formal recruitment held during summer or when school starts? pros and cons

[jordang312]

I've been through formal recruitment once. That Formal recruitment was 2 weeks before school started and was a lot of money. I had a lot of problems with how it was done. I felt like you never for time alone to think about decisions you wanted because someone was always talking about it. Be it your roommate, gamma chi, or other PMNs.

Also, I felt like because it was my freshman year at a new school I didn't know anyone well enough to form friendships with them. Now that I've had a semester to get "the lay of the land" so to speak. I can see what all the girls are like in informal settings and not recruitment and it gives me a better idea of who I could potentially join and be good friends with.

Also, they had all 7 sororities information on walls in the hallway and they kept changing everything. The fees, housing requirements, GPA requirements. It was hard to get an idea as to what house you would be able to pledge because all the requirements kept being changed.

I'm going through formal recruitment a 2nd time this upcoming September ONLY because I found out the process WILL be different than the first time.
1) It originally cost you $260 and you had to leave earlier for school in the Summer. The 2nd formal recruitment is occurring during September 2-7th. So, you'll have some chill time rather than doing everything the 1st week of school.
2) This time each house is going to give out information cards with set fees, GPA standards, housing requirements etc.
3) When each event is over you get to go back to your room and really think about what you want. Not what your roommate wants. But, what you yourself want. I like the element of being able to get away from it all and being able to think about it yourself. I don't like being with a bunch of strange girls crying at all hours of the night about parties or how they got dropped. It's awkward for me. If I want to be emotional then I'd rather be by myself.

For those reasons, I'd much rather go through recruitment when school is already in session.

I'm excited about USM recruitment!