Recs Problem!
 

I'm going through rush in August and I've contacted all of the alumna chapters in my area for the houses on my campus. So far, I've only heard back from a third of the alumna chapters, and I sent all of them emails since May. I don't know what else to do, I don't want to harass the alumna chapters or anything. Any advice?

TRY USING THE PHONE.

First, it's alumnae. Second, do not rely on them. You need personal recs....from people who know you. And don't dare say you don't know any. Teachers, school counselors, employers, fellow employees, neighbors, parents of your friends, SS teachers, etc. You need to network. When you find a member of ABC, ask if she knows any members of the other groups where you need recs. It's your responsibility to do this - not some anonymous alum.

You should NOT have contacted the alumnae chapters directly. Not all alumnae chapters are created equal. Some of the groups you contacted may be full of 80 year old ladies who do nothing more than meet for lunch 3 times a year and don't bother themselves with recs.

Do what Titchou said. If that still doesn't work, contact the alumnae Panhellenic in your area. http://www.npcwomen.org/alumnae-panh...directory.aspx If there's a phone number on the website, use it. If there isn't a link, call national Panhel directly and ask them for a phone number.

And also...they're chapters or groups or GLOs or sororities, not houses. Houses are structures of brick and mortar that you live in. You are attempting to join a sorority, whose existence has nothing to do with a house.

The only reason why I contacted the alumnae chapters directly was because it was suggested on GC to do so...I didn't know that it wasn't proper protocol.
I have worked every connection possible but truth of the matter is that my town doesn't really send too many people to college every year, and we're pretty isolated so it's hard to network. I've tried like heck to network, and it hasn't really helped me at all.
Maybe it's different where ya'll are from but people just don't go through the Greek system here.
So I'm sorry if I've been doing anything wrong, after reading your posts I really felt attacked and unwelcome here, so maybe I'll just go back to lurking.
Thanks again for your help.

We do not tell you to go to the alumnae chapters. We tell you to go to the PH group. Your obvious lack of knowledge has confused you.

And you live in small community with no college graduates? How do they get teachers at your high school? They have to have degrees. Other positions in the community have people that have degrees. Men, too, can help as they knew Greek women when they were in school. Do you have relatives elsewhere? Do they know people who went to college and were Greek? Expand your networking.

elecoug, I sent you a PM.

elecoug, sorry if I came off harsh. But the house/chapter thing is just one of my pet peeves.

I'm putting on my asbestos suit: I have seen this problem of no/few/limited contacts before and I totally get it: There are places (I live in one of those places) where for political or social reasons the moms didn't join OR they joined one of two houses. Often their daughters don't join because of political, not "needing" to join...or no entree into houses (recs). (Political means liberal here. IE, sororities are elitist...blah blah)

I asked at my husband's business: ONE (baby) wife was in a sorority...while very well represented in other parts of the country...not so much here. High school teachers reflect the demographic...so not a success there either. She would have been happy to write a rec for a girl she knew..

We have one family friend, contemporary of my older daughter, who pledged/joined...but (this is an individual thing obviously) she won't do recs.

The local Panhellenic Association is a waste of time. They sent my daughter, three months AFTER recruitment, a good luck with recruitment letter.

My daughter had a great recruitment. But she did it with three recs (not the four that I thought she had) out of 10 houses at a highly competitive school. I wouldn't advise doing recruitment that way, but sometimes that is the only way. Please don't tell pnms that it is always their fault that they can't find recs, that they haven't tried hard enough, they haven't exhausted all avenues: Sometimes they have...there may be no one out there who can help.

To add to Ellebud's post, geographic area is often an obstacle. In our area, we have two nearby universities and both have Sigma Kappa, as one of my chapter sisters says... you can't shake a stick without hitting a Sigma Kappa. :-) We have 6 more universities within a three hours' drive.

However, in the many years that I have lived in my area, I have yet to meet an AEPhi, SDT, AST, DPhiE or a TPA. We have a handful of ASAs and Tri Sigmas, so finding a rec for these chapters would require quite a lot of effort and the PNM still might come up empty handed.

.....and in my neighborhood: AEPhi, SDT, ZBT and AEPi...no DPhiEs.

I did make a call to a friend who has family in the midwest (ok, so now it's intellectual curiosity), My friend's niece (from her husband's side) did pledge a different sorority, other than the above. This is five degrees of separation....and the sorority isn't at our local universities.

On some campuses, chapters ARE called "houses"... as in "Which houses did you pref?" "That House won Varsity Revue two years in a row." It's not always ignorance. Sometimes it's the common parlance, even if it's not accurate.

I know that. I just really hate it. It's like the Tri Sigma and Tri Delta hate of the hyphen.

LOL. I hate the Tri Delta hyphen thing.

OTOH... on my campus we used the word "house" for sorority all the time. :D