A Canadian recruitment story...

cdn · #1 08-12-2009, 11:58 AM

Greek life in Canada is smaller and not very well known in some schools. Some of my friends have gone through their entire university experience without even knowing that their schools had any sororities, and my school doesn’t have a Greek life office or anything like that.

So the rush I went through was really different than the stories I’ve read on here. Basically, all the sororities here individually plan their own events and advertise them through facebook, sorority websites, posters at the school and word of mouth. The events go on for about two weeks and then the sororities invites some rushes to pledge. Each sorority has information sessions, sisterhood events, philanthropy events and mixers during rush, and the atmosphere is generally pretty informal. You don't have to have any recommendations and most events do not have a dress code.

Unlike recruitment in the US, where the goal seems to be to have all the PNM’s meet every sorority (from what I’ve read, sorry if I’ve got it wrong), many of the rush events for different sororities overlapped here, and it was difficult to plan my schedule so I got to meet all the sororities. For example, one sorority could be having a rush movie night during another sorority’s rush mixer, so you couldn’t attend both.

Hopefully that explanation wasn’t super confusing! I attended rush events for two local and one NPC sorority. I don’t want to give away my affiliation until the end, so I’m nicknaming the groups- Rose, Trillium and Daisy.

danke shoen · #2 08-12-2009, 12:16 PM

OO, I am so excited to see another Canadian here and to read your rush story

FSUZeta · #3 08-12-2009, 12:39 PM

rose is very difficult to read (at least on my computer screen)

cdn · #4 08-12-2009, 12:41 PM

Going in, I didn’t have any idea of different sorority’s reputations on campus and I want to say that I was pretty open-minded…But to be honest, I had very little idea of what a sorority was about. I was super involved in high school, and then opted to go to a good university 6 hours from home with none of my friends. I had the vague idea that a sorority would be a good way to get involved, and hopefully distract me from being homesick.

A couple of weeks before school started, I checked out their websites, where Rose and Daisy had posted their rush schedules. During the second day of classes, I also saw a poster for an information session for Trillium. Rush started the week after classes started.

Monday: Rose was kicking off their rush with a barbeque mixer, meeting in the building beside my res. Daisy was having a philanthropy can drive event…across town. As lame as it sounds now, I opted to go to Rose’s event just because it was closer.

The mixer: The website said to meet in the university centre at 6pm. I went there and was greeted by about five sisters wearing t-shirts and sweaters with their letters. They were standing around talking to four other rushes by the time I got there. It was pretty casual conversation, just talking about where we were from, what programs everyone was in, etc. We waited until 6:20, when there were about 12 rushes total and then walked to the fraternity house where the barbeque was taking place. The fraternity had a number of rushes there, and were waiting on maybe a few more. We all got hamburgers and hot dogs and then sat on chairs and picnic tables in their backyard.

When everyone was finished eating, they started up a game where we went around the circle and each person had to say their name, their year, their favourite food and a weird fact about themselves. It ended up being pretty fun. One of the sisters tried to say that her weird fact was that her favourite food was sauer kraut and the guys were like, “No, no, that’s cheating, try again.” A girl said her favourite food was cafeteria food, which got a lot of laughs. A few people picked weird facts that were a little too weird- one of the guys said his nipples were inverted and tried to show them (!!). At the end, the sisters walked us back to the school and offered to walk home with anyone who lived farther or didn’t feel comfortable walking alone, which was nice.
I had a one on one conversation with one sister in particular walking home where I felt like I got really meaningful advice. She was talking about how and why she ended up being a Rose, and just said that she felt like it was an amazing fit. She said that she really hit it off with the girls from Rose, and immediately felt at home. And this will probably sound basic to sorority women, but as a rush that really hit home for me. I needed to look for a group where I really fit.

Overall, I had a lot of fun with the girls and I thought they were really nice. I didn’t feel like I really hit it off with anyone in particular, and I wasn’t sure if I enjoyed spending time with the sisters, or if it had been the guys that made the night fun.

littleowl33 · #5 08-12-2009, 12:59 PM

You're a great storyteller! If you don't mind my asking, which group is the NPC? I'm assuming it's not Rose because they had boys at their event, which is against the NPC rules for recruitment.

cdn · #6 08-12-2009, 01:39 PM

Littleowl33- Trillium is the NPC sorority, and thanks

Tuesday: Trillium had an information session at 12.

