Changing your mind after refusing a bid
 

I was reading a thread last night regarding this, but I can't find it again. Anyway, the girl whom posted had just gone through rush, received and accepted a bid, and then refused the bid. She was having second thoughts and wondered if she could change her mind and rejoin the house. While some Greek systems or GLOs have different policies, some say that a bid is good for up to one year. Therefore, the girl who was asking about her chances of getting back into that group needs to contact the sorority president and the Director of Greek Life at her school. Good luck and I would love to know how this turns out if anybody else remembers seeing this thread.

Um what. This is Green Book stuff, not "some Greek systems or GLOs."

If she went through formal rush, signed a bid card and received a bid, then yes, she is bound to that sorority for one year whether she begins pledging or not.

However, if she was offered a bid through COB or from a group that she did NOT put on her bid card, the bid expires after 48 hours at the most.

Thanks for clearing it up that it is an across-the-board policy...I had no idea. I hope that she pursues it and gets her heart's desire.

Being "bound" doesn't mean the chapter will take you again after refusing the bid. All it means is that a PNM can not accept a bid to any other chapter until next formal recruitment. If a PNM is matched but refuses the bid/depledges, the chapter can fill her spot. Even if the chapter has spots to fill in total or quota, the chapter doesn't have to take her back.

She can re-approach the chapter that offered her the bid. If the chapter met quota and is at/over total, she is SOL. If not, the chapter may say anything from "sure, welcome aboard!" to "you will have to re-rush, but we're having a COB event in two weeks / a month / next semester, why don't you come by then" to "you turned us down and now you want in? Get lost, kid".

She is bound to that chapter for one year, so she cannot join any other chapter until next year's FR.

Not necessarily. My chapter has held COB bids open for longer than that. Sometimes a biddee wants to think about it, talk it over with her parents, figure out how she's going to meet the time and financial obligations...

But bids don't stay open forever.

You know that's a question I don't have an answer to: How long do bids stay open to PNMs? Is that a by chapter/school/GLO question or is there a Green Book standard?

You mean informal bids? As long as the chapter wants them to, but probably not more than a semester. If the chapter wants to give the woman an hour to accept or decline they can, or if they want to give her several weeks to decide, they can as well. The only limitation is that a chapter may not have more bids pending than there are open spots available.

Our campus technically says 24 hours to accept a COB bid, but it's up to the chapter's discretion. I know our chapter personally has given certain PNMs a couple days to talk things over with her family and/or get finances in order, but it's on a case-by-case basis.

I don't want to wag my finger but they really should standardize that. If it means issuing another bid (in the technical sense) then do that. But you don't want it to get around that Susie's bid expired after 2 days and Sherry was allowed to take a week to think about it. That just sounds like a recipe for disaster to me.

We often did what Zeta13Girl mentioned - the women signed the bid and then waited till next semester to pledge.

And I thought refusing a bid and depledging would be two different things.

That's because situations like that shouldn't happen. If Sherry gets a week, Susie gets a week. You don't offer a bid to someone you don't want as a sister, and if Susie asks for an extra couple of days to decide because she wants to talk to her parents and they're on vacation, or wants to hear back about a part-time job, or wants to get a major exam behind her before she decides - she should get the time she needs, just like Sherry did. Especially if she was caught off guard by the bid, which can happen with COB. Although we did sometimes "encourage" biddees to make a decision sooner rather than later, so that they could catch up and be initiated with the current NM class rather than have to wait.

While Chapter Adviser at Ole Miss we had a young lady who didn't come back after Bid Day. She waited one semester before approaching the chapter about pledging again. She was hesitant at first since AOII was not her first choice. However, she ended up meeting more AOIIs and women in her new member class that she changed her mind. It ended a very happy ending.