All of these recruitment threads...

[KSUViolet06]

Originally Posted by nittanyalum

That must have turned into trainwreck after trainwreck after trainwreck...

It honestly wasn't THAT bad at all, until the other things I talked about started happening.

A particular incident I recall was a girl who had made some comments about a sorority early on in recruitment, but ended up preffing and then pledging them. During her NM period, one of her sisters found the thread and wasn't very happy about it. From what I hear she told everyone about it and this girl's NM period wasn't a fun one.

Originally Posted by KSUViolet06

It honestly wasn't THAT bad at all, until the other things I talked about started happening.

A particular incident I recall was a girl who had made some comments about a sorority early on in recruitment, but ended up preffing and then pledging them. During her NM period, one of her sisters found the thread and wasn't very happy about it. From what I hear she told everyone about it and this girl's NM period wasn't a fun one.

If it's the one I'm thinking of, she ended up depledging because those girls made her NM period very horrible.

I've always been a strong advocate for PNMs posting their experiences AFTER they're done with recruitment. I'll even admit that I cringe when I see a live rush thread going on. Sure, it's their time in the spotlight, but you really never know who's reading. And even if you try to be discreet as possible, there might be someone who'll figure out what school you're at and who you are. You won't be able to please everybody.

Rush threads are great, but it's certainly not worth risking your chances for a successful rush.

[Leslie Anne]

This is why it's a bad idea:

Originally Posted by fantASTic

I did one Google search and found your school IMMEDIATELY. from what you said about your new position, it was easy to pinpoint you down to one of FIVE women. Looking any more, it would probably be relatively easy to find out who you are.

For some reason it's now become acceptible to not only harass PNMs but stalk them too. Personally, I think this behavior should be a violation of the TOS, but that's not likely to happen. People here have too much fun doing it.

Besides, the point of these threads isn't (or at least wasn't) to entertain us. The original intent was to help PNMs going through the Recruitment process. Finding it entertaining was just a bonus.

[violetpretty]

PNMs will tell us the number of chapters, occasionally, which chapters are on their campus, and the start date/schedule, which is almost always enough to figure out for a school with spring formal recruitment since the pool is already narrowed.

This might be unavoidable for many PNMs since they don't know anything else, but campus-specific language can also give them away. For example, Northwestern is the only place I've seen that calls their rounds "Set 1", "Set 2", and "Informals" (with preference a widely used term for the fourth and final round). Along with campus-specific language, it depends what your campus calls the women who temporarily disaffiliate to help PNMs with recruitment, Rho Chis, Rho Gammas, Gamma Chis, Pi Chis, Sigma Rho Chis, Greek Life Guides, etc.

In summary, PNMs:
1. Please include your username in your title at the very least.
2. If you don't want to say which region of the country your school is in, pick a pseudonym for your school to include in the title based on your code names (i.e. someone with Disney princess code names could name her school Magical Kingdom U).
3. Don't identify yourself. Don't put any identifying information on your profile, don't put your first name in your username, links to your screenname, etc. Don't describe your outfits, any activities you are involved in, etc. So maybe we've figured out you go to Maryland, but that still makes you one person in 500 unless you've identified yourself more specifically.
4. If you want to be honest without jeopardizing your chances, wait until after bid day to write a recruitment thread. You can still feel like you're giving a live update if you write stuff down in a word document each night. That way, if you have a change of heart about a chapter that you trashed in earlier rounds, you can edit your word document.
5. If you have questions during recruitment, your Rho Gamma (or whatever your campus calls them) is your best source of information. She will be able to give you answers specific to your campus and will keep your conversations confidential. If she isn't knowledgeable or strikes you as untrustworthy, you can ask another Rho Gamma, someone on Panhellenic recruitment team, someone on Panhellenic exec, or the Panhellenic advisor. Sure, you an ask questions on Greek Chat, but often times, the question will be something that we'd need to know the campus culture (size, region) to be able to speculate what kind of answer to give you. And when you give those things out publicly, it can out your school. PMing a GCer that you trust works without giving away your info publicly.

[ComradesTrue]

Originally Posted by violetpretty

PNMs will tell us the number of chapters, occasionally, which chapters are on their campus, and the start date/schedule, which is almost always enough to figure out for a school with spring formal recruitment since the pool is already narrowed.

This might be unavoidable for many PNMs since they don't know anything else, but campus-specific language can also give them away. For example, Northwestern is the only place I've seen that calls their rounds "Set 1", "Set 2", and "Informals" (with preference a widely used term for the fourth and final round). Along with campus-specific language, it depends what your campus calls the women who temporarily disaffiliate to help PNMs with recruitment, Rho Chis, Rho Gammas, Gamma Chis, Pi Chis, Sigma Rho Chis, Greek Life Guides, etc.

In summary, PNMs:
1. Please include your username in your title at the very least.
2. If you don't want to say which region of the country your school is in, pick a pseudonym for your school to include in the title based on your code names (i.e. someone with Disney princess code names could name her school Magical Kingdom U).
3. Don't identify yourself. Don't put any identifying information on your profile, don't put your first name in your username, links to your screenname, etc. Don't describe your outfits, any activities you are involved in, etc. So maybe we've figured out you go to Maryland, but that still makes you one person in 500 unless you've identified yourself more specifically.
4. If you want to be honest without jeopardizing your chances, wait until after bid day to write a recruitment thread. You can still feel like you're giving a live update if you write stuff down in a word document each night. That way, if you have a change of heart about a chapter that you trashed in earlier rounds, you can edit your word document.
5. If you have questions during recruitment, your Rho Gamma (or whatever your campus calls them) is your best source of information. She will be able to give you answers specific to your campus and will keep your conversations confidential. If she isn't knowledgeable or strikes you as untrustworthy, you can ask another Rho Gamma, someone on Panhellenic recruitment team, someone on Panhellenic exec, or the Panhellenic advisor. Sure, you an ask questions on Greek Chat, but often times, the question will be something that we'd need to know the campus culture (size, region) to be able to speculate what kind of answer to give you. And when you give those things out publicly, it can out your school. PMing a GCer that you trust works without giving away your info publicly.

Applause.

[Zeta13Girl]

I agree with those of you that said to use usernames. While putting the school's name in the title can risk exposing the PNM it also can be confusing I know at least once this semester of two girls going through recruitment at the same school so then you would have two of the same titles that might end up being confusing. Just a thought