A Question on Quota . . .
 

I was wondering the different ways Greek systems came up with Quota for formal rush . . .

I have heard that some systems do it by available spaces in each Chapter, taking into consideration Total.

I have heard that some do it by the amount of PNM's starting formal Rush or going to PRefs . . .

Anyway could we post the various ways it is derived and which schools?

I am especially interested in the bigger Systems such as LSU that cut a lot of girls.

I go to Oglethorpe University in Atlanta. Here its the number of girls invited back to pref. night divided by the number of sororities.

So if 120 girls were invited back, we would divide that by 3( # of sororities), so quota would be 40.

At UF I think they take the number of girls going back to Round 3 or Prefs. and take into consideration the number of sororities and total. Somehow it's usually around the same number each year, 50-60. Can you believe it's only been a year since I fully understood all this, and for the life of me can't remember the exact scenario?! Anyway, I'm pretty sure that's how they do it.

Tara
I have a Phi Mu castle...

Well . . . Does every group do it that way?

And if so that leads to another question:

What is the number limit you can invite to prefs? I mean how do you determine who gets cut in the first couple rounds?

UCF takes the number of girls that attend prefs and then divide that number by the number of sororities. Last year, we had close to 600 girls come back for prefs which meant that quota was at 65. This also means that pledge classes are large and some chapters have over 180 girls.

At NAU we go by the second nights numbers, not by pref night. Which in some ways sucks. Like last year there was a small rush, then many girls dropped out. So quota seemed unfairly high last year.

As for us, there isnt a certain number we can invited back to pref night. How it works is we choose who we dont want to invite back, and they get invited. Then they go and out of all the invited they get can only choose 2.

We do it the same way as you girls -- number of girls at pref divided by the number of sororities.

Those numbers end up getting a little skewed, though, because girls know if they suicide a certain sorority they can get picked up 48 hrs later when COB starts.

We cut girls for a lot of reasons -- not enough time, grades, things like that -- but surprisingly, a lot of girls make inappropriate comments at rush. We had one last year mention she got kicked out of her last school for a drug charge.

The way it's supposed to work!
 

pref night rushee # (which may or may not take into account drop outs after the pref parties) divided by #of chapters = quota

Pref invite #s depends on your retention rate. The retention rate is the chapter's avg retention for pref night for the last three years. (This equation is used for every night.)

quota/retention rate= #of girls invited to pref

This is where I have to point out that quota fluctuates until this night.

So as an example: :p

The night before pref all the chapters are sitting down to make pref invite lists. A total of 200 rushees are left. There are 5 chapters.

quota
200/5=40

Sorority A has a retention rate of 90%. They're the house everyone wants to be in.

40/.90=44.4444 let's just call it 45

So Soroity A can invite 45 girls to pref.


Sorority B has a retention of 60%.

40/.60=66.6666 We'll call it 67

Soroity B can invite 67 girls to pref.

And so on and so on.


But this is where the whole quota may or may not take into account post pref drop outs becomes a problem.:mad:
If after pref 50 girls drop out of rush that would make quota = 30. Now considering Sorority A's retention ratio is so high; what are the chances that they are gonna lose 15 rushees? Pretty darn slim! So then you get Sorority A with a massive rush class compared to the rest of the chapters. And it makes the rest of the chapters look weak. If Sorority a has 40 rushees the avg pledge class for the four other chapters will be 27. So Sorority A's class is 50% BIGGER than Sorority B-E:eek:

As the other ladies have said, quota is the number of women who go to pref night divided by the number of sororities. While you all are blessed with 600 women, my school had 58 go through last year....with 8 sororities. Never bitch about voting on pref night :)

As for your other question James on how many to cut etc, some panhellenics have release figures. These are statistics compiled over a three year period that recommend to each group the number of invitations they give, based on the percentage of past retention. Basically, the release figures require the larger groups to release women sooner from recruitment, allowing those women to explore all options available to them. Without release figures, the largest sororities may invite tons of women back to their parties, with really no intention of extending them a bid.

In terms of quota, you find out what quota is, and then you compile your bid list. The bid list consists of 2 lists. The first list is the list of women you want to give a bid to. It is put in alphabetical order. Your second list is put in preference order, and is used to fill in slots on your first bid list that are vacated when a woman on the first list goes to another sorority. For instance, if quota is 10 and 30 girls come back to your preference party, you list the top 10 you want in alphabetical order on your first bid list. On your second bid list, you list the remaining 20 (or less if there are women you choose not to extend bids to) in preferential order. As the process of bid matching goes through, the bid list is completed with members from the first list, and second if you lost women on your first list to other groups.

Complicated enough?? :)

Thank you everyone, its getting kind of clearer.

So do the methods listed above pretty much cover just about all Formal Rushes?

And especially the amount of girls that can be invited back to prefs after the 1st round(s)?

Yes, because these rules are determined by the NPC. The nationals have all agreed to follow them.

Of course, a system comprised all of local Greeks may do it differently.

New group...
 

If this is a group's first year participating in Formal Recruitment, say due to a recent colonization, how would they know how many they could invite back? What numbers are used for them?

IIRC, a new group can invite back whomever they wish. They're considered to have had a 0% retention rate, so the cap is infinity (or, more practically speaking, the number of PNM's participating in recruitment).

If the group has participated in recruitment for one or two years, the 0% is averaged in for the other year(s). So if a sorority participated last year for the first time, and their retention rate was 90%, they would use (0 + 0 + 0.9) / 3 = 0.3 = 30% to calculate their cap.

Obviously, a sorority can choose to invite back fewer people than it's entitled to invite.

Actually, release figures should not be used until three years worth of data can be used, so if a chapter is very young, they have no release figure.

Well, I was close... :) What I remember is that my chapter was never forced to release anyone because of release figures... our retention rate was low enough (sadly) that our cap was always higher than the number of women we wanted to invite.