviews have been positive of all the guys that were there, but a couple were apparently difficult to get a read on, and one guy was very quiet, and only one person had a decent talk with him. We have a bunch of guys from one city in NE that came together and from the comments looks like they were difficult to get on an individual basis, which I think is an important thing to see, since it's unlikely we will sign all of them.

Tommorow is a rush event in Ogallala, which should get guys from Western Nebraska. Again I won't be able to head out that way, but I'll post more comments when they come in.

Next Saturday is a rush event in Sioux Falls. I'm definately going to be there for that, not sure if I'll make the thursday night barbeque b/c I hope to have a job by then but we'll see.

Let me say--
I am really impressed by all the work that your chapter does over the summer!

Good luck w/ getting those signings. :D

Good luck! I hope you have a pledge class full of great men!
-M

I happened to be in Lincoln and was invited to a Delt summer rush event a few years ago.

The two sound very similar (BBQ Steak sandwiches, etc on the patio). I looked at the applications and was absolutely blown away by the quality of the rushees. There were probably 6 or 8 men there that evening (NHS members, student body officers, national scholars, athletes, etc.). Three bids were given out, and all accepted. As I recall, their summer rush pledge class was over thirty that year) Sure takes a lot of pressure off the first couple of weeks of classes.

I, too, am very impressed by the amount of work put into summer rush at UNL. I told "my" chapters about it, but they've never really gotten it together for summer rush.

Best of luck to both Beta and Delt this summer.

I'm a little confused on how this type of fraternity Rush works. You fill out an application and can possibly recieve a bid after just meeting the pnm once after a few hours? and you just keep on giving bids out all summer? I've never experienced summer rush before, could someone please explain the process:confused:

thanks in advance:)

Okay, summer rush is mainly a midwestern thing (talking midwest like Kansas...not Chicago), and is pretty much only at the larger schools (Nebraska, Missouri, Kansas, K-State...Big XII schools). For us it is the main time during which pledges are signed, and it allows the pledges to move into the house at the beginning of the year (I've never been inside a guy's dorm room while a student at Nebraska...Girl's dorm rooms yes, but never a guy's).

Since the students are not on campus yet, a rush application is used. This app provides the chapters with contact information, HS activities and awards, GPA, and ACT score. On the friday of our finals week, at around noon, Greek Affairs gives copies of the recieved rush apps to all the houses and they may begin calling rushees at that time.

The manner in which bids are given out is different for every house. My house in general has a rule that a rushee must have been talked to either on the phone or in person (a lot of free dinners can come a rushees way during their rush period) with two of the three rush chairs, and then the rushee must meet the guys in the house at some event before getting a bid. Other houses give bids out to anyone who stays at a rush party longer than 3 hours, others require rushees to ask for a bid...there's a lot of variance, but yes some guys get signed having only met with a house for a couple of hours.

We can give bids out nearly the entire summer, all the way up until 2 weeks before classes start...after that guys must go through formal rush, but not all the houses participate in that (since the houses only have a certain number of spots available in the chapter house for pledges, they may close their pledge class...some will take guys who live in the dorms; others won't.) However despite that ability to give bids out all summer, most guys sign before mid July b/c at that time University Housing starts charging fees to break housing contracts, and either the pledge or the chapter must pick up that extra fee.

I hope this cleared up any confusion.



DeltAlum, the Delts here at UNL do a great job on rush, there's quite a few guys in Delt that I would love having in Beta. I love Delt's HouseMom...she's the Director of Recruitment for the College of Arts and Sciences, and the head of the Student Ambassador program that I'm involved in...just a fantastic, fun, and friendly woman.
I think the biggest thing about summer rush for chapters is that it has to be the way everyone else is rushing guys...and if chapter feels that they are doing fine without it, they probably won't see any reason to put the effort in to it.

This will go way off topic, but I have to respond to your comment above. And I don't want to PM, because I'd like all of the people who read this to know it.

She is very impressive. I sat with her at dinner one night when I was visiting the UNL Delt Chapter while making calls on broadcasters in Omaha and Lincoln. (Actually, it was the day before the 9-11 attacks). I was surprized at how young she is -- given that most of the house moms I've met are post retirement.

It really took me back to my pledge days when nobody sat down at dinner until the chapter or pledge class president escorted the house mother in and seated her. That made a big impression on me those many years ago.

At that dinner at Lincoln, they seated the pledges across the head table from her (us) so she could help them with any questions they had regarding table manners or anything else really. Two or three times during dinner, members of sororities stopped by to announce things, or thank the chapter for its help. Of course, when they entered the dining room, everyone stood -- as they should. I don't think you find that in some of the chapters today -- particularly the smaller ones with no house mothers.

I wish all of our chapters had them.

