My little sister's rush at UNH
 

My little sister is rushing at UNH and since I never got to write about my own rush experience, I decided to live vicariously through her…

She’s a sophomore right now and didn’t want to go through rush last year because she wanted to get herself settled into being away at college first. She actually didn’t want to rush until spring semester this year, but decided to go through formal recruitment since she’s already a sophomore and sometimes houses don’t take spring pledge classes.

The five houses she will be visiting are Alpha Chi Omega, Alpha Phi, Alpha Xi Delta, Chi Omega, and Kappa Delta. Since I am completely obsessed with Laguna Beach, I’m going to use names from the show to describe the houses.

Monday

Alex – The house was beautiful and the girls are really close with each other. They do almost everything together. They were really nice and didn’t seem fake. The house has a sleeping deck, which she liked, but it had bunk beds. The girls also get their own rooms downstairs where they have a desk, closet, etc. One of her friends who is in a frat told her that he doesn’t know anyone in this house and that they never really do anything with the frats, so she didn’t really like that.

Kristin – A few of her friends are in this house, so she already knew people when she got there. They didn’t really have any decorations up around the house or anything, so she didn’t like that. Also, they asked if she wanted a house tour and pretty much let her decide what she wanted to see, unlike the other houses. She felt like the 2 girls she talked to weren’t really listening, because they weren’t looking at her when she was talking. She said she didn’t really feel comfortable here.

Lauren – The house was absolutely gorgeous! They had a really big chapter room, which a lot of the girls use as a study lounge. There’s no sleeping deck, so all the girls have their own rooms which they can paint any color they want. They have mandatory study hours (10 a week compared to 6 for the other houses), which she really likes. She also really liked their philanthropies. The one thing she didn’t like is that she didn’t get to see the kitchen.

Tuesday

Jessica – She said the house kinda looked like a ski lodge…I’m not really sure what that means. This house also didn’t have a deck, but it did have a study lounge. They don’t require study hours if you have above a 3.5 (which she does) and she doesn’t like that. She’d rather have a set time where she does her work and this would make it easier for her. The 2 girls she talked to were really nice and she felt like they weren’t fake, but none of the girls in her Rho Psi group liked this house. She also heard a bad rumor about them from a girl who isn’t in a house. I told her to form her own opinions and that if you asked enough people you’d hear bad rumors about all the houses.

Taylor – She loved the decorations at this house and said it was beautiful. It’s the only house that serves breakfast every day and it’s made to order (the other houses only get lunch and dinner). They have a deck and a study lounge, but also have separate rooms for everyone to keep their personal stuff. She loved the fact that they had TiVo too. This house has the highest new member fees, but it’s the cheapest to live in once you become a sister. She loved the 3 girls she talked to at this house. The one thing she really didn’t like is that they took the house tour in large groups (about 15 people) and she felt it wasn’t very personal.

She had to cut her list down to the three she wanted to see today and she was having a really hard time doing it. I was on the phone with her for over an hour last night trying to help her decide.

She was pretty sure she didn’t want to go back to Kristin, but she couldn’t decide which of the other four to drop. They had to have their decisions in by 10:20 this morning and then they would find out then who invited them back. As of 9:30 she was going to go with Jessica, Lauren and Taylor. She said that she didn’t feel comfortable at Kristin the first night and she “didn’t want to take the risk of giving them another chance and if it sucked again then she would miss out on one she liked”, but she IMed me at 11:45 and told me that she decided to give Kristin another chance, so she ‘regretted with interest’ Alex and Jessica (she got invited back to all 5). She also said that one girl in her group didn’t get invited back to Kristin so she figured that’s good if they’re more selective.

So now I’m waiting to hear from her to see how tonight went. Preference is tomorrow and she’ll only get to go to two and then bids go out on Friday.

thanks for sharing your sisters story. hope all goes well for her.

good luck to her and all happiness.

Yay a UNH thread! I helped them with rush 2 years ago, and half of the chapter I advise now has high school friends at our UNH chapter. I can't wait to hear updates.

Also GreekGirl, can you pm me about URI? I think today is bid day, I want to hear how everyone does. I hope Sigma Kappa does well!

Jessica, the house which would let sisters who have above a 3.5 out of stufy hours, would still ALLOW her to be there but they recognize a smart student must not need the "structure" of being forced into 10 hours. If she joins this house she CAN do the same hours as the other sisters and maybe she can be "in charge" of monitoring the other sisters and NMs hours in a log book or something. Her grades are outstanding!

