If No Deferred Recruitment, What's A Good Alternative?

[pearlbubbles]

Originally Posted by 33girl

When you say "retained" do you mean just to initiation, or throughout their college career? Or is it really too early for you guys to tell?

Unfortunately, just through initiation. I think this last semester we lost a few extras due to transfers, finances, and university withdrawal. But we were still right around total.

[ASTalumna06]

Thanks everyone for your responses. I think what I should have included in there was whether or not your chapter received/required recs and/or resumes (if you can share that information). I think that when I pictured PSB turning away from deferred recruitment, the entire process would be a lot more organized. For the fraternities, it's not really that much of a problem. But for the sororities, it's kind of a different story.

From what I understand (and someone correct me if I'm wrong), the majority of schools without deferred recruitment are generally ones with larger chapters, more competitive recruitment periods, and numerous recs being received for PNMs. PSB still has none of these things.

The other thing I'm confused about... Generally our larger new member classes have come in the spring. There has been talk about implementing minimally/partially structured recruitment for the upcoming spring semester. Again, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it a little backwards to be allowing first semester freshmen to receive bids AND having a more formal kind of recruitment in the spring? I can't think of any campus where this occurs.

[33girl]

Originally Posted by ASTalumna06

Thanks everyone for your responses. I think what I should have included in there was whether or not your chapter received/required recs and/or resumes (if you can share that information). I think that when I pictured PSB turning away from deferred recruitment, the entire process would be a lot more organized. For the fraternities, it's not really that much of a problem. But for the sororities, it's kind of a different story.

From what I understand (and someone correct me if I'm wrong), the majority of schools without deferred recruitment are generally ones with larger chapters, more competitive recruitment periods, and numerous recs being received for PNMs. PSB still has none of these things.

You have it right - the chapters at Bama, LSU etc have girls signing up 6 months in advance and are receiving recs - so when the girls walk into rush parties, they really aren't complete strangers. As opposed to the girls having up until the day before or even the day of to sign up, as I assume you guys have.

Originally Posted by ASTalumna06

The other thing I'm confused about... Generally our larger new member classes have come in the spring. There has been talk about implementing minimally/partially structured recruitment for the upcoming spring semester. Again, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it a little backwards to be allowing first semester freshmen to receive bids AND having a more formal kind of recruitment in the spring? I can't think of any campus where this occurs.

It is VERY backwards, for girls anyway. See my earlier post. It should be one of two ways:

-If first semester freshmen can rush: fall rush should be structured and formal, this is when most people join, women rushing must visit every sorority at least once. In the spring, a minimally structured or completely nonstructured rush can be employed.

-If freshmen have to wait till second semester: fall rush is primarily for upperclassmen and is minimally structured. Spring rush is formal.

The whole point is - freshmen should NEVER be allowed to join a sorority without meeting all the groups at least once. (Again, this applies to girls.) It completely flies in the face of all the regulations NPC has made over the years to make things fairer for the sororities and for the rushees.

[ASTalumna06]

Originally Posted by 33girl

You have it right - the chapters at Bama, LSU etc have girls signing up 6 months in advance and are receiving recs - so when the girls walk into rush parties, they really aren't complete strangers. As opposed to the girls having up until the day before or even the day of to sign up, as I assume you guys have.

It is VERY backwards, for girls anyway. See my earlier post. It should be one of two ways:

-If first semester freshmen can rush: fall rush should be structured and formal, this is when most people join, women rushing must visit every sorority at least once. In the spring, a minimally structured or completely nonstructured rush can be employed.

-If freshmen have to wait till second semester: fall rush is primarily for upperclassmen and is minimally structured. Spring rush is formal.

The whole point is - freshmen should NEVER be allowed to join a sorority without meeting all the groups at least once. (Again, this applies to girls.) It completely flies in the face of all the regulations NPC has made over the years to make things fairer for the sororities and for the rushees.

This is the problem... no one even has to sign up. The one thing that they added to the upcoming fall recruitment period is a kick-off recruitment event (like the one we have in the spring). The PNMs are required to attend parties put on by each chapter, but there's no sign-up, so if a PNM doesn't attend that event, it doesn't matter. They can just show up at the next one put on by which ever chapter they like.

My chapter doesn't do this, and I'm not implying that the others do either, but it leaves room for people to believe that other chapters are telling girls who are interested in their particular chapter, "Don't worry about showing up to this event.. just come to the next one."

