Facebook... "Dirty Rushing"?

[AGDee]

A few comments from one of the old fogies here who rushed before the internet existed...

1) Our whole Panhellenic Council Exec Board and our Recruitment Counselors all disaffiliated, but the school library still had yearbooks in it and if someone was determined, they could find out which sorority they belonged in. They also only had to ask a fraternity guy. It's not that big a deal. The big deal is that the women in those positions are objective and unbiased in their dealings with potential new members. I think the bigger deal you make out of it, the more it becomes a game with the PNMs and they are focused more on that than on recruitment.

2) Telling members of sororities that they cannot befriend any freshman women simply leads to the appearance that sorority women are stuck up snobs. That is why the Green Book says that silence should be the period between Pref and Bid Day. What kind of impression does it make if no sorority women will speak to the freshman?

3) In many cases, dirty rushing occurs because Total is not set appropriately, leaving too many open spaces in chapters. The worst dirty rushing I've seen was on a campus where quota is 7-9 each year but Total is 45 and none of the chapters are at Total. This is a total set up for chapters to encourage women to drop out of recruitment and accept a bid through COR because every chapter KNOWS they will have empty spaces after formal recruitment.

Panhellenic unity and the understanding that if all the chapters are strong, the greek system is strong is tough to achieve, but that should be the focus, rather than worrying about who is friends with who on Facebook.

[CuriousWildcat]

They told us at our first GIANT recruitment meetings with all of the Gamma Chi groups that all of the sorority members had to set their facebooks to private, and were strongly encouraged to not use them at all during rush. (this was also in fall)

[FSUZeta]

most chapters are (or should) be self policing. executive officers of the chapter i advise, divide up the membership list and look at their assigned members facebook accounts. the chapter is also told to make their accounts private. less than tasteful photos are blocked.exec. makes sure that they do.

i thought it was a rule that panhellenic officers disaffiliated during the recruitment process.

[33girl]

Originally Posted by AGDee

A few comments from one of the old fogies here who rushed before the internet existed...

1) Our whole Panhellenic Council Exec Board and our Recruitment Counselors all disaffiliated, but the school library still had yearbooks in it and if someone was determined, they could find out which sorority they belonged in. They also only had to ask a fraternity guy. It's not that big a deal. The big deal is that the women in those positions are objective and unbiased in their dealings with potential new members. I think the bigger deal you make out of it, the more it becomes a game with the PNMs and they are focused more on that than on recruitment.

2) Telling members of sororities that they cannot befriend any freshman women simply leads to the appearance that sorority women are stuck up snobs. That is why the Green Book says that silence should be the period between Pref and Bid Day. What kind of impression does it make if no sorority women will speak to the freshman?

3) In many cases, dirty rushing occurs because Total is not set appropriately, leaving too many open spaces in chapters. The worst dirty rushing I've seen was on a campus where quota is 7-9 each year but Total is 45 and none of the chapters are at Total. This is a total set up for chapters to encourage women to drop out of recruitment and accept a bid through COR because every chapter KNOWS they will have empty spaces after formal recruitment.

Panhellenic unity and the understanding that if all the chapters are strong, the greek system is strong is tough to achieve, but that should be the focus, rather than worrying about who is friends with who on Facebook.

WORD, WORD, WORD, WORD to this whole post. Especially #2. College Panhells, get your act together!!! Silence or disaffiliation is not supposed to last an entire summer or worse, if you have deferred, an entire semester - this is one of the things that gives deferred rush a bad name because PEOPLE GET IT COMPLETELY WRONG. I think the max for disaffiliation is 30 days, and even then you don't HAVE to do it that long.

Honestly, if you can't carry on a conversation with someone without talking about your sorority, that's a problem in itself. You're not very well rounded.

And I don't know where Dee is talking about w/ #3, but I can name two more just off the top of my head. Lots of groups say their nationals tell them not to vote to lower total - if that's the case, tell them exactly what's going on and explain that until the dirty rushing can be curtailed, NO ONE is going to grow and it's going to make all the sororities look bad. Not to mention the money wasted on formal rush parties that yield 2.5 new members...

[jaade124]

Originally Posted by AGDee

3) In many cases, dirty rushing occurs because Total is not set appropriately, leaving too many open spaces in chapters. The worst dirty rushing I've seen was on a campus where quota is 7-9 each year but Total is 45 and none of the chapters are at Total. This is a total set up for chapters to encourage women to drop out of recruitment and accept a bid through COR because every chapter KNOWS they will have empty spaces after formal recruitment.

you've just described my school's greek system in a nutshell.