I would have liked to chat a few more minutes with her, but the chapter was initiating that evening, so we went from dinner to Ritual -- which, of course, she couldn't attend, so I didn't have the chance. I suspect they have a lot of dinner guests and she probably wouldn't remember me in particular, but, as I said, she was impressive.

First signee :D
 

We got our first pledge of the year over the weekend. One of the guys who got a bid on Thursday.

The pledge is from Lincoln, plays soccer (yes!), and all the comments I've heard about him have been outstanding. He knew one of the rush chairs pretty well since they had gone to the same high school. Hopefully he'll get at least one of the other guys from that school who we really want to sign too.

When I hear more about this weekend I'll post.


DeltAlum...That sounds like Laura to me:D. Every chapter has the formal dinner on Monday nights, and that was the reason for the house announcements. Delt is one of the few (if not the only) houses to have a second "sit-down" dinner during the week (on Wednesdays I think), where the housemom must be escorted in and so on. But as I've said previously, the Delts are a great group of guys and I've got quite a few friends in that house, probably more than any other.

Betarulz, I have a question for you. What happens if a guy you signed depledges after moving into the house? Does the school find room for him in the dorms?

We have the same rush here and yes he would just go over and get a dorm room. A guy in our house depledged another house and the next semester pledge us and he said he put his stuff in his car drove over to housing and had a dorm that afternoon and was moved in by 6pm.

Yes, the school is required to provide housing for all freshmen, so whenever a guy depledges, housing has to find room for them, which usually by the middle part of the semester isn't that difficult as people decide to leave school.

Update from the rest of the weekend in Ogallala.

Three rushees came out, one got lost apparently and didn't make it out there until after the party was over so he only talked to the rush chairs. So far the comments on the two that were there early enough are pretty split: one guy has some good comments and the other has been called a lush four times in three posts...we like to party but I think that this kid will probably think that we don't party enough, but that's the beauty of extended rush periods in that he'll be able to find the house that meets his criteria best.

impressed
 

I have to say I am really impressed by your whole summer rush. It seems that you guys have it down to a science. We pretty much only do fall rush, and as far as I know thats how it has always been at ASU. We do a big Fall rush, and then during spring dont do as big of a rush.

Okay, for the most part all the stories I'm getting from this past weekend are about what happened AFTER the rush party with my bros...nothing too exciting, just parents taking shots and such.

This week: Another Barbeque on Thursday, and then on Saturday a rush party in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

You may thinking "wait, isn't that outside of Nebraska?" Obviously yeah. We actually have a very large contingent of guys from Sioux Falls and South Dakota in our house. In fact a lot of people from SD come to Nebraska, probably b/c it is one of the bigger universities in the region, is a good distance from home (not too far/too close), and the weather is slightly better.

So b/c of the large % of our house being from SD, we knew we were going to get some SoDak's anyways and thought that this might be a good way to meet those guys.

I actually will be attending this rush event, so expect a more detailed review of the weekend next week. I'll try to put up some info about the Thursday night BBQ, but I have to work at 10am on Friday and very little is likely to be posted thursday night.

Two guys got bid cards earlier this week, bringing our total number of bids offered to 4, with one guy having signed so far. Barbeque tonight that could see a whole lot more bids extended depending on who shows up. Could see the guys who already have cards turn them in tonight (Bid Cards must be signed by parents).

Betarulz, what is the Greek climate on your campus? Is fraternity rush competative for the PNMs as well as the fraternities?

I'm not sure what you're getting at exactly, but I think I understand.

I'd say the Greek system is super strong at Nebraska. Last summer 4 sororities (APhi, Theta, ChiO, and Gamma Phi)won their GLO's top chapter award, and so did 4 fraternities (Beta, Pike, Acacia, Sigma Nu), and I know that ATO and Delt, are very respected within their own orgs.

There is some anti Greek sentiment, but not that much, cause I think most GDI's don't really care. Greeks run our campus, and their involvement is WAY more than that of GDI's.

As for rush...I think that the great thing about our Greek System is that there is a lot of variety. There isn't that one house who wins grades, and intramurals, and has the best social calendar, and the guys girls are after. Therefore there each house has its own top competition. My house is constantly battling Farmhouse and AGS for pledges, and also Delt and SigEp to a lesser extent. Pike is in a bigger battle with ATO (for athletes) and Lambda Chi (guys who are going to live in the dorms) than they are with us, although they are a really strong house. Each house is different in that respect, so we're going after different types of rushees. This is not to say that we arent' competing against all the houses b/c we are...the strength of the System as a whole brings in a lot of great guys and every house can/will bring in some super guys.

