Hi everybody! I've been lurking for awhile now, and have decided to share my recruitment story from this year from a medium-sized school with four sororities. I shall nickname them after my four favorite stores—Tiffany’s, BCBG, Coach, and Sephora.
About my school: it has a reputation as a commuter school and definitely has a more non-traditional student body, but the administration is doing a lot to give it a more residential-campusy feel and so far they’re doing a great job!
A little about me: I was SUPER involved in high school and got really, really good grades. I have gone to two colleges before this one (yay transferring!) and, while my grades weren’t as good as in high school, I think they’re still pretty good (well above a 3.0). I’ve been really involved in college, too, (mostly with academic societies and volunteering clubs) and currently am a student athlete. At this point you might be wondering why I didn’t go Greek before. Well, at my first school I was also an athlete and had practice and game conflicts the entire week of recruitment so I didn’t even bother, and at my second school I was told I had no chance whatsoever if I wasn’t an eighteen-year-old freshman straight out of high school (it’s on the have-recs-or-else list) and I listened and chose not to participate in recruitment (perhaps foolishly, but I guess I’ll never know, and it’s neither here nor there anymore). I don’t know anyone at my new school very well except my teammates and a few people I’ve met in class, and I have always loved the idea of a sisterhood (God gave me only brothers!) and would like to get involved here and meet lots of people and have an impact on my new campus.
About the GLOs: All four are smallish chapters, but extremely active in terms of community service, which is SUPER important to me.
About recruitment here: The recruitment process is spread out over a couple weeks and is fairly informal, according to what the Greek Affairs Director (who was SO nice!) told me. First all the sororities have events together, then they hold their events separately and you can pick and choose whose you attend, finding out who will offer you a bid as the individual chapters see fit.
Pre-recruitment thoughts: I know someone who is really sweet and in Tiffany’s through my team, and many women who have been on the team in previous years hold exec positions. I do not know anyone in Coach, although they are quite visible on campus. I have met one girl from BCBG, but she seemed kind of fake, was constantly looking around while we were talking, and actually made a negative comment to my face about girls with a certain hair color that I happen to have and physical description into which I clearly fit—ouch. She also mentioned she was getting in touch with another potential new member who had gone to my high school who was always known for causing mad drama wherever she went. So, while I will definitely give BCBG full consideration next week once recruitment starts, so far this one woman (and I know there are many more, so I will not let her decide my impression of her entire sorority!) has rubbed me the wrong way. I do not know anyone in Sephora, either, but they wrote me a really nice response to my email request for more info, called me to follow up about next week’s events, and I ran into the president and two members today at a volunteering event that I was working with my team and got to meet them. It really impressed me that they were out so early on a weekend morning giving their time and energy to such an important cause! The president also wrote a lovely follow-up email, so it’s good to know they know of me now.
So, based on general impressions, so far my preliminary inclinations are:
1. Sephora
2. Tiffany’s
2. Coach
3. BCBG
BUT I am going to keep an open mind and not let ANYTHING sway my decisions other than the experiences I have as I meet the sorority women and go through the process. I will attend all of the first, joint-GLO events (except the one I have to miss because of practice) and as many of the individual events for each of the sororities as I can!
I am SO excited to hopefully find a home in one of these GLOs and, if nothing else, at least get to learn a bit more about myself, meet some awesome ladies along the way, and hopefully make lots of new friends!
Now I just have to hurry up and wait!
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