And another huge problem is that sisters here don't understand the whole concept of "meeting every chapter" and "mutual selection" and "we're all Greek together". Hell, I didn't when I was at school, either. Only having COB puts everyone into a competitive mindset. However, I try to explain things like this to them, and they look at me like I have two heads. And because COB is all they've ever known, I try to tell them that the point of COB is basically to "fill in the empty spaces after formal", but they don't understand.

I tend to be believe that this whole system of first semester bidding/spring formal will throw off the entire total/quota process.

And I also think that waaay too many things are changing at once, without any of the smaller details being given a second look.

[pearlbubbles]

I'm a little confused; so the sororities this school only do/have always only done COB?

I'm not really sure how this would work. But I think that there definitely needs to be some sort of Panhel meeting to acclimate everyone to the new process.

PNMs only visiting events they want to sounds like my campus' informal recruitment. But for formal, how can you know if you're in the correct place if you haven't met every chapter? I certainly wouldn't have been able to decide the correct house for me based on my post-high school inklings.

[ASTalumna06]

Originally Posted by pearlbubbles

I'm a little confused; so the sororities this school only do/have always only done COB?

I'm not really sure how this would work. But I think that there definitely needs to be some sort of Panhel meeting to acclimate everyone to the new process.

PNMs only visiting events they want to sounds like my campus' informal recruitment. But for formal, how can you know if you're in the correct place if you haven't met every chapter? I certainly wouldn't have been able to decide the correct house for me based on my post-high school inklings.

Yes, we only have COB at the moment. We just bid whoever we want, whenever we want. We do still have a "bid day" and none of the chapters are permitted to distribute bids before then, during that given semester. There is also a date given on which official recruitment parties can begin. It usually allows for 2 weeks between the start of recruitment and bid day. But bid day consists of PNMs receiving their bids (which they can receive from all three chapters), and they have 24 hours to go to the Student Activities office to sign it. The whole process has become so much more organized since I was active, but it's still a very uneventful day. After that day, you can hand out more bids if you like. My chapter would usually schedule at least one more recruitment event after bid day, which was basically by invitation only, in order to get to know any PNMs that maybe the sisters didn't get to know well enough throughout the recruitment period... because again, PNMs aren't required to attend all of our events.

I was lucky enough to end up where I was supposed to be (especially because I didn't really know what I was getting myself into in the beginning). Other girls aren't so lucky. It's not that they hate where they are... they just kind of wish they had the opportunity to look at other chapters. And yes, I have first-hand experience with someone saying this to me. Don't get me wrong; all PNMs have the opportunity to visit all three chapters (Panhellenic organizes it so that no two parties overlap), but it's almost as though you go to one party, and you just keep going back without the slightest thought about other chapters and/or without even knowing that they exist. I don't know what the Greek atmosphere is like at your school, but here, people are clueless. If you thought you didn't know a lot before you joined, I'm sure you knew 10 times as much as PNMs do here.

It's kind of funny to me that people don't understand only doing COB, because it's all I've ever known. But at the same time, I can see how it might be confusing. At other campuses, COB is used to fill open spaces, and are usually events attended by PNMs who have been personally invited. Our COB events are held in the student union (we don't have houses) and they are open to whoever would like to walk in. In the past, that didn't really happen anyway, and the only people who showed up were pretty much the people we personally invited (through a friendly "hey, you should come to this event tonight"), but they weren't people we had already met through formal. We rely very heavily on bringing in our friends, and meeting as many new people as possible.

Basically, we recruit like the fraternities.

[Xidelt]

AST, your greek advisor sounds like an ass clown.

[33girl]

Originally Posted by Xidelt

AST, your greek advisor sounds like an ass clown.

Actually, I think the GA is trying to urge them towards having a more structured rush (which is exactly what they need) and the suggestions about supplemental programs, etc are coming from higher up, not the GA.

The GAs at my school, on the other hand, need/ed to work their way up to ass clown.

[ASTalumna06]

Originally Posted by 33girl

Actually, I think the GA is trying to urge them towards having a more structured rush (which is exactly what they need) and the suggestions about supplemental programs, etc are coming from higher up, not the GA.

The GAs at my school, on the other hand, need/ed to work their way up to ass clown.

True. I think sometimes it's hard for her because she knows what she knows about her school and how recruitment worked when she was active, and it's completely different here. It will be a long process, but we'll get there. There have been 3 different Greek Advisors in the last 4 years, so that hasn't helped in trying to gain momentum toward a common goal, either.

Everything is just extremely confusing right now, and she's trying to make everyone happy (the fraternities, the sororities, and the administration), which is difficult when everyone wants/needs different things. Hopefully we'll eventually find some consistency among all the chaos.

[ASTalumna06]

Random question... does Gannon have deferred recruitment? I couldn't find any information on the website.