I went to the designated meeting spot for the information session and there were already a number of rushes and sisters present. Again, the sisters wore their letters on shirts, sweaters or bags. We used an empty classroom to meet in and arranged the chairs in a circle. All the rushes were given a sheet with basic information about the sorority- their charity, a brief history, etc. First we went around the circle and everyone said their name, year and where they were from, and then the sisters went over the sheet, basically reading it aloud. They also gave us their rush schedules, saying that they didn’t like to post the info on the internet, and a few email addresses to reach sisters with questions. They encouraged us to attend their sisterhood event that night if we could.

The session was over, but I hung around to talk to a few sisters. The first girl I talked to didn’t seem very excited about anything, very downbeat. It was a really awkward conversation where she gave yes/no answers to everything I said, and didn’t ask me anything. I talked to a few other sisters who gave a better impression. One girl seemed really sweet, if a little shy, and the other was really friendly and outgoing.
Overall, I was left with a pretty neutral impression of Trillium- some girls seemed nice, but the one girl really turned me off. They had a sisterhood event that night, but I couldn’t attend because I had a class.

Thursday: Daisy had a sisterhood event and Rose had another mixer. I decided to go to the Daisy event.

The event was an all-you-can-eat-wings night at a local bar. The Daisy website said to meet at a place on campus, and then we would walk over. When I got to the meeting place, I didn’t see anyone wearing Greek letters. I stood around feeling silly for a while, and then a girl walked up to me and asked if I was there for the Daisy sisterhood night. Thank goodness she did, or I would have stood there alone all night. She brought me over to the group, explaining that they don’t usually wear their letters for every single event. She was super friendly and introduced me to everyone else there- three other sisters and about five rushes. She said that they would wait around for a little longer to see if anyone else would show, then walk to the bar. We stood around chatting for a while, and a few more rushes came in. Before we left, the sisters quickly explained that they didn’t endorse underage drinking, but we could drink if we were of age and wanted to. When we got to the bar, quite a few sisters were already there waiting, along with a few more rushes who had shown up on their own. The sorority had reserved a huge table and they made sure that the rushes were sitting beside at least one sister.

The wings place had all kinds of crazy varieties of wings. One sister in particular was in her element. She went back and forth to the wings table about twenty times, coming back with dill pickle wings, sweet and sour wings, and a big plate of, “These ones had no description, so I’m daring everyone to try one.” The sisters were all really fun and open. They wanted to let us know that they were generally a pretty small sorority, and they liked to keep it that way so that they knew everyone really well. I found out later in rush that a different sorority was well known for not being small and not knowing most of their sisters. At the end of the night, most of the sister stuck around to walk the rushes back to campus, and like the Roses, offered to walk people home if they wanted.

Overall, I had a great impression from Daisy. I felt like I really got along with the sisters and I was excited to go to more of their events.

COBaby · #7 08-12-2009, 02:05 PM

Wow, this is so cool! The bf is going to school in Canada, and his descriptions of Greek Life there are very different from here. Can't wait to hear more!

cdn · #8 08-12-2009, 03:23 PM

Friday: Rose was having a charity pub night and Daisy was having a mixer. I originally intended to go to Rose’s event, but my mood was more with Daisy at the time.

I went to the designated meeting spot to meet with the sisters before the mixer. The sisters and rushes stood around for a little while talking, waiting so they wouldn’t miss the latecomers. At around 9:30, we set off for the fraternity house divided amongst the sisters’ cars. The car I was in was a lot of fun…except none of us had any sense of direction! We ended driving right by the fraternity’s street twice. Eventually we made it in, and everybody made fun of us for getting lost in a ten minute drive from the school.

The mixer was a lot of fun, but if you ever attend a rush event where alcohol is allowed…Watch how much you drink! Most of the girls weren’t drinking much, and quite a few of the sisters didn’t drink at all. But a couple rushes got pretty out of control…One rush drank so much she threw up in a sister’s purse. Super awkward. I imagine the sister was pretty annoyed, but she didn’t say anything and was really nice about it. At the end of the night, a couple of sisters gave me and a few other girls a drive home. One of the rushes commented that she didn’t think it was appropriate to allow alcohol during rush. A sister explained it to me discreetly at a later date, basically saying that if a girl thinks it’s appropriate to get embarrassingly drunk while she’s trying to impress the sisters and become a part of their group, then how bad will she be if she becomes a sister and no longer has to try to impress them? I don’t think it’s a bad point, to be honest. I didn't have as much fun at this event as the wings night, but I still had a good impression of Daisy.

Sunday: Rose sisterhood event and a Trillium event scheduled. I had skipped a few Rose events now, so I decided to go to theirs.

