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11-05-2002, 11:38 AM
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Clique pledging?
I recently saw an article in my school's paper regarding fraternity rush: http://www-tech.mit.edu/V122/N51/51rush.51n.html
There's been a falloff in numbers as the school transitions to deferred rush (was August, now September). There's also a very uneven distribution of pledges - some houses have zero, some have over 20. IFC and fraternities seem to be blaming this on "clique pledging", where a group of people will go through rush together and all join the same GLO.
This hasn't been much of an issue in the past, because rush was the first thing you did, before such groups had a chance to form. It is less of an issue, IME, for formal sorority rush, since cliques would likely get broken up among several rush groups - whereas, with fraternity rush, the existence of a clique is obvious because all the men show up together, or at the very least, are all suspiciously visiting the exact same houses.
So I'm wondering - how much of an issue is this at other schools? Would you bid Joe just to get Bill, Fred, and Tom to sign - or would you invite Susie to pref just to get Sally and Jenny to accept their pref invites? Anyone go through rush as part of a clique, and were you happy with the result?
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AEΦ ... Multa Corda, Una Causa ... Celebrating Over 100 Years of Sisterhood
Have no place I can be since I found Serenity, but you can't take the sky from me...
Only those who risk going too far, find out how far they can go.
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11-05-2002, 12:11 PM
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My school did separate people alphabetically into rush groups, so having to deal with a whole clique at once was never a problem. However, we knew who was friends with who and would try to make sure that the clique was all invited to the same parties. Most of the time we liked all of the girls in the group, but there have been instances where there was one that no one wanted to pledge. When we didn't invite that one girl and then her friends turned us back, yeah, it hurts, but who wants sheep that are afraid to branch out on their own? It isn't like you still can't be friends with someone in another GLO!
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11-05-2002, 12:18 PM
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Actually, with our recruitment being deferred for a whole year, we can't help but rush cliques, especially for COB. Sometimes it can work to your advantage, like when you get 1 or 2 girls from a group really interested in your house and they talk all of their friends into joining, but it can also be a disadvantage, like when you have 1 or 2 girls really interested but their best friend can't join for whatever reason so none of them do. There is also the dilemma of "well we can't get Suzie unless we also give a bid to Jenny, even though we don't particularly know/like Jenny." It even happens with formal recruitment; you see groups of girls choosing to cut the same houses, or if they all want a particular house and that house cuts one girl, she and all of her friends will drop out of recruitment. It's absolutely ridiculous and is reason number 785643189 why I can't stand deferred recruitment.
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11-05-2002, 12:35 PM
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Not necessarily a bad thing...
We had deferred and we pledged a few small "cliques", but if we liked one person, we usually liked their friends, so we didn't have an issue of wanting to take one and not the other. The only thing I saw negative about it is when people pledged in a clique and then kept to themselves and didn't attempt to get close to other sisters. I mean, what is the point? If all you were going to do was hang out with the people you were already friends with, why even bother pledging and shelling out all that $$$? To wear a jacket, I guess.
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11-05-2002, 02:09 PM
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It shouldn't matter when it comes time to sign the bids should it? I know at my school, no one knows what bids they have until bid day, and they go into a voting booth type thing and get their bids in an envelope. if a group of guys said they wanted to join, and all that got bids signed their cards, but one guy didn't get a bid, he could just try for spring rush.
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11-05-2002, 07:23 PM
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There used to be (I think there still is) a 24-hour period that my school's IFC imposed, during which fraternities and independent living groups can extend bids but PNMs cannot accept yet. The idea is that each PNM can see all the bids he's getting and have some time to think it over and talk to his parents if he so wishes. This makes it very easy for cliques to compare notes.
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AEΦ ... Multa Corda, Una Causa ... Celebrating Over 100 Years of Sisterhood
Have no place I can be since I found Serenity, but you can't take the sky from me...
Only those who risk going too far, find out how far they can go.
Last edited by aephi alum; 11-05-2002 at 07:40 PM.
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11-07-2002, 01:45 PM
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It would be very difficult to tell, with 800-1000 girls going through rush, who exactly was in the same "clique" but I did hear of one story about fraternity rush...
Apparently about 3 years ago fraternity "ABC" was "THE" fraternity to be in here. Then, a group of my friends from high school all went to fraternity "XYZ" together. This particular group of friends has since gone on to hold many leadership positions across greek life, helping "XYZ" so that they are now one of the most prominant groups on campus. They still aren't seen as the most exclusive, best, or whatever... but they have ONE of the best reputations.. I'd say top 4 out of 15, easily. Apparently "XYZ" was nothing before this huge group got together (there were about 5 of them, from what I know). So, it can help the smaller fraternities, apparently. I think this is an extreme situation, though, because these particular guys were just incredible men. One of them won the most outstanding senior award out of what I would expect to be about 5,000 graduates. I'm not absolutely sure that's the number, but something like that.
I don't know how much of this story is truth and how much is rumor, but that's what I heard from the old president of "ABC".
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11-07-2002, 04:44 PM
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I can't speak for everyone, but I think this is a real problem at deferred rush schools. During fall term, we have to keep careful track of not only all the freshmen we meet--but who their friends are: who lives on their hall, who they go to parties with, what clubs they're in, etc, etc, etc. Sometimes one girl will get cut from a group all of her friends want, and she we drop out of rush rather than pledge another house. Or, if she does pledge, it creates weirdness between her and her friends from freshmen year in later years.
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