In terms of rushees, there is some competition for certain houses I guess...I know last summer we had a ton of rush crushes...a lot of guys saying they were only going to sign Beta and no one else. With our extended rush though, we can at least find that out and encourage them to explore everyone. I also know last year we had more guys that we wanted to sign that we couldn't b/c we didn't have enough room, and they weren't receptive to living in the dorms. But overall the variety of our greek system means that pretty much every rushee is able to find a chapter that they can really click with.

Hope this answered your question...let me know if I'm no where close.

Yes, that gave me a pretty good idea! It's just that PNMs for sororities and their quest for a particular house or houses seems really heartbreaking. I just wondered if the way men handle their rush ever got as hard core as what I've seen for sororitues here...cutting because of every nit-pickity reason under the sun.

I think that there are several reasons for the severe cuts seen during women's formal rush that the summer rush process avoids. The biggest thing is that the length of time is so much longer. It took me a month from first meeting the rush chairs of Beta to getting a bid card, and during that time I went to a Thursday night BBQ, and two parties at two different lakes, and talked probably 3 times with the rush chairs on the phone. That's a lot of time to really get a decent idea of what a house is like.

The other thing that I think makes a major difference is that guys can self select which houses they are going to be interested in over this long period of time on more objective measures (goes back to the greater variety of chapters). For me, the first question I asked was about the house GPA was for the previous semester and whether or not that was an average semester for them. If a house didn't have at least a 3.2 they weren't an option. I also didn't go to all the houses, nor does anyone have to get invites back to a rush event since all the houses pre-schedule their events before school gets out so that the brothers can schedule accordingly to get off of work and such. As a rushee if you can make it, then you can show up unannounced.

Finally, since there are no cuts, the guy just never gets a bid...sometimes in the cases of rush crushes it becomes awkward, but usually if a guy is ready to sign he'll tell the rush chairs so and get a decision back fairly quickly.

Wow. I'm really impressed.

This seems like one of the most casual and best rush systems I've heard of. More like a sorority COB period, almost. Good deal.

Okay, another busy rush weekend for the Alpha Tau of Beta Theta Pi.

Thursday had a BBQ at the chapter house, 6 rushees and the one pledge showed up. No bid cards were offered, and all of the 6 rushees I think were new. One guy was deemed very annoying and probably won't be seen again. The guy who has signed has caused a lot of interest from other kids at his school, which is good. This school is a really big school, and yet the guys we're seeing come out have all found ways to distinguish themselves and have a ton of involvement and activities to go with good grades.

Yesterday was a rush event in Sioux Falls, and I finally made a party. Two rushees showed up, and I was pretty impressed with both of them. I was really impressed by one of the guys, he was asking some great questions (about philanthropy, social stuff, study hours, costs) and seemed really comfortable with everybody there. It's good that he impressed everyone in person b/c his app didn't really stand out. His HS grades weren't so hot, but the general feeling is that in our pledge program we'll be able to help him out a lot. The other guy was really good too and while you could tell there was some nervousness early on, he settled in. He also asked some really good questions, and might be a guy who decides to live in the dorms his first year, which is okay. (We usually look for a couple of guys to do this so we can have a bigger pledge class.)

Had a great turnout of brothers with 18 guys showing up for at least part of the time. This is a continual goal to get as many guys as possible to each event so that rushees can meet as many as possible, as well as get a chance to see how important the house is to each brother.

This week: Thursday BBQ and Saturday lake party at Lake Calamus in central NE. I won't be there, as I've got work, but will post any more news.
Following week is a Parent's Day at the chapter House, and looks like will be the biggest event of the season. I will definitely be at this event.

Gee, this sounds so great! I love how you are "reasoning" things out for people like me. For instance, your comment about the guys living in the dorm as a recruitment aid and looking at someone as a pull for others. It has to be a part of your success, the way you are being very logical and turning what some could perceive as a weakness into a strength! Good going!

edited 'cause I don't know which was worse, my keyboard, typing or spelling!:o

Second signee!
 

Got word today that one of the guys we were really hoping to get will sign with us on the 14th at Parent's Day.

Obviously we're happy b/c this kid is a stud, but it's also great b/c the guy's older sister is engaged to a guy in Farmhouse and we still got him. I haven't met this kid but I've heard a ton of great things about him.

Congrats!! Hope he's all you hope for!

Big weekend coming up for us.

Tonight as always is a barbeque. Seven guys are probables for showing up and if they do they are all likely to get bid cards tonight, unless a bunch of people have a qualms with them.


Most of these guys are ones that the rush chairs have all met with, either by taking them out to dinner, or meeting with them at their homes, or taking them out bowling/golfing/something, but they have yet to meet a lot of guys from the house, so it's kind of their final "test".

