Non-Texan attending UT-Austin

[TXalum1]

Originally Posted by AnchorAlum

I lived in Texas for 20 years. I was heavily involved with Alumnae Panhellenic in the Richardson/Plano area and even though I moved back to my home state of Florida five years ago, I still remember the pressure the girls went through and the anxiety their Mothers suffered!

First of all, whoever started the myth that you don't need to worry so much about recs should be drawn and quartered. Plain and simple. Maybe up north. ANY where in the south, that is simply not true. If it's 3 A.M. and Susie from San Anton has recs and it's between you and her and you're from Pittsburgh with no rec, it's a no brainer. Let's not kid ourselves.

If you're going out of state, as my daughter did when she went to an out of Texas school, you need to be so prepared. And if you're an out of state person going to any school in Texas, you need to be super prepared. That's just a statement of fact.

What is "prepared"? Recs to every single house. Two or three is not overkill. And support letters aren't bad either. Professional photos. You should have seen some of the portfolios I saw as Rec Coordinator for Alumnae Panhellenic. The "activity" sheet was a professional resume.

Why? Because every Texas girl has them, even if she is a double legacy to five houses. I'm not exaggerating. It is brutal at UT. Some of the houses have already cut before ice waters. They have so many legacies in one year the number would exceed a quota of 50 or 55 new members. That's why some girls, especially Highland Park legacies to certain groups go to certain SEC schools (sorry, y'all), pledge certain houses, and then transfer back to a Texas school so that they are members of a house they could not get into at UT, but their Mama and their Grandmama will be happy that she is now a member of THEIR sorority.

I could not make this up. I wouldn't want to!

My roommate in the house was from Austin, and she had friends in almost every group on campus. Trust me, what AnchorAlum says was true then and is true today. I know lots of stories about "pledge here and transfer there" from the old days. One pnm, or rushee as they were called then, asked where we had chapters because she intended to join on our campus and then transfer to school "x".