University of Florida Rush
 

Some please help me understand how if UF has 19? sororities, why after just the first round of rush parties, awesome, incredible wonderful young woman are getting cut so hard so soon?

Is the UF greek system THAT competitive? I thought my school was brutal!

My best friend went to UF, however, that was over ten years ago. UF is very competitive, there are (from my understanding) an average of 1,500(+/-) PNMs that participate in recruitment left at that number quota is around 79 (if none drop, etc.). Which might account for the heavy cutting. In my experience cuts done after the first round are heavily based on GPA and recs (if the school/chapter requires them). When I was active the pendulum on GPA requirements ran from 3.2 - 2.0 and most chapters were only allowed one or two (if any) grade risks (though I do not see how a person with a 3.0 was a grade risk). Also, (please feel free anyone to correct me if I am wrong), some chapters can only invite back X numbers of girls, while others can invite back XX. But I agree with you it seems like heavy cutting after first round. We use to save our heavy cutting for after round two. Again, I am getting old... am too far away from my chapter to be active and there are no Pi Phi chapters in Massachusetts. So my knowledge is dated or second hand through family and friends.

Quota this year is at like 60. There are 1200 girls rushing. There are only 15 sororities but they have to have 19 parties to be able to get everyone into a house so the rest of us all go to a thing called the lounge when we are not in a house. There are normally 200 girls in a lounge at a time. Uf cuts hard on GPA some houses you have to have at least a 3.6 some you don't.

I think UF also uses release figures throughout Recruitment which can result in some heavy cutting.

FSU is using release figures this year - first round release is 25% which means that each chapter must eliminate at least 1/4 of the PNM for the first round of invitationals. Eek!

Barbara, ... I'm confused... I thought that release figures were supposed to be based on the last three years of a chapter's return by party. Not a flat percentage for every chapter regardless of prior return rates. If a chapter isn't getting good return rates, then a manditory percentage cut could be terrible.

Paige

I always thought it was based on chapter size and previous recruitments also. Allowing the playing field to be as even as possible, for both the chapters and the PNMs.

I just find it interesting that the two young women that have posted their UF rush experiences were both so heavily cut and were invited back to mostly the same houses. Which seems shocking to me that out of 19 houses, they would be invited back to 4 or 5 houses.

If they cut on grades that is one thing. If they cut everyone because they didn't recieve a rec on that girl, was the rushee told to get recs before hand?

I just can't believe the high percentage of cuts after only the first round. Sounds like there are going to be many many many devastated young woman walking around campus soon if the cuts continue like this.

I wish everyone the best of luck during the next rounds of rush. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

Paige,
I know they used 5 years of data. The percentage I was told may be for my chapter only and if so, I apologize in advance for shocking any PNMs recruiting at FSU.

I will double check with my source and get back to everyone!

Barbara

Barbara ... it could be that all the chapters are having good return rates - at least for the first invitation rounds - and this is a way to shake things out fast. I'll be interested to hear what you find out. Thanks!

Barbara---From my understanding the release rates are inividualized for each chapter. I was helping out in my house today and our release figures are not at 25%.

Thought I'd help clarify things since it looks like I'm the only recent NPC Greek from UF...

Quota is NOT set yet. Panhellenic sets quota after the end of Round 3. Total # of rushees divided by # of chapters. Problem is many rushees drop out in between Round 3 and Prefs (burnt out, tired, sick, not happy with the houses they have left, etc.) I think they take this into consideration in their calculation somewhere, but it still ends up that some houses will make quota (or even quota plus) and a few will be far below.

Regarding invitation percentages, each house is told the max # they can invite back, based on their return rates from this rush and previous years. For example, pretend Sorority ABC is just the nicest, most wonderful sisters ever, and 90% of rushees they've invited to Round 2 for the past couple years chose to return, and Sorority XYZ has terrible sisterhood and most rushees hate them and only 10% that they invite actually choose to return. Panhellenic will allow XYZ to invite back pretty much everyone, since very few will actually chose to, while ABC will only be able to invite back a few, since pretty much all of their rushees will return.

Those are extreme examples, but it works. The method to the madness is that the party sizes need to be manageable. If you have 100 sisters rushing, you don't want only 10 rushees at your party; they'll feel outnumbered and intimidated. You also don't want 150 rushees at a party - it will be too hard to manage and to get to know the rushees.

Also, since Panhellenic theoretically wants every house to succeed (I'm not getting into my personal feelings that the quota system is BAD BAD BAD now, but anyway...) setting up the invite percentages helps the chance that each house will have the opportunity to have about the same size pledge class, since they are trying to all have about the same size parties each time.

Also, if a house can invite back, say 75% of the rushees, they don't have to - they CAN invite less. Some chapters have very strict rules on who they can invite back (i.e. GPA) and will invite a little less than they are allowed.

I can tell you that GPA is huge at UF. It was when I rushed in 1996 and is even more so now. UF as a university is proud to have the highest academic standards in the state, and the sororities follow that. The competition to have the "highest sorority GPA" is intense, and houses don't want to take a grade risk. And yes, a 3.0 can be considered a grade risk if that's a high school GPA and there's no indication that the person took honors/AP/etc. classes.

Usually any mandatory cuts would take place in the beginning rounds. A sorority doesn't want to lead on a rushee that they know they can't bid, and don't want to waste a spot on someone that they can't bid too. So for any rushees that have GPA problems, you will pretty much know how much of a problem you have by Round 2 or 3 at the latest. GPA is a simple objective # to use to quickly narrow a sorority's numbers.

OK, sorry for long post, back to studying! The luxurious life of a law student...


GOOD LUCK GATOR RUSHEES!

G8Ralphaxi