I arrived at the meeting place a few minutes early, sat down, and waited for everyone else to show up. And waited. And waited. After about half an hour of sitting around by myself, I thought they might have cancelled the event or changed the time and I decided to just go home. I felt kind of silly for skipping a Trillium event to go to a Rose one that didn’t even happen

born2bdphie · #9 08-12-2009, 03:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cdn

The mixer was a lot of fun, but if you ever attend a rush event where alcohol is allowed…Watch how much you drink! Most of the girls weren’t drinking much, and quite a few of the sisters didn’t drink at all. But a couple rushes got pretty out of control…One rush drank so much she threw up in a sister’s purse. Super awkward.

Ahahahahaha! The next time someone whines to me about not being allowed to have drinks at NPC recruitment I'm telling them this story hahaha.

cdn · #10 08-12-2009, 07:37 PM

Tuesday: A Rose mixer, playing capture the flag with a fraternity.

On Sunday, I sent an email to the Rose rush chair asking if the Sunday event had been moved or cancelled. She responded saying it had been moved back a few hours and apologized for leaving me hanging. She said the Tuesday mixer would be going on as scheduled. I went to the meeting place and about 15 sisters and two rushes were waiting there. I didn’t recognize any of the sisters from the last event I attended (keeping in mind these are not sororities with hundreds of actives, this one had more like 50). When I asked if one of the girls I'd met before was coming, the sister I asked said, "Who?" which was a little weird. She didn't end up coming. We waited around for a while and a few more sisters and rush came in. In total, it was probably about 20 sisters and around 5 rushes. We met up with the guys and then walked to a nearby park to play.

It was a lot colder out than I expected, but after a few minutes of running around like loons everybody warmed up. We played girls vs guys, and we thought we were cheating kind of a lot…Moving the line, changing our flag, etc. We couldn’t figure out why the guys were being so easy going about it…until we found out that they hid their flag at the top of a tree that was too small to climb and that we weren’t tall enough to reach. The game ended in a truce, and we all walked back to the school. This event didn’t leave a lot of room for talking and getting to know the sisters, but I got the impression that they were pretty cool and energetic. They were fun about the game, they weren’t worrying about messing up their hair or looking cute or anything. I had a good time, and liked Rose, but probably not as much as Daisy.

Wednesday: Trillium “home spa night” sisterhood event.

We met at the designated meeting spot for Trillium before walking over to one of the sister’s house for the event. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this yet, but none of the sororities at my school have their own houses. When we got there we were greeted by a crowd of Trillium sisters, almost all wearing Trillium gear. One of the girls I talked to at the info session grabbed me almost right away and found me a place to sit near her. We weren’t exactly “paired off”, but the sisters made sure the rushes were included and made a real effort to get to know us. I thought this event was a great idea, and the sisters pulled it off really well. They had all kinds of nail polish and nail supplies on a big table in the middle, a hand scrub in the kitchen, Sex in the City playing on the TV, and edible (ish) face masks going on in one corner. They also had a table with fruits and veggies and punch on one side. It was really cute and cozy. I met another sister tonight who really made an impression. She was so funny and outgoing, and basically went around the room talking to everyone and making us laugh.

On the way home, I was talking to the sweet, quiet girl from the info session, and for some reason I brought up dues. I didn’t realize at the time that talking about it was considered kind of tacky. She told me she was treasurer so I just asked. She got really uncomfortable and said she couldn’t really say...Which seemed a little shady to me at the time. Anyway, it was a little quiet between the two of us for the rest of the way back, and I’m hoping now that she wasn’t actually offended.

Overall, I had a great time that night. I think I really hit it off with a few of the girls. I was starting to worry a bit about dues, though, and kind of worrying about what sorority I wanted to be a part of. There were only a few rush events left, and I was told early on that the more events you attend for a sorority, the more likely you are to be asked to join that sorority. Without getting into any other private factors that may go into new member selection process-- if they know who you are, you're more likely to get in.

Psi U MC Vito · #11 08-12-2009, 08:26 PM

I have a feeling that it is going to be Daisy. This actually sounds similar to the system of recruitment at my school, for both fraternities and sororities. Also to all the NPCers out there, but is asking about dues considered tacky? I actually think it is a good thing because it means they are really interested and shows responsibility.

AOII Angel · #12 08-12-2009, 08:53 PM

I can't imagine why any NPC sorority would have a problem with a PNM asking what dues are! That was NOT an unreasonable question.

CougarGrad · #13 08-12-2009, 10:32 PM

I'm really enjoying reading your story. I don't think I've read a Canadian recruitment yet.

littleowl33 · #14 08-14-2009, 09:38 AM

cdn, come back and finish your story!

cdn · #15 08-14-2009, 10:32 AM

haha, sorry guys! Working on finishing the story, but I have work as well.