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A complete 1996 rush post with a bittersweet ending
I found my way to this website because my younger niece is preparing for recruitment (or rush, as I knew it!) and asked me for help, as I’m the only person in our family who ever pursued sorority membership, but truthfully, she’s probably regarding my advice as a cautionary tale! Anyway, I found this site kind of addictive, especially the recruitment stories. I wanted to share my story, as maybe it’ll help someone either see a) what NOT to do or b) that life goes on. From my short time lurking here, I see that not everyone wants to hear a recruitment story from 1996 or be asked fifty times if I should continue, so instead of dragging this out forever, I’m just going to post it all at once and if you want to read it, there it is, and if not, well, then, you won’t have to.
A little background: I grew up in New England, where Greek life is generally not a big deal. Most of my close friends were a year ahead of me in high school and not a single one of them pursued membership in a sorority. One, and only one, of my male friends joined a fraternity. I truly didn’t have any preconceived notions about sororities, other than my belief that it was a “club” for women to join. I didn’t know about rush, pledging, or even the stereotypes. I liked meeting new people, making new friends, etc, so that is how I became interested in it. I went to a larger school in New England with an urban campus (I won’t post the name but if anyone guesses, that’s okay with me). Greek life wasn’t all that important but a decent number of students did seem to be involved. When I saw the girls wearing their sweatshirts with letters around campus, I thought they looked cool and became intrigued!
Just to let you know about me personally…I was an average high school student, but my school wasn’t that tough to get into so I was probably an average or slightly above-average student there. Honestly, no one was overly concerned with academics there. In high school, I’d been involved in several clubs and activities and was a scholarship recipient from one of those clubs and was therefore a member of the collegiate group of that organization. Appearance-wise, I was overweight and my lack of confidence definitely was apparent. I didn’t dress great, but not terribly either. I guess I just tried to blend in.
In 1996, there were six sororities on my campus. One was a new sorority that was Latino-focused, although they were open to members of all races, one was a local that was planning to affiliate with a national group later in the academic year, and the other four were NPC groups. I only knew one person in a sorority, and she was a new transfer student who lived in my dorm. She was pretty, funny, and nice and definitely made me interested in being a sorority. I’ll name the sororities after characters on the show Felicity, since that’s my favorite show of all time. So, they are:
Felicity
Ben
Noel
Julie
Javier
Megan
From what I’ve read here, what happened on my campus seems kind of unusual, and I’m not sure if rules were different back then or that’s just how it was at my school. Our formal rush was over a 4 day weekend in October. In the 2 – 3 weeks leading up to it, the sororities could hold their own events to get to know them better. I attended all of the events that I heard of and made some initial impressions.
Felicity: This was the group that my friend was a member of (although she was a transfer student and had just affiliated with them). Chapters don’t have houses on my campus but this group rented several apartments in one of the nicer complexes in the city for the sisters and had two parties in a common room there. I thought the girls here were SO beautiful and nice. I loved, loved, loved this group, and I thought they liked me too. They were exactly the kind of girl that I wanted to be. I remember one night they had a little ceremony where we held candles and went around the room and said why we wanted to join and then blew out the candles. I can’t recall what I said but several of the sisters “snapped” and told me later that what I said was beautiful. I felt SO good and thought they liked me a lot.
Ben: This group was made up of nice, average-looking, down to Earth girls. One night they took us on a trip off campus to go on a hayride and another night they hosted us at a house they rented off-campus. I felt like I knew this group the best because of the nature of their activities and the interest they took in each of us.
Noel: This chapter hosted some kind of party but I honestly cannot remember what it was. This was the group that was a local who was planning to become part of an NPC group later that year. I believe this was the last pre-rush party I attended and by then, I had though that I really wanted to be part of a national sorority so I kind of stupidly wrote them off. I don’t know why I didn’t give them a chance, especially knowing they planned to become part of a national sorority later that year and I could’ve been part of that.
Julie: This group hosted a scavenger hunt through the city for us. Although it was fun, I didn’t really feel like I connected with any of the sisters. In a way, it seemed like they were bonding more with each other than paying attention to the PNMs. I didn’t dislike this group; I just didn’t feel like I had gotten to know them.
Javier and Megan did not hold any pre-rush activities. Javier was NPC and Megan was the new Latina sorority.
Because the chapters did not have houses, formal rush was held in an academic center, with each sorority using a classroom as their room. I know rush was a Friday through Monday and that there were rounds each day, but we didn’t have cuts until right before preference and we did not rank or cut sororities ourselves. I remember that on days 1 and 2 we had parties with each sorority (with day 2’s being longer than day 1) and on the evening of day 2 you went downtown to pick up your invitations to preference, which you could receive as many invites as you were extended but only attend 3. Sunday, day 3, was preference and Monday was bid day. I won’t lie and pretend to recall the specifics of each party but some impressions that stand out to me to this day are as follows:
First, I still loved, loved, loved Felicity. This was the group I wanted to be part of and I was introduced to their president and just really felt like they loved me too. I couldn’t believe it because they were so beautiful and classy and I was just so….well, average, but it seemed true.
