If you could throw any kind of recruitment party you wanted...
 

So I know the "When did recruitment go from being competitive to uber-competitive?" thread went downhill and closed, and if you read it at all within the last 24 hours, then you know - or probably have some idea - what happened. But I figured we could turn it into something fun and entertaining.

If you could throw an "untraditional" recruitment party and do whatever you wanted, what would you do? Have a dance party? A food fight? Create a ball pit using the entire first floor of the house?

What would your recruitment party consist of?

My recruitment party would be like sitting in a sports bar with super comfy couches in jeans and tee shirts of your favorite teams. We'd watch sports, have good deep friend snacks, and just hang out. No cheesy skit, no bumping unless my PNM liked a rival team which could make for a heated conversation. If things were going really well, we would do what they do on the Buffalo Wild Wings commercial to make the party last longer. This is the first round party. :-)

A food fight would be so fun! I would go bowling though, because most bowling alleys play music that you can dance to and everyone likes dancing. Plus, it is relaxed and you can easily talk to pmn in between turns. And I suck at bowling and really just enjoy laughing at myself.

I've always had a fondness for board and card games, so I'd go with that.

I tend to go in for Euro games like Settlers of Catan and Carcassonne. For a formal recruitment party, though, I'd go with games that most people know, so you don't end up spending the entire party teaching a new game to the PNMs.

The chapter would have several copies of various games available, along with a bunch of decks of cards. PNMs would be picked up in pairs or triplets (2 PNMs + 2 sisters, or 3 PNMs + 3 sisters). The group of 4 or 6 would then go over and pick out a game, find a spot around a table or on the floor, and play. When the game is over, if there's still time left in the party, the group can chat. (You'd probably want to choose games that would leave time for chit chat - e.g. if the party is 45 minutes long, you would want games that typically run 30 minutes or so.)

You can tell a lot about a person by how they play a game - uber-competitive, sore loser, "I usually like to use the blue pawns, but that's ok if you want to play blue, I'll use red", etc.

This is funny, because these are all pretty much things that we did for COB.

Uniform dressage.

S'mores campfire party with songs. Can begin & end with Sorority specific songs, but do the John Jingleheimer Schmidt songs etc in the middle.

^ Oddly enough, there was a chapter at my school that did a S'mores party during FR ...

We had a portion of rush called "informal rush" (even though it was part of FR). If you were invited back to the first invitational round, informal rush was included in the invitation. This was the only portion that took place outside of the student center. It took place over the course of one evening and the following day, and each PNM could budget her time pretty much as she wished. One chapter reserved the BBQ pits near the student center for the evening and did a S'mores party.

DeltaBetaBaby, I agree with you that most of these ideas would work well for informal recruitment. To take my board game example - if you had a 2-3 hour long evening party, you would have enough time to teach PNMs a game like Settlers and play a full game and have time for some good conversation.

Laser Tag. If you die...get out of my house!

Han shot first.

Game of Thrones party. You win or you die.

Hey, we already have sigils, and it may end up less bloody bthan SEC rush.

Hunger Games. And may the odds be ever in your favor. I know I would love to show up for my first party with flames coming from my cape.

Just be careful of the PNM who's a little *too* interested in finding out who your "brother fraternity" is! :p

I always wanted to have a Speakeasy or Great Gatsby themed party. You only get in through the secret door if you have the password. They would have Flapper girl dresses and long pearls and a live jazz band.

And if you don't have that password you can just spend the party dancing. :cool: