Rules re: rushers from other chapters
 

I am curious about something, and I am not a green book expert at all. Are chapters allowed to invite members from other chapters of their org to rush during formal recruitment? If so, is this something that can be done any time, or only in specific circumstances or with Panhellenic's permission?

One of the rush threads this year mentions that the girls who rushed her at one chapter were actually from another school. I know that AOII send members from established chapters to assist with colonizations, and I guess I thought this was some kind of special rule for colonizations.

I know that we have had active members assist with recruitment at schools that are struggling, but I guess it never occurred to me that they could actually be rushing the PNMs. If this does happen, do you know if the NPC has rules about telling the PNM that she is being rushed by someone who is not from that chapter?

I know when I transferred schools, I had already done all of the rush workshops and stuff so I wanted to come back and rush, but I wasn't eligible since I wasn't a student enrolled full-time in that university.

Just curious, and thinking that this could sure help struggling chapters, but could alienate PNMs who think they are meeting members from that chapter.

ETA: To clarify - I am not wondering if chapters that employ this are "tricking" PNMs. I don't think anyone would do that or would want to. I just wondered if there is a rule that says they have to formally tell the PNMs in some way, or is it just something that if it comes up in conversation, that's fine, but if it doesn't that's fine too.

There was a sorority on my campus that had members from other Florida chapters come out to help them rush. We had a lot of PNMs and this chapter was the smallest on campus. Unless they wanted 1 sister to 5 PNMs, they needed the help from sisters at other schools!

The girls from the other chapters never made it a secret that they were not from the UCF chapter. I'm not sure if this was a requirement but even if it wasn't, it wouldn't be right to lie to the PNMs about this. If a PNM joins because they like the girls from the other chapter and think that these girls were from the UCF chapter, it wouldn't be fair to the PNM.

It seems to be a cardinal rule that if you are helping another chapter that the "helping chapter" is identified in another way. Maybe a slight difference in dress, nametag or something else. Sometimes it depends on the campus PH, other times it depends on the sorority or even the individual chapter.

I remember that we had to make it crystal clear that we weren't from the AB chapter when we went and helped at a initial formal recruitment back in the day. We mostly did the skits and behind the scenes stuff, but when we were on the floor we had to be clear that we weren't from that chapter. I've also worked with other chapters who have had "helping chapters" in during recruitment, and they always were told to make it clear what school they were from if not the home school.

Now, here's the funny thing about that time I helped with the other chapter's recruitment. Years later, AOII published our history book and there's a chapter entry and picture for each chapter. Somehow, the submitted picture for that chapter was OUR girls performing our skit. So, my picture is actually in the AOII history book, just not as a member of my own chapter.

When I rushed my sophomore year, another chapter came in to help one of the sororities. I knew it was going to happen ahead of time, because I had a good friend at the chapter that came in, but I know a lot of other girls were a little ticked that they didn't get a chance to talk to the girls from the actual chapter. Pretty tricky. I guess the argument for it is that you're pledging the sorority nationally as well, and if those girls recruit a banner pledge class, than they'll in turn keep recruiting banner pledge classes until the chapter gets built back up. Still, I gotta agree that I would hope that they're honest with the PNM's.

When I have been involved in situations like this, they made sure that the women from the originating chapter were the first line and any assistants were floaters and/or helped with other duties that needed to be done during the party. They were clear about which women were visiting sisters. I do think it could be an additional "perk" because you can say "And we have sisters at _____ and _____ that we're close with too!", showing that there is a bigger picture to Greek Life than your own chapter.

Dee

irishpipes, clean out your PM box :)

I've also seen cases where a school was changing types of Recruitment (Spring to Fall or informal to formal) so they went to visit another chapter to learn more. They assisted with refreshments but otherwise stayed out of the way and let the home chapter do their thing. It was made clear that they had visitors. Similar to what AGDee said, it was a nice addition but it didn't really affect anything

You know, if recruitment weren't already complicated enough, this would actually be a cool thing to do during rush. Most schools already have open house or icebreakers, philanthropy day, skits, and prefs. It would be fun to - gasp- add a day to highlight the national/international aspect of the org and also the lifelong committment. PNMs may realize that the org's reputation on the particular campus is only a drop in the bucket. It would be fun if it could ever be worked out. Having sisters and alumnae participate - maybe with a skit or something. Just a pipe dream - an Irishpipe dream :)

I could see something like that replacing skits as things get less frilly...

ETA: At my alma mater, they are asking that alumnae check in with Panhellenic before going to recruitment events. I felt a little off kilter when I heard that because I feel like "Hey, this is my chapter too!". I've been a member of it for more years than any of these youngens! LOL I do understand that they want to know who is there, it just felt odd.. like I'm an outsider or something.

We always had help from our UNT, TCU, TAMU, SWT, Southwestern, Tech, and UT chapters. These sisters were amazing, always stepped up to the plate to help, stepped in to rush women, and were amazing!! When you have 80 girls in a party and 30 members, you have to do something. RULES: they never advertised or hid the fact that they were from another chapter and dressed just like us. Make sure they know what to talk about and what NOT to talk about.

We were permitted to bring in women from other chapters. The rules were, they had to pass the same rush-rules test that everyone had to pass, be clearly identified as active sisters from another chapter on their nametags, and could not be a part of any form of entertainment.

The same rules applied to alums. Can I tell you how weird it was when I went back as an alum to help out with rush, and I had to stand there during pref not singing songs that every AEPhi knows and every active was singing - and all the other alums were singing despite the rule - and they went flat! I was actually thanked by the party chair for not breaking the rules and singing even though I could have kept them on key. *sigh*

I'm an alum and I was at Baylor last year helping out. There were other ladies from several other chapters. They couldn't all wear the same thing and I think there is some Panhellenic rule there about only having 2 variations of outfits. The chapter was in violation of this rule (not totally sure what the rule is but the recruitment chair and pres were worried) but the Panhellenic board never came it. I felt the university was very helpful to the chapter and allowed the chapter some liberties. The way the chapter presented it was, hey here are our sisters from other chapters. They sold it as wonderful sisterhood that extended beyond just their campus. They tried to rush in groups so that there was at least on chapter member in each group.

A struggling chapter at A&M did this. Unfortunately, it did not help much and the chapter continued to struggle. The visiting sisters had to wear a nametag stating which chapter they were from and also had to wear a different outfit. Maybe it depends on the campus but I personally think it made things worse for this chapter, they ended up closing 2 years later.

I was at a chapter recently that had Alpha Gams from other chapters. I was only there one day but I know that it was explained that the chapter was helping out. As someone earlier said, the majority of actual "rushing" was by the actual chapter.

Having finished formal recruitment a few hours ago at my school, "yawn", alumna had to sign in each day and wear a orange or purple (dependng on which one you happened to get) ribbon. All sorority members have been wearing white ribbons since school started so that pnms would know who was in a sorority and knew they could not talk to them.

As for as what alumnae could do....stand there and smile!I think that we could sing:D Course I was stuck in the voting room almost every party..but they did let me out for Pref!;)