NotSoRetro's Deferred Recruitment at a Private School

[NotSoRetro]

Since the board is alive with so many questions about deferred recruitment, I thought I would give you my "not so retro" deferred recruitment story. I will try to be as honest as possible so I will not likely reveal code names in the end.

I attended a private university in the South. The school is known for having a highly competitive recruitment process, particularly when I went through in the early 2000s. While several things have changed since I went through, the lessons I learned about how to "rush yourself" and make the most of the opportunities deferred recruitment presents seemingly have not.

I went to high school in a desirable suburban area and chose my university based on its academic offerings. However, I was really interested in joining a sorority and only applied to schools that had a thriving Greek population. I am a first generation Greek woman, but for whatever reason, my parents felt like this was a very important opportunity and pushed me to go through recruitment as well.

Although I have pretty average looks and style, in my high school, I was used to being the best and was pretty popular. It didn't come naturally to me at all though -- sadly I was consumed by the idea of being the best and tried really hard to be that way – elected class president, etc. I had pretty low self esteem, although I would never have admitted it, and I think my attitude toward recruitment was pretty similar to a lot of PNMs... in high school, I was a star and because of that, I will be in a star sorority (ugh, I am glad I have grown up since then!).

As soon as I decided where I'd be going to college, I started working on getting letters of rec for recruitment (because I knew that although they weren't "required", they were still a necessity). It was hard work to network and find one for every house, but after a couple of months and some awkward luncheons, I had done it.

At that time there were 8 chapters at my university (I'm using cities for code names because I am not very creative – sorry!):

Chicago
New York
Boston
Las Vegas
Los Angeles
Houston
Miami
Atlanta

I knew the system as a whole was VERY strong here, and I knew that every chapter had a high number of members, solid sisterhood, etc., but that at the same time there was a set tier system. Prior to arriving at school, here's what I knew about some of the individual chapters:

New York – a girl from my high school was a sister here and my best friend's mother wrote my recommendation. I knew they were a really good chapter with a strong GPA and a lot of involvement on campus. However, I would have never considered myself in the same realm as the girl I knew. In my snotty 18 year old mind, I was way cooler than her!

Atlanta – It seems like everyone I knew who was Greek was an Atlanta. Seriously! I had offers for tons of recommendations to Atlanta, but was nervous about seeming over-eager so I only had two sent in. One was from a really influential alumna though, so I always felt like I had a really good shot with this chapter. Also, some of the alums who were helping me with recruitment showed me a lot of their pictures from Atlanta parties, scrapbooks, etc. These alums were doing a great job to rush me, and I was pretty certain that I would be happy as an Atlanta.

Prior to starting school, most of my high school friends went through recruitment at their respective universities. A ton of them went Atlanta which just fueled my ambition to be an Atlanta. They also had perfect rushes – meaning they were never cut by a house. Because I was used to being friends with the "best" and was always trying to be even better than them, I started to develop the expectation that the same thing would happen to me – I would be one of the top rushees on campus and get whatever I wanted!