penn state calls "courting" askings. it's pretty much a free for all as to who asks who. askings are a ton of fun.
~homecoming in the fall : fraternities ask usually end of march/beginning of april
~greek sing after homecoming in the fall: sororities ask usually end of march/beginning of april
~THON: this is a little different, most THON partners stay together for years, but the askings are usually sometime in march. it alternates every year as to who asks.
~Greek Week in the spring: fraternities ask. my freshman and sophomore years the askings were novemberish, my junior and senior years the askings were in january
here's an example of how askings go for homecoming and greek week.
round one: a fraternity or fraternities will call the sorority president and schedule when to come do the official asking ie before or after chapter one nite. also they let the sorority know some of what they have planned for the whole asking, ie bagels every morning, rides to class, flowers etc. after all the people who have been scheduled to ask your org. have done their skit or whatever, the chapter votes on whether or not to pair with one of the ones who asked or wait til 2nd rounds for someone different to ask.
round 2: goes pretty much the same as round one, but there are less sororities to pick from because some of them have accepted and are doing homecoming with someone who asked them during round one.
open askings: either the sororities or fraternities can ask because they haven't been paired up yet.
it can get really crazy sometimes with the different orgs competing with each other. one time my org competed with 3 other sororities at the same time for the same fraternity to do greek sing with us. it's truely march madness!
we called "mixers" socials and the social chairs handled everything. we usually had socials thursday-saturday nites every week.
even with as many of the fraternities as there are at penn state, you usually wind up doing stuff with the same 5 or 6.