3 of the guys are from Omaha (3 different HS), one from Lincoln (He's come to one barbeque already. He's from a different HS than the other Lincoln guy we've signed), and the other 3 are from various towns in NE (Beatrice, Plattsmouth, Grand Island). I'm still looking for some out of state guys to get signed (since I'm a native Kansas who made the right choice to head north.)

This weekend we have a lake event in central NE, near Broken Bow, and this will be important to get those guys from places like Kearney, Grand Island, Lexington, and Hastings out to be seen, as well as other places that guys might think the drive to Lincoln is too far.

Also next week is the start of New Student Enrollment, where the incoming freshmen get their tour of campus, sit through very corny skits, and enroll for classes for the fall. After all the events of the day end, all the fraternity houses are open for tours, and this is a chance for a lot of guys who haven't turned in their rush app to get a look at the greek system. This is when I started my rush process two summers ago. It'll be interesting to see the new apps that come in.

Anyways big weekend that could see our pledge class really grow.

Okay, not much news to report after this weekend yet. Our chapter has an internal message board which is the main way that I get my info when I'm not in Lincoln. Unfortunately, this board went down over the weekend and just within the past couple of hours got reset, no posts from the rush chairs yet.

The biggest news for our chapter is that our housemother of four years resigned last Wednesday. She was formerly the housemother at the Oklahoma State Chapter of Beta Theta Pi, until they were closed for various reasons. With their re-colonization in the last two years, (they'll probably become a full chapter this summer at Convention), they are moving back in to their house and she is returning to her post there. This news has been met with mixed emotions. We don't think this will have an effect on rush at all, however one little brother going through rush actually said that she was a selling point for us in comparison to Farmhouse. Most of us feel that the change is going to be insignificant and if someone is to base their decision on that, then we don't really want them anyway b/c apparently we haven't made that great of impression on them.

Anyways, this weekend is going to be big with our Parent's Day rush event. I think we are one of the few houses that has a rush event specifically designed to get guys to bring their parents. I think it really is a good idea and can make the difference for someone whose parent's aren't sure about the whole fraternity thing. As always BBQ on Thursday, and this week is also the beginning of New Student Enrollment.

Okay, update from last weekend, finally.

Apparently the weather wasn't so great up in NE (it was awesome here in KS), and a lot of houses cancelled their events, but ours was held. 3 guys came out, which was considered a success b/c of the weather. 2 of the guys have bid cards already. One of the guys has had a bid card for a while but is being rushed hard by a lot of houses and I guess is trying to make sure he makes the right decision.

The third guy is a friend of some guys in the house and might be turning into a rush crush, and might do the male version of suiciding. He's probably going to get his bid card soon though, lucky for him. I've become more and more leary of rush crushes lately, particularly when they have friends already in the house. With all the time available to check out other houses I kinda want them to make sure that we are what they want, and not just join b/c one of their friends is already in the house. I'm not saying that it's not great to have brothers pull in their friends, just bad when those guys end up saying "Beta or Bust".

Keep it coming!
 

Betarulz the info that you are giving on rushing is so helpful! It sounds like you guys have got it perfect, you must be pretty successful at it. Its really interesting to read about you summer rushing, because we aren't able to do it at PSU. Keep the updates coming!

amen...
 

super rush thread...
you guys work hard and deserve the success. it shows what you can do with good organization.
:D

Best of Luck to the Summer PNMs and to the hardworking GLOs!

First off, I'm surprised by all the praise for our summer rush. Thank you. I realize that for most of you guys out there it isn't what youre used to, and something that some houses try, but you have to remember that this is just how we do it here. I guess what I'm saying is I don't find it too amazing b/c it is all that I know and it's the way in which probably 99.2% of fraternity men at Nebraska joined their organization. I personally find fraternity formal rush during the school year hard to understand and think that you guys must do a great job to find "your" types of guys in a much shorter period and all. Plus the time commitments that must take during the beginning of your school year, when everything else is starting up...football, new parties, new classes, etc.


Anyways, we right now have about 10 bid cards out, 5 guys who will be getting bids sometime in the next week, and 1 kid that may get a bid card but is somewhat of a sketchy situation. This situation has been a topic of major discussion on our chapter message board over the past two weeks, mainly because the kid didnt' have too hot of a rush app, but is a great guy in person. The discussion has focused on risks, and what exactly constitutes a Beta. One of the things that is an expectation of the chapter is that the guys we sign have always been Betas, they just never knew it/been called that by name. In other words we don't take boys and make them Betas, we take untapped Betas and mature them in to full fledged, productive members. So there has been a lot of discussion of just how much emphasis should be placed on HS grades and the rush application versus opinions from meeting with the kid.

Anyways, another Rush BBQ tonight. I head up to Lincoln tommorow afternoon for a big party and then Saturday is Parent's Day...I'll post on Sunday!