freshman vs juniors

[Sunny]

This is a different twist on the freshman vs. juniors debate. Why are freshman considered a better "financial investment"? (I'm not trying to be callous in refering to rushees like that, I'm simply curious) Freshman rotate through every 4 years, while a junior holds a spot of only two. So hypothetically, a house of juniors pays one-time/initiation fees every 2 years, twice as often and a house of freshman. So if a pledge class had a few juniors, it seems it would almost be a better monetary investment. Even though this really only applies to houses at or near quota, those houses tend to be more diffucult for older rushees. Of course, this in no way addresses other aspects of the arguement, such as freshman have 4 years to devote to the house. If I'm completely off base, please feel free to tell me. It was just a thought I had.

[LeslieEMU]

Maybe I'm on work brain freeze, but I am confused with your logic. Maybe you can better explain so we can help you out

[finest_alum]

I think she means that you have a junior initiate - she pays the one time fee.. 2 years later, another junior initiate pays another one time fee. One freshman in those four years pays only once, making the 2 juniors taking that one spot a better investment financially. Right, Sunny?

Either way, I still think juniors are at a disadvantage if most of the rushees are frosh and sophomores.. you just grow up a lot in those two years and may have much different social interests than those in your pledge class. Just my .02

[Corbin Dallas]

plus for most groups, the initiation fees go to nationals, and not the chapter. we get NO money from our freshmen. All the money they pay goes to IHQ. I don't know why it would matter to a chapter how much money their headquarters got.

------------------
Steve Corbin
Lambda Chi Alpha
Theta Kappa Chapter
Rose-Hulman Inst. of Tech.

[Sunny]

Finest_alum...that's exactly what I was trying to say.

Thanks for clearing that up...I didn't realize the money all went to HQ, so I couldn't quite figure out why juniors were at a financial disadvantage...thanks guys!

[SoCalGirl]

The initiation fee does go straight to nationals, so the chapter's account isn't helped.

Freshman are better investment because:

They reduce UNCERTAINITY of what the future income will be. If you can't immediately replace a junior, the chapter won't be able to count on their dues to pay for supplies, socials, rush, and philanthropies.

A freshman will, as a sopohomore, learn rush skills the first time. She then perfects techniques in her junior and senior year. She'll be able to help new members learn how to be better rushers. This will make for a good return on rush. In other words, QUOTA. A junior will only be a rusher for one year. Rush retreat costs add up. (Start up costs.)

Most importantly, the rapid turn over of juniors hurts MORALE. It's very emotional when you lose your sisters. If a girl is upset how can she recruit more members? Plus, if you can't replace them easily, it creates inferior feelings in the members. "How come ABC is always at total, when we can't even get quota?"

[LeslieEMU]

Okay then, I want to take the middle of the roads and say that I think Sophomores are the best investment...

a) They've experienced college life for a year, have had a chance to see what Greek Life is about, and will better appriciate the bonds of sisterhood/brotherhood

b) Because they've been in college for a while, they have most of the crazy "I'm away from my parents, let's go nuts" mentality out of their system and are not as likely to do a complete 180 and turn into a psycho pledge (you know we've all seen this happen)

c) They're still a good financial investment because they have at least 3 years, maybe more depending on their major

d) I've found that freshman are more likely to drop out than Sophmores

that's my two cents

[twinstars]

i don't know how it works at other colleges, but at mine, the more girls we have in our chapter, the cheaper it is for everybody since we can spread group expenses out over more members. it is in all of our interests to keep the group big and meet quota each year.

each year during rush, panhel tells us how many new members we're allowed to take. once these members graduate, i don't think we can "fill their spot." all we can do is try to make quota the next year. non-freshmen are gone a bit sooner, leaving empty spots in the house that can't be filled. the house is at "maximum membership capacity" when we take only freshmen and meet quota.

here's another non-financial argument that my chapter makes in favor of taking only freshmen... we can only take a limited number of girls each year in rush, and usually more girls want us than we can accept. we look at it this way--the older rushees have ALREADY HAD a chance to join... the freshmen have not. we don't want to take that chance away from someone who's never had it before. that older girl could have rushed before but chose not to for whatever reason.