Originally Posted by esviel (Post 1781890)

Hello all,

So I rushed the *************** chapter of Delta Upsilon and I am currently pledging. I am part of a pledge class of two - yup, only me and another guy.

It would have been a class of 7 or 8 but one by one, during closed rush and even after bid signing, the others have decided not to pledge. Even on the night of bid signing, a couple of my would-be brothers decided not to sign, right there in the crowded hall.

This is when I started having some serious doubts about whether I was making the right choice.

The only reason I joined is because my best friend (a sophomore who I met during the beginning of the year) is a brother there already. Otherwise, I would not even have considered joining a fraternity.

I learned from him that in the past, there have been pledge classes of 1 and 2 (and even a year where there were no people brought in). It is evident that if something like this happens one more time, we will no longer exist at [school deleted]. The utter lack of interest in this fraternity was clearly evident during the rush events, where I was the only one to attend all of them.

Now, you may be wondering, "why the hell did you join if you knew that it was like this? Why jump onto a sinking ship?"

Well, I feel like this would be a great opportunity to test my character (my friend, who I mentioned earlier, has the same mindset). I feel like it would be a great accomplishment if I could help completely revitalize a failing organization.

And even if I fail, it should be an interesting experience, a funny story I could tell my kids and grandkids.

At [school deleted] there is a hierarchy of fraternities (as I'm sure there is at any school) and DU is pretty much at the bottom of the list. We can't afford to be selective. We basically have to beg people to pledge.

Never again.

My goal is to get us to the top of that list before I graduate. I want to get a bigger and better house. And I also want us to become more involved in the community.

So I found this site and have been browsing around for effective recruitment techniques. Downloaded the book called "Good Guys", read the entire thing in one sitting. It had some very good ideas but I must admit, it requires a fairly high level of social skills, which I have not yet fully developed (although I'm pledging now, the brothers say the process is supposed to make me more outgoing; we'll see).

I guess part of the reason why we have such low recruitment numbers is that DU is "non-secret, non-hazing". And this chapter actually lives up to those ideals. So I don't understand why there are so few who want to join - could the best and brightest leaders of tomorrow actually want to be hazed? Or maybe we don't haze because people will not tolerate it; the bigger and better the frat, the more harshly they haze, it seems. I don't know....

But what I do know is that something needs to be done now because the immediate survival of this chapter depends on it. If you have made it through this long post, then thank you for hearing me out. Any support or advice is welcome.