[33girl]

I completely agree with prohibiting first semester freshmen from pledging. Here's why:

1. Joining other campus orgs (yearbook staff, football team etc) is not a lifetime commitment. Greek life should be. Will it really kill you to wait a semester if you're going to be a brother/sister your whole life?

2. Shortened pledge programs have been mandated by many universities and national GLOs. Often times people are initiated before they have their first semester's grades (and subsequently flunk out or leave the school) or know whether that college is truly the right fit for them. I know a lot of the propaganda says "going Greek your first semester helps you fit in at a big campus", but the fact is, going Greek won't prevent you from being in classes taught by TAs instead of real professors, or hating that the whole school culture revolves around football. You can't "hide" in your GLO. It's part of the campus, and you can't know what the campus is truly like until you actually live there and go to class there.

And once you're initiated - you're stuck (females anyway). Unless you transfer to another school with your sorority you can never join another one, and even if there is a chapter of your sorority there, they might be completely the opposite of the chapter you joined and you want nothing to do w/ them or vice versa.

3. Rushees know the stereotypes going in. I take this as a PLUS. Formal rush can be really phony and superficial, so if that's the only time you've had any contact w/ these people, it can be hard to make a decision - especially if you don't know anyone else on campus. Plus a lot of times, chapters are rushing in a way that isn't really "them" (especially if they're getting national help). We had deferred and never had anyone say after joining "I'm so disappointed, I thought you guys were the sorority that had all the homecoming queens" or something like that. I'd rather have a girl who's heard all the stereotypes, positive AND negative, and goes where she wants, not necessarily to where she would have thought was great her first week on campus.

4. "Dirty rushing" happens at every campus, no matter WHEN rush is. Some of the pre-freshman year schools supposedly have their whole class picked out from recs and resumes before the school year even starts. If that isn't "dirty" I don't know what is.

5. Less chance of burnout. If all you've ever known is your GLO, after 4 years I can't see how it WOULDN'T be on your nerves. If burnout isn't a problem, why are so many national groups implementing special programs to keep the seniors involved?

The NPHC groups do not allow first semester freshmen to pledge - and they seem to have much less of a problem instilling the fact that membership is a lifetime commitment. I'm not saying there aren't NPHC members that leave their GLO behind the minute they graduate, but for the most part, you hear from the 40 year olds "I am an AKA" not "I was an AKA."

And to the OP's question, it's not just private schools that do this.