A Q to all Gc'ers with NPC formal Recruitment

[PrincessHeather]

Hi All!

Well I have a Question for all of you lovely ladies that have Formal Recruitment on your campus.

I come from a small campus with a very small Greek System. Phi Sig and One other National Sorority make up my school's Panhellenic Council.

We were making changes to our Panhellenic Bylaws and XYZ has been thinking of Proposing Prohibiting Picture Taking at Recruitment Parties. The proposal won't come until after this Formal Recruitment so at this time we are (and have always been) able to take pictures.

What are the Rules on your campus? Can you? Do you?
Or if you can't...Why not?

Thanks for your input

Also PNM's how do you feel about pictures at recruitment parties? Would you mind? Would you feel awkward?would you not want your picture taken? would you feel false hope that you are 'in' if a Sorority takes your picture?

*and I am talking about like big and small group pictures. not individual pics or anything like that.*

We have never had a problem with picute taking. I honestly feel that XYZ is only suggesting it for petty reasons. For example my chapter loves pictures and scrapbooks...XYZ doesn't. Some of their members do have scrapbooks but they always complain ours are "cuter" than theirs. man, i'll plan a scrapbooking class if they want.
Thanks again for sharing!!

Greek Love,
Heather

[FAB*SpiceySpice]

WOW! I have never heard of people taking pictures at recruitment parties! My school however has a very competitive formal rush with 14 sororities so we tend to try and do everything possible to stay away from things that might be considered a rush infraction. I don't know why taking a picture of someone would be one, but at my school I can see people complaining about that!

[GtownGirl98]

I am also from a small campus with 4 sororities and I don't think that candied pictures have ever been okay. I don't know why except that we are supplied with pictures of the ladies before recruitment startes.

[33girl]

I know once we took Polaroids (I think the party theme was a cruise and so there was a "ship's photographer") but I don't think it's allowed anymore. If your rush is small you shouldn't need photos...if it's large, you probably have pics the rushees submitted anyway. It is something that can make the PNMs feel uncomfortable...sending in your airbrushed senior pic w/ your rush applications is one thing, random photos you didn't prepare for are another.

[SmartBlondeGPhB]

When I went through rush (1988) Gamma Phi took pictures at the party before prefs. Then at Prefs, every PNM got a framed picture with a mat that said "Picture yourself....... a Gamma Phi Beta", I even still have mine.

But it never happened at the 2nd school I went to and I've never heard of it happening since.

I think gifts like we got are rush infractions now so I can't see why you would want to take them.

[bruinaphi]

If you are such a small system I would stay away from making all sorts of rules to regulate recruitment. If you start to get caught up in rules you are likely to spend less time recruiting women to participate in FR and then your ROI gets lower and lower making FR less practical. I have several chapters of various sizes that take pictures at various parties. I think they are a great way to help actives keep track of the NM's, even on a small campus.

LD

[sugar and spice]

When I went through rush, Tri Delta took pictures at Pref -- of each rushee with her rusher. Then, during the Pref ceremony, they showed a slideshow where the photos of each rushee and rusher were interspersed with pictures of Tri Delts doing sorority stuff. It was really cute and helped to "place yourself" in the sorority. I never even imagined it could be a rush infraction at some schools.

[astroAPhi]

Heather, I am from a very similar Panhellenic system... two NPC orgs (we just added a local, but this will be their first formal recruitment).

From what I had heard in the past, we had done a theme party that was like a cruise where they took your picture like they do before the cruise. What we thought was a cute idea freaked out some rushees. Now, I'm a picture person, so I don't understand people who put their hand in front of their face every time they see a camera, but that's just me.

Last year our advisor tried to take pictures of the actives during the philanthropy night, but always ended up getting a PNM in the picture. Unfortunately, we feel kinda stupid using the pictures now, because every PNM she took a picture of went to the other sorority.

A group picture of PNMs might not be bad though. But keep in mind that not all of those girls will end up as your sisters, and if there's any bitter feelings between you and a girl who joins XYZ, it looks bad if you scratch out her face or put stickers over her.

[Little E]

wow, we take photos at our rush events, but we are the only NPC and don't have formal.
What lauradav said is a good thought. With such a small Greek system placing a ton of rules isn't the best idea. You'll get caught up in them and lose your focus. Though I guess if it will cause a huge fight and drama w/XYZ, are the photos THAT important to you?

[DaisyCrazy]

At my school, we are not allowed to take pictures. This is an ammended rule, however, b/c we used to be able to. The year I went through Recruitment (ages ago!), there was one sister that went around the room the first night and took a Polaroid picture of each PNM saying, "Smile! We want your picture for our scrapbook." At the time, as a naive freshman, I thought nothing of it. Later, as I looked back, racking my brain to remember what the heck Ronda Rushee looked like, I thought it was pretty ingenious. But the very next year, my first formal recruitment as a sister, CPH changed the rules and no more pictures were allowed. And no one sends in recs, so we're stuck trying to help each other remember each PNM, "She was the one in the yellow top w/ the black headband..." Of course, I'm an advisor now, so I'm no help anyway! I'm stuck in the background doing the "behind the scenes" kind of stuff.

Soooo, this year CPH has finally decided to help us out and they have secured some digital cameras and will be taking a picture of each PNM at Convocation. Each of the PNM's will sign a release that we have "permission" to use their pictures (I guess so if there's some girl who's totally freaked out to have her picture taken, she doesn't have to). Then each of the 5 NPC chapters will get a disk w/ the pictures on them. At the end of recruitment, we will hand the disks back to CPH and they will destroy them. Therefore, no unwanted pictures of the PNM's floating around campus. But, we will be able to show the sisters pictures of the PNM's to help in membership selection.

So, PrincessHeather, if taking pictures of all the PNM's is really important to your chapter, consider asking your CPH to do it for you. That way the pictures are "regulated" and everyone gets the same thing and hopefully XYZ can't find anything to complain about!

[AllisonDG]

I like the idea of using digital pics of the PNMs. My school does not use rush pics and it is so hard to remember everyone at the end of the day!

[Munchkin03]

I've never seen pictures being taken at a Recruitment event. We have two NPCs, and I was Panhel president last year. So, if we did it, I probably would have heard about it.

[AEPhiSierra]

at my school we also take pictures purely for remembering rushes. we have a small greek system (3 nationals and 3 locals but the locals don't do formal rush with us) and we don't have people register in advance or submit pics for formal rush, rushes just kind of show up. we usually take candid group pics cuz having one sister with a camera taking candid gshots seems a little less noticeable and takes less time than taking pics of each rush individually.

[MooseGirl]

I think PrincessHeather was focussing more on the candid photos, than individual ones of PNMs, for scrapbooking purposes. If the other group has a problem, how about only taking pics of the sisters...you know beforehand, or after, or during skit/songs, etc...

Our campus too has only one other sorority. I know in the past we've taken candid photos of sisters with PNMs. It doesn't matter much to us if the woman doesn't join or if she goes with the other group. We are just glad that she came out to give Greek Life a try!

Just like I have a couple pref pictures with women who never accepted their bid in my scrapbook. I don't mind if ppl ask who so-and-so is..."oh she was a PNM but decided not to join" not a big deal here.

[Glitter650]

we took pictures last year in order to remember PNMs... our rush is fairly small... so they don't pre register or send in photos or anything so meeting all those women (although it's less than some schhols) it's kinda hard to remember all of them especially the first two nights, so polaroids work beautifully