Formal vs Informal rush?
 

hi guys I am new to this site so bear with me...
I will be rushing this coming fall and at my school, formal recruitment is only during spring semesters. I called the greek life office and the lady told me that the difference between formal and informal is that, you already know which house you are interested in when you're going through the informal one. I am transferring so I definitely wouldn't know which sorority I want to join unless I meet all of them. Is informal recruitment same thing as COB? And how do I go about contacting these chapters that I'm interested in joining?

Katie

Hi Katie,

The woman from greek life was generally correct, except you don't HAVE to know which house you're interested in before going to informal recruitment events. If multiple sororities are having open informal recruitment events, it's definitely okay to go to more than one, even if you're not quite sure where you'd like to be. Just go to them, have fun, meet some sorority women and go through formal recruitment in the spring if you like what you see (if you don't get a bid before then! :) )

Good luck.

I went through both (I quit halfway through formal, and was later invited back to informal) and I preferred informal out of the two. Formal is very fast paced, and you talk to so many girls at each house that you can barely remember who's who. I loved informal because I got to spend more time with the sisters and I had conversations about things other than just the sorority. I fell in love with the house and the sisters the more time I spent there. I would encourage you to go through formal recruitment to look at all the houses. If formal doesn't work out, definitely try informal. Good luck and have fun with it:)

thanks for the answers, ladies~~I have another question about informal...does informal rush have a set bid day or something? I was wondering, if multiple chapters are doing informal, and I go to all of them, is it possible for me to receive more than one bid?
Not sure how this works but I was also wondering whether or not you can wait to accept a bid. Do you usually accept it right there when they tell you?

during informal it is possible to receive more than one bid-there may or may not be a set bid day-it really depends on the campus and how they handle informal. i have heard of some campuses that have a more organized informal/cob recruitment-other campuses are more relaxed . some campuses/sororities may put a time limit on the time a pnm will have to accept or decline a bid. of course, it may not be an issue at all, you may want to accept immediately, or you may know that this sorority is not for you. the members who offer you a bid will most likely let you know how long you have to consider their invitation.

you could call the greek life office again and ask them to explain exactly how their informal recruitment works. you may be able to get your name on a list so that the sororities will contact you about their parties. visit as many as you can.

Are you going to be a freshman or a transfer? If you're a freshman, you will probably not be allowed to participate in informal rush during the fall. The idea (I think) is that freshmen should at least have the opportunity to participate in formal recruitment and visit all the sororities.

You don't have to set your sights on any one sorority during informal rush. You can visit several sororities, and you can get more than one bid.

Good luck. :)

The rule applies to freshmen, not transfers. Transfers can participate in fall informal recruitment even if they haven't been around long enough to go through formal recruitment at their new school.