need advice
 

Soo I'll try to make this long story short.

I am transferring schools this upcoming year (as a sophomore) and am planning on going greek.

The transfer is mostly due to my old school not having my major but I also knew from early on that the school just wasn't my cup of tea.

Anyway, I did go through some of recruitment last year and dropped out because I didn't get any of the sororities that I was hoping for.
I probably shouldn't have attended recruitment at all because I had a horrendous cough, and at some points could barely speak to the girls, but for some reason I thought I could suppress this enough to go through with it.
I would like to think this is the reason for me not doing so hot in recruitment...but who knows.

I would really like to do well next year and I do believe I am in a good stage in my life to meet new people and make a great first impression.
But I was just wondering....How much of my "Recruitment Horror Story" of last year should I reveal to these new girls?
Should I even tell them I rushed? Should I say I dropped out because I was too sick?

They do ask on the registration if I have ever been through recruitment before so I suppose I would like to maintain some semblance of the truth.

Help me!

on the recruitment form you should answer "yes" to the question "have you been thru recruitment". if there is space to add it, you can add that you withdrew from recruitment due to illness.

as to what to say to sorority members, i really don't think that they will ask you if you participated in recruitment at your former school, but if they do, you can just say something to the effect of,"i did participate in recruitment thru the first (or second or third) round, but i was really sick and had to withdraw."

If you have to put on your application whether or not you went through recruitment before, put "Yes, at my prior school." You can put something about not finishing if you want. Although it wasn't because you had a cough that you didn't complete rush, it was because the sororities you wanted didn't give you invites and you didn't give each sorority a chance. I would strongly advise you to give EACH sorority a chance at your new school. Good luck.

Answer no. Being a sophomore is going to be tough enough and I fear that a yes answer will only give some of the chapters another excuse to cut you. Think of it this way, you didn't go "through" recruitment because you dropped out before recruitment ended so you didn't go "through" it. Or pretend the question only really applies to recruitment at your new school. Say nothing about your prior experience. It is none of their business. If you are asked say you signed up but but didn't go "through" because of illness. No need to spill your guts. They don't call me BadCat for nothing.

You're going to a new school. You have a completely clean slate. I agree with BadCat on this one - anything that happened at your previous school is nobody's business. I don't know why such a question is on the rush app anyway - say she had gone to a school with nothing but locals and a FAR different rushing style. She may have "gone through recruitment" before, but it's as similar to NPC rush as "taking a ride" on the space shuttle would be to "taking a ride" on a bike. It's immaterial.

That being said, it would behoove you to keep a far more open mind than you did at your first school and look at all the sororities instead of just the ones "you were hoping for." I'm hoping that attitude came from not liking the school in general.

The reason this question is asked is that some NPC groups require chapters to check with the previous campus of a transfer to see if she went thru there and why their group didn't pledge (or maybe did and she dropped out)her that time around. My GLO does and it helps to know for sure that she went thru at the other campus.

Couldn't they just do that on their own anyway, without asking that question of the PNM? Or does the amount of transfers sometimes prohibit that being practical? How far into rush does she have to be for this to be something you need to know? (Sorry, I know that's slightly nebby)

I guess I understand it to a point, especially if the NPC group in question has lots of chapters that are located at schools with high transfer rates, but it would kind of suck for the PNM who is trying to turn over a new leaf. At any rate...it seems like it's kind of on the same train as Panhel can't say recs are required because they don't know what the individual groups do with them. They don't know that every group needs or cares about this information.

i see this question on every recruitment form at the schools where i assist zta chapters with recruitment. another question that appears on each form is "have you ever pledged a npc sorority?" and "have you been initiated into a npc sorority?" whether panhellenic checks up on each pnm who answers "yes" to any of those questions, i couldn't say.

If asked during recruitment, I think I'd say something along the lines of "I went through recruitment but between me not feeling well, not feeling like I was at my best, really not knowing what to expect, and already thinking I might be transferring, I decided to drop out of the process and try again later." (of course, only if true) And then move on.

Good luck, and this time make sure you get plenty of rest, and be the healthiest possible when going through so that you don't have any unnecessary liabilities.

To the best of my knowledge my chapter has never received such a request from a chapter at another school, possibly because we have a very low transfer out rate. Even if we did receive such a request we couldn't respond as we shred all our recruitment records as soon as the bid lists are finalised so no new member will ever find out where they were on our invite or bid list. We love all our new members and they were all at the very top of our invite and bid lists.
As I said before, answer no and if you are asked say you signed up but did not go "through" recruitment because of illness, like during rush you were in the critical care ward at deaths door.

OP: don't lie. Don't make up any elaborate stories. You'll get caught. I guarantee it. You've gotten some good suggestions on how to answer any questions truthfully without elaborating. Practice your answer and don't volunteer any additional information. There are ways of turning a conversation away from "sticky" subjects.

The chapter I advise maintains recruitment records for a period of three years. Each chapter will have its own policy or way of doing business.

The whys and wherefores are veering into MS. But the basic underlying principal is to determine if there was some "issue" that the chapter at the current school had not been able to discern thru their recommendation process. If I found out a PNM lied about this on their recruitment form,I'd drop her like a hot potato. Anyone who would lie on a direct question on a registration form would lie about other things. Tell the truth on the form. If someone asks, say you dropped out due to illness. Which is also true.

Ah. I would think, however, (trying to find a delicate way to put it) that such issues would only be fully found out during pledging or after initiation and not in a short time period like rush. If she gets a second rec from the same personal friend, that same person is likely to praise her even more to the skies if she knows that chapter #1 cut her because (example) they heard she had a drug problem. It really turns into a she said/she said issue, and again, this is something for the GLO to worry about, not Panhel. If someone has a transfer GPA, they should know enough to ask.

Here's another question: how many of the groups at her old school and new school overlap? If the answer is zero, then it's definitely no one's business.

I'm talking about an issue that would make her a "no" rec more than anything else...and whether or not her pledgeship was revoked....I'm talking worst case scenarios here...is that fair? Maybe not but with hundreds of PNMs coming thru with no issues, not taking a chance. She goes.

I think in a worst case scenario, I would be so glad to see her out and so anxious to warn my sisters that I would be making a DANGER DANGER WILL ROBINSON facebook post the minute I found out where she was going, rush applications and confidentiality be damned. LOL

Like I said, I do understand it, but as someone who needed a "clean slate" when she got to college, it sucks when you make mistakes and can't change your life because the past keeps haunting you.