Rushee Pictures?

[Silverlily80]

Last year our Panhellenic Advisor decided we should do away with requiring rushees to give us pictures. We have about 200-250 girls go through rush, and while that may not seem like a lot, it was hard to keep them all straight without pictures...I was just wondering if any of you all have done away with the picture thing and what you think about it. ~Thanks!

[CRMSNTiDEGRL717]

U of Alabama's panhellenic council has also done away w/ pictures

[ZTAngel]

At the University of Central Florida, we have over 700 girls coming through rush (I've heard 900 from some people). We do not have pictures. I think that pictures are used in the wrong way. I have a few friends at the University of Florida (where pictures are still used) and from what I understand, the pictures end up being used in a way that was not intended. We tell the girls that their pictures will be used only so that there is a face to go with the name. At UF, I hear that the sorority houses divide the applications into the "pretty girls" and "ugly girls". I feel that it is as if the ladies are being pre-judged. I want their face and personality to be in front of me at the same time; this way, I can get a better clue as to who the girl really is.

[shadokat]

I could be totally wrong on this, but I thought NPC actually said pictures were no longer allowed. I have women at the chapter at U of Miami who after their pref parties stayed up until 6:00 AM voting on the girls, because 250 girls came to the pref party and so many of them were not familiar to everyone. I can't imagine. Our pref parties have like 30.

[AlphaChiGirl]

I know that, at some schools, the pictures are not only used to weed out the "pretty girls" from the "ugly girls", but also to find out the race of a prospective rushee. This doesn't surprise me.

There are more potential abuses of the rec forms...sometimes, the houses look at the activities/professions of the parents to weed out the "wealthy girls". I'm not going to name the campuses at which this has happened, but it does happen.

[SigTauJake]

For a male point of view, we use pictures simply so we can remember who the guys are. Remember the scene in Animal House where they are looking at slides, well it is like that. With 50 to 60 guys coming to an event, and three to four events a week, it is hard to remember all of them, so we take polaroids of them, to use at bid voting. Rush is informal, thank God, so we really have no rules to follow.

[ees125]

My four years at PSU we never used pictures and during my freshman year when I went through rush there were a little over a thousand girls rushing.

[twinstars]

sororities can use rushee pictures in a "sinister" way, or not. each house uses them differently. my chapter gets a picture of each freshman rushee out of the "freshman facebook"... so it doesn't really matter if the girls give us pictures with their rush apps and recs or not. the rushees are supposed to provide one headshot for each sorority when they register with panhel before rush begins. we use these pictures to make posters of girls with recs... of legacies... etc. we do use slides sometimes so everyone will know who we're talking about... but there are absolutely no comments made about a girl's looks in my house. with us, the whole purpose of rushee pictures is to help us get as familiar as possible with girls maybe some of us know but not everyone has met yet. we rush in january, so all throughout the fall we use the pictures so every sister can vicariously get to know girls that not everyone has gotten to meet.

for instance, we will flash a rushee's picture on the screen, and someone who knows her will stand up and say, "so-and-so is so sweet, i play volleyball with her and she blah blah blah..." or "she's in my english class, she always sounds really smart..." we talk about her personality, intelligence, reputation, etc. no one in my house will stand up and say, "she's too fat." that would be considered incredibly tacky even if everyone thought it were true.

and it's not even the case that the "good" or "attractive" houses all pick girls' pictures and appearances to shreds. as a group making membership decisions, we simply do not talk about a girl's looks, even though we are probably considered one of the better houses at our school. i know of houses not normally considered as "good" (shallow as that sounds) that in fact DO talk openly about fatness etc. as a group... saying that so-and-so is chubby and they don't need that in the house, things like that.

i don't know, these are just things i've noticed at my own school...

and anyhow, since freshmen here don't rush until after christmas break, our decisions on who gets in are based on more than just initial impressions and appearances. the girls who get in usually already know a lot of us and have been casually getting to know sisters throughout the fall before rush. so if a girl is beautiful, but she's a complete snob (or whatever)... she won't get in.



[This message has been edited by twinstars (edited July 05, 2001).]