Men's and women's recruitment
 

I was surprised to find out this weekend how radically different men's rush is. It appears that they can recieve multiple bids and are allowed to go to as many or few parties as they wish.

Do fraternities have quotas of PNMs they should take? and why is that the men can operate this way and women's is so complicated? Would it be logistically possible to change to men's or would it be a total disaster?


Thoughts anyone?

ps, I'm not trying to start a coup and overhaul the system, I understand it's merits but I just wanted to see everyone's opinions.

33girl, are you there? This is a perfect softball for you.

The reason women's rush is so complex and rule-bound is that they WANT it that way. It works for them and they're happy. Women tend to organize, cooperate and make rules to ensure stability.
Men, on the other hand, are heirarchical and competitive. We value the entrepreneur and the chapter that can rise as far as its ambition will take it. We don't WANT rules or restrictions on chapter size, number of pledges, or when and where we can rush.

There are schools that have formal rush (like sorority rush) for men. Generally, the result ensures every fraternity a pledge class but the quality is lower than it could be because the men get lazy and tend to rush whoever walks through the door instead of going out on campus and finding the most ambitious and sucessful candidates.

I know of no campuses where sororities have a non-structured rush.

Each side is pretty happy with they way things work now. There are flaws, and they are not insignificant, but fraternities as well as sororities seem to be prosperous and successful within their respective rush systems.

Pretty good summary.

They tried to organize men's rush here one spring. I think a total of 8 guys signed up. Led to a horrible rush the campus over.

I think it would be hard to picture 300 men interested in joining a fraternity going through the types of rushes I have seen sororities participate in. The current state of sorority and fraternity life differ greatly, in that most campuses have booming sorority populations yet the fraternity population may be 1/2 to 2/3rds as many. My alma mater just organized men's rush in that they had men that were interested register. It drew about 120 registrants for four fraternities, however, the sororities draw over 200 applicants yearly. In my mind, recruitment never ends.

There are campuses that don't have a formal recruitment for sororities. NPC now has 4 levels of recruitment and suggestions for which type of campuses use which level. So, in the past couple years, some flexibility has been added. It is up to the college's Panhellenic Council to determine which method to use. We are finding that most are reluctant to change, even when formal recruitment only brings a quota of 4.

Firehouse is pretty much right. :)

I think the men and the women would both benefit from being a little more like each other, but that's just my opinion.

And there are schools where women's rush is more like men's. Sometimes it's a problem though because the trash talking and dirty rushing can get out of hand. Women are meaner than men that way.

And that's why they are reluctant to move to Minimally Structured or Continuous Recruitment methods. The thing I always hear, when we are trying to encourage a campus to change is "But, without quota, they'll dirty rush and take everybody"

Re: Men's and women's recruitment
 

We never had a quota of PNMs. There was a pool of candidates, and we just picked as many (or as few) as we thought would fit with our chapter. The system worked well at my school, which is why I imagine neither side wanted to change.

Re: Re: Men's and women's recruitment
 

You never had goals for the year?

Whether you achieved them or not?

-Rudey

Re: Re: Re: Men's and women's recruitment
 

Definitely, we had goals for each semester and the year as a whole - I was just saying we didn't have quotas that were mandated by the university.

If you search, I think you'll find quite a few posts on this subject. It's been discussed many times on here....

Legacies to fraternities
 

I'm curious how legacies factor in or not to fraternities. Is there any official policy?

Most fraternities have some policy, usually an understood one...here we usually call the guy to come to rush events, and if he's alright, we'll bid him. If there is significant opposition however, we'll call whoever rec'd him to us and tell them that we wont be bidding him before hand. Legacies have good and bad effects, because obviously prominant alumni legacies are very valuable, but you can get hurt by taking guys that are less than what you're looking for.

I see your points. I know I have read articles in the student newspaper about how some fraternities have compalined about low turn out for rush. I suppose requiring attendance could fix that, but it could also cause alot to drop out.

I understand the need for quotas, I am just amazed that frats can operate w/o them. How can they be asured that they have enough to fill the house etc if they can recieve multiple bids?

My campus has a somewhat structured recruitment for men, and completely structured for the women. The first day every man has to go to each chapter once and if I remember right there was some kind of "passport" that was stamped at each chapter. Then the next three days he can go where he pleases or where he has been invited. Over the summer the fraternities have events all over the state where they get to meet potential members, but no bids are handed out. A lot of the students I know have told me they were contacted because of degree program (AGR for example), or they knew someone from their home town and met people because of a sibling. However we're in the process of hiring a new greek advisor, and I have heard that men's recruitment is changing this year.

Of course I agree with 33girl that a combination of men's and women's recruitment styles would be a positive change, but it won't happen quickly. I also have some other opinions about my campus, but I'll save it for a more appropriate thread.