Otterbein General Recruitment Thread
 

Since I'm a PX again this year, I guess I'll do a general play by play on the Panhellenic recruitment which will be starting a week later than usual. We have a new Greek Life adviser this year, so this will be her first experience of an all-local recruitment...especially one as wacky as what we do.

When we begin school on the 2nd, there will be one last week for girls to sign up for recruitment, with the absolute, final, skin of your teeth sign up being the Saturday of Open House (yes, it has happened!). We're hoping not to have that, but anyone who wants to go through we will accept.

A run-down on our system.

The sororities are all local. There are 6:
Sigma Alpha Tau
Theta Nu
Tau Delta
Epsilon Kappa Tau
Kappa Phi Omega
Tau Epsilon Mu

Houses range in size from 70-14. Dues range from $45-80. House capacities range from 16(?)-5. All houses are over 80 years old and have been continuously local since their inception.

Annually, we have about 150-200 girls go through recruitment with many being placed. We don't use the new figure system that the NPC does, no option maximizing (i.e., if you go to all your parties, you're going to be bid somewhere...there's a technical name for this but it escapes me at the moment). Recs are NOT required and no real formal rec system exists that I know of...mostly alumnae just contact their sorority. Legacy status is...nice? but not vital in any way. Juniors and seniors going through formal is not unusual and they are usually bid somewhere as off-quota.

There are 3 rounds over 3 weekends:
Open House
Novelty
Final
bid day

The weekend thing drives me batty...lots of suspense!

But I really hope all my girls have a fabulous recruitment and I hope they all find a home and be as happy in it as I am. As a senior, I've got a lot vested in the success of this recruitment. It will be hard to not be helping my sisters, but I really hope that they come through and show just how kick-ass our sisterhood is :)...but I hope that for every house. To be honest, every single girl could fit into at least 2 houses on campus if she desired to join. There's such a variety of personalities and styles that there's a place for everyone. The community is really laid back and fun and we like to keep it that way. Can't wait to see how this all turns out!

WOW, classes start on the 2nd? I think I would cry, haha.

Good luck with everything! I really don't know too much about locals so I can't wait to read all about it!

Arg I know! But we've been off since the day before thanksgiving so I suppose it is to be expected. It's rough because they're making the Tuesday a "monday" class day to even things out. Bah, humbug!

Awesome, I can't wait to be updated on how everything goes!

I am the founder and President of a local sorority and we plan on holding our first recruitment this coming semester...do you have any advice? We are the only sorority on campus but would still like to do a rush week with different events and activities, as well as a bid night.

eeeek! Just went and got my PX letters :). We're trying something new this year. Each PX group has a color and a number, which will hopefully make it easier for all involved to remember who is where doing what. I've got pretty green letters for my group. My partner and I are going to yankee trader this weekend to buy goodies, we're going with a green theme. I was thinking about making a big green number 2 like a tour guide's umbrella for them to follow.

Our Panhellenic Association ordered us baseball tee shirts with our group numbers on the back. We are also getting hoodies and tote bags!

Has recruitment started yet?

Nope, opening ceremony is on Wednesday and then Open House is on Saturday. So far ,we have 114 total signed up.

*phew*

I'm exhausted and its only opening ceremonies. We had 136 girls signed up as of 12:30. and then 146 or so as of 6PM, and then we had a TON and I mean a TON sign up at ceremony. I mean...geeezzzzzzzzzz there were a lot of girls. My group grew from 13 to 17. One group has 27!!!

More info tomorrow but I have to be at work at 5 am, so bed time!

Ok, this morning after the dust settled..156 is the current total. Girls can still sign up until Saturday morning at 9.30.

phoenixazul, do you feel that not having recruitment enrollment during fall semester makes it hard to plan for recruitment?

at fl. gulf coast u. they offer enrollment after school begins-recruitment is deferred a few weeks into the fall semester-and it makes it very difficult to plan-how many bottles of water do we need, how many girls will we be feeding on pref. night.

Now, see, we typically DO have sign ups during fall. We had them this year, but in my honest, personal opinion...they started too late this year (week 7 of a 10 week quarter). Usually the first two weeks, no one signs up. But then after that they see you sitting there, day in, day out. They get curious, they sign up. But for some mysterious reason, we have a TON of last minute girls and always had. If we had an application process or rec requirements, I don't think this would happen (but that would be unwise for our campus), but due to the sorta casual attitude about recruitment...procrastinators abound!

Sorry for hijacking this thread, but how are your dues soooo low? I'm in a local sorority, and we just had a dues increase from $125 to $175, and it may raise again this semester because of our insurance. (not that we've had lawsuits or anything at all...but we finally got insurance this school year) We've had girls who had to quit because of the dues increase. Could you PM me w/ details, like what kind of insurance your sorority and/or other sororities have and other things like that?

Thanks so much, and good luck w/ your recruitment! I'm excited to see how everything works out! :)

Well, today was...interesting. We had all our girls show up who were supposed to (those who didn't have excused absence), and we had 2 add. I was really proud of my girls for that. Plus they were all on time! Unfortunately it rained the entire time. boo! The temperature didn't get too bad until after our lunch break though.

Let me say that I love open house as a PX because you get to see all the other houses, which you don't always get to do as an active. Plus, you get to see them at their absolute best. It's also rare that you get to see *EVERY* active in the same spot at the same time. I love being able to see the house as a whole...and I think its beneficial to the PNM's as well.

That being said, all of the houses looked PHENOMENAL today. Every one has done some sort of renovation/remodel in the last year or two. We didn't have any real problems, except for being let out early of one house, which through us and the groups ahead and behind off for a bit. didn't short anyone time, gave groups more time, but we eventually got back on schedule.

The group ahead of mine was ENORMOUS though. They've got 27 girls! It's actually 2 groups combined together. They are PX'd separately, but for the purpose of open house they are together. Complicated, especially for the smaller houses, but its what had to be done. It was always funny because the Recruitment Charis were like, "wow, small group! Yay!", when ours was pretty much the average size!

That all being said, it was SO HARD to not go up and just squeeze my sisters today. I probably did something that gave it away :(. But at the same time, my sisters were doing kick ass today. All I heard in the house was laughter and the girls in my group all seemed engaged. *whew*. Plus our house looked tip-top.

No word on what quota will be as of yet (probably low 20s). Off quota lists comprised of Juniors and Seniors and independent sophomores had to be turned in all ready. I pick up my group's invites on Tuesday and we have our meeting to distribute them on Tuesday night (busy night for me, mortarboard and PX like RIGHT after each other).

I'm glad that recruitment has started off well for all of the houses :)

I had a question though, what do you mean by "independent sophomores"? They're rushing but aren't assigned a group?

Go PhoenixAzul! I'm glad to hear that recruitment got off to a good start.