Second, because I loved Felicity so much, I didn’t give other chapters the attention they deserved. I should have paid more attention to Ben, but I did not. I barely got to know Julie, although they may have been a good choice for me. I dismissed Javier because I didn’t really get the chance to know them before rush (completely missing the point that rush was a way to GET to know them!). I had no interest in Megan. Probably the biggest mistake I made, though, was having zero interest in Noel. I did not even consider them because they were not NPC yet (and mind you that prior to starting the process, I knew NOTHING about sororities yet decided that quickly that I belonged only in an NPC group). I completely ignored the fact that the girls were leaders in many organizations across campus, that a lot of the members held roles in the student organization that I was part of, that these were smart, fun girls who would probably be great sisters. No, I just didn’t want to be part of their group.
Third, although I had strong opinions in my head, at the parties I was kind of shy and awkward. I was very conscious about my weight, although looking back, it probably would not have been such a deal-breaker on this campus.
I loved rush. You know how a lot of people on here say they were completely overwhelmed by the chanting/yelling/singing that the chapters do? Well, I wasn’t. I LOVED it. I was already thinking about how much fun it would be to be on the other side of the door next year. I loved the bonds the girls had. I loved the friendships and stories they told. I wanted to be part of it so badly!
After the parties on day 2, I went back to my dorm to rest and get ready to go pick up my invites to pref the next day. Finally it was time. I went down there expecting to be invited back to everyone (not because I thought I was that great but rather because I truly did not yet understand that the sororities chose you; I naively thought that they were “clubs” and my desire to join was enough). I got there and was handed two invites: one to Megan, the Latina group, and one to Noel, the local. Megan, it seemed, had preffed everyone, so I felt like that one didn’t even count. And Noel? I felt like they weren’t “real” because they were “just a local” still. I went outside and sat alone and cried and cried and berated myself for thinking that a fat loser like myself could ever fit in here. (When I think back on how little confidence I had, I just cringe). There was another girl in my group also crying and I remember being really surprised that she only got invited back to Megan. She was outgoing and cute. I still don’t really know what happened there. Maybe her grades were poor or maybe she was secretly obnoxious or maybe that’s just the way things went for her. My Rho Chi was a super nice girl who came out to find me and saw how upset I was. She asked me who I really wanted and I said Felicity. She looked at me kind of funny and asked if there was anyone else. I said I also kind of liked Ben. She hugged me and told me go to my parties the next day. I went to my dorm and cried forever. The next day, I did not go to any parties and dropped out of rush. My friend from Felicity called me the night they gave out bids and was upset along with me. She said everything was messed up. I told her how much I wanted Felicity and she told me that honestly I didn’t have a chance there. She also said that although she could not tell me about voting, she thought the girls in her new chapter were snobs and nothing like the girls in her old chapter and she was considering disaffiliating (which she eventually did). She asked how I felt about Ben and I told her I liked them too. She called them and found out they didn’t get enough girls and were going to do one more party at their house the next night. She told them I was interested and it turned out my Rho Chi was a member of Ben. They called me and invited me to their party. I went and thought I gave it my all. They were going to call us that night if they were extending a bid. They said it would be late so I stayed up very, very late waiting for a call….one that never came. Again, I cried myself to sleep and skipped my classes the next day.
After rush, I eventually started feeling better, although I had a hard time making friends. I’m shy by nature and that was why I thought being in a sorority would give me a chance to meet some girls. My social life never really bloomed in school. My school was very expensive (at least to me!) and I started to question my major. My school was a career-focused school so if my major wasn’t for me, there weren’t a lot of options. After that first year, I decided to transfer to a community college and just take some general ed classes at a fraction of the cost. I moved back home with my parents, did that, eventually got a decent job, met a great guy, got married, and had a couple of kids. I never did earn my bachelor’s degree (although I’m almost done with it now, taking part-time classes!) and I never joined a sorority. And you know what? I’m okay. I made friends at work, at the community college, etc. Would I still have liked to be a member? Sure. Would I maybe have stayed at school? Probably. But would my life have turned out exponentially better? I doubt it. It might have been different but I doubt it would be better. I doubt I’d be any happier. Life is good. Things worked out, even though membership in a GLO wasn’t in the cards for me.
I guess there are two pieces of advice I want someone to take away from my story. First, when evaluating sororities, don’t let your favorites be the ones that have the type of girls you WANT to be. Know the person that you are today. Felicity was full of thin, beautiful, accomplished women. I was a middle of the road girl. Ben and Noel were SO obviously better fits for me (and probably other groups too!) but I just focused on who I WANTED to be, rather than who I was. Big mistake.
Second, even if you don’t get in and things don’t turn out as you hoped, you will be okay. Even if it hurts for a very long time, you will be fine. That doesn’t mean being Greek isn’t a great experience (I would assume!) but it isn’t the ONLY big experience in your life. It definitely seems like the be all and end all now, but it’ll all be okay in the end.
Anyway, I know this isn’t the typical wonderful happy-ending story, but after I was hurt by my rush, I probably would’ve felt better knowing that I wasn’t the only person in the world who felt that way. So, I just figured that, with it being recruitment season and all, maybe some women who doesn’t find her home might find solace in this. It’s been a long time since I really thought about all of this, but I’ve enjoyed reliving the memory. Even though I was crushed at the time, rush really was a positive experience in my life.
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