Denise

We're not there but we (internationally) don't require girls with higher GPA's to attend study hours either.

I just got a call from my sister...

I got my information wrong...Pref is tomorrow not tonight, so I'll have to wait to hear about it. I didn't get to talk to her very long but here's the little info I got.

She went back to Kristin, Lauren and Taylor last night. She really liked Kristen and Lauren. She felt like the conversations flowed well and nothing was forced, but at Taylor she felt like there were a lot of pauses where she didn't really know what to talk about next. She's glad she gave Kristin another chance and said that it must have been a fluke the first night. So she has decided to Pref Kristen and Lauren. I'm so excited for her! I can't wait to see which house she chooses!

Denise - I know she could still go to study hours, even though they wouldn't be mandatory for her, I think she just feels it's better to have them mandatory so she has to go. She's very serious about her schoolwork and getting good grades and I think maybe she feels that if it's not mandatory then she won't go and will have to do her work on her own time...I'm not really sure. It makes sense to me though. I believe that this house won best G.P.A. the past 2 years, so it seems like it's working for them.

lauralaylin - Today was bid day. I'm actually an alumna, so I'm not very involved with rush this year, I only know how my house did, but one of my roommates in a senior in Alpha Phi, so I'll ask her about everyone else.

good for her....
may it be a wonderful ending.

Good luck to your sister!

(I am obsessed with Laguna Beach too!)

Things seem to be going really well with your sister, I'm glad that she gave Kristin another chance and it worked out. I hope pref goes well for her.

Thanks for asking about URI's rush, I hope more groups got quota this year. With one less sorority on campus, I wonder how things have changed too!

O.K. So tonight was Preference and here's what my sister told me after she filled out her pref card:

"I picked 'Lauren' first then 'Kristin' second. I knew every night that I def wanted to back to 'Lauren' and at first I didn’t even want to go back to 'Kristin' so I took that as a sign. At 'Lauren' tonight they gave us cookies with our names on them (in frosting)and it was just so much more personal…the time flew by and I dunno I think I had more fun there. I liked 'Kristin' too but I dunno I didn’t have any bad experiences at 'Lauren' and I had that one bad night at 'Kristin'."

So she absolutely loved 'Lauren' all three nights and right now we're hoping that at 11 a.m. tomorrow that's what the name on her bid will be. I know she'd be happy at 'Kristin' too, she's already got a lot of friends in that house. But I truly feel that now she understands what I meant when I told her that after prefs she would walk out of a house and "just know" that's where she belonged.

Here's what she said about it:

"They come down to the group and are like " I would like to welcome ___ to 'Lauren' pref night" then you go inside and they had a table set up specifically for you and my girl brought down things that were special to her like her bids day tshirt and stuff her big made her and stuff. Then they go in a room and are like "sisters of 'Lauren' I would like to present my friend ____" and then they say this chant Then 4 sisters go around and talk about what the different symbols are and stuff and one girl read a poem about being in a sorority and another one wrote a letter (she’s a senior) about what her experiences were like. And before all this they go around and light your candles, and then after its done you talk to your pref girl for a little longer and then leave. It was nice though."

So everyone keep your fingers crossed...She's gonna call me as soon as she gets her bid, but I'm pretty sure I know what it will be...I think I might be more excited than she is!

it sounds lovely. i hope that the card in her envelope reads "lauren" today!!

She got her bid...









...are you ready?...












LAUREN!!!!










which was...











ALPHA PHI!!!!




She's at her pledge retreat right now and couldn't be happier. I didn't really get to hear much about bid day, but I'm sure it was fabulous! My roommate (who is an Alpha Phi here) is so excited. She said now we're 'in-laws', haha! It's funny because before rush actually started my mother and I, as well as a lot of her friends, were convinced she was going to Chi Omega (Kristen), because she already had a lot of friends in that house and they're the ones who told her to rush, but I'm glad she didn't base her decision entirely on that. I'm so excited for her and to hear how her pledging goes. I know she's found a great house and I'm so glad you guys were here to share her story.




on a separate note, all I know about URI bids is that quota was 17. Alpha Phi got quota and Sigma Kappa got quota + 2.

hooray for your sister and alpha phi!!