Is it bad to ask about costs?

[33girl]

Oh, I agree. The problem is telling someone they can choose to look at only the "cheap" sororities, as if rush was one-sided. It isn't. You can't walk into your first meeting with your rush group and Rho Chi and say "I only have $2000 a year to spend, so can I just skip the parties of the groups that cost more than that?"

[DGTess]

Originally Posted by 33girl

So are you agreeing with the woman in the other thread who is telling her daughter to cut the more expensive sororities, regardless of whether 1) she likes them and 2) those are the only ones that keep her?

No, just the opposite. I'd never have equated sorority membership with either "if you have to ask you can't afford it" or with "drop the lattes". My experience was so much better than that. But I'm learning from Greek Chat that there are many, many chapters and many, many schools where such trivia is important.

I'm sorry that happens.

[33girl]

In many of those schools the "trivia" includes beautiful houses with fulltime cleaning staffs, cooks, and waiters.

As bizarre as this sounds to me (and to you), when you shake the costs out, it's probably no higher than Ima Independent doing the following:

-renting a student apartment
-eating out constantly because she doesn't cook
-driving from place to place to see her friends because they live faraway at the other end of campus/town
-constantly calling cabs to get to nightspots

As far as clothing, shoes, bags...that has NOTHING to do with sorority membership. The "right bag" etc issue is EVERYWHERE. I'm sure that right now, there is a girl ready to enter some enlightened place like Juniata, standing in Macy's telling her mom that IF SHE DOES NOT HAVE A COACH WRISTLET SHE WILL DIE, ABSOLUTELY DIE. Hell, there's probably some girl getting ready to go to CCAC saying the same thing.

[DGTess]

Originally Posted by 33girl

As far as clothing, shoes, bags...that has NOTHING to do with sorority membership. The "right bag" etc issue is EVERYWHERE. I'm sure that right now, there is a girl ready to enter some enlightened place like Juniata, standing in Macy's telling her mom that IF SHE DOES NOT HAVE A COACH WRISTLET SHE WILL DIE, ABSOLUTELY DIE. Hell, there's probably some girl getting ready to go to CCAC saying the same thing.

Maybe. I never have understood the concept of "cute shoes" and have never owned more than one purse at a time, that I carry with everything. I have never subscribed to, nor read, fashion magazines except to giggle, and don't recognize most of the names that people use to tell recruitment stories. I realize I'm way at one end of the spectrum, but most of the young people I know are way more practical than that.

[GeorgiaGreek]

UGA makes a pdf handbook available to PNMs (actually it's online, so anyone can see it) and it states the average costs (new member, in house, and member not-in-house dues). I have only been asked once by a PNM what dues were, which we're all required to be able to answer, but I did find it a little strange, given that they were provided with an approximation already.
I could be off base here, but I would think that if someone were looking to join a sorority, new member dues of 1300 vs. 1600 would not make a huge difference in choosing a house. If you're going through recruitment at a big southern school, private school, or any school where where there are a lot of girls for whom finance isn't a concern and might find it an odd question (because they've never had to ask it), I would find out that information outside of the party by calling the greek life office or a sorority office on your own time. There are plenty of girls paying their own way, but you never know the situation and level of understanding of the person you are talking to.

Additionally, you only have a short amount of time to get to know the girl you are talking to; It would be much more beneficial to you to ask questions about the sisterhood and activities of the sorority or show off your personality than to go over numbers and figures.

[happilyanchored]

I'm relatively new at this but just to butt my head in, during recruitment at a school without houses (so obviously our dues are not anywhere near what they would be at an SEC school) we PNMs were consistently told that should paying dues be a problem, that no sorority would turn them down and they would be glad to work out a payment plan with a new member and/or look for dues "scholarship" money they said was available. I'm lucky that I never had to look into either of those options, but are those unique to my school? Could you maybe look and see if those options might be available to you too?

[WCsweet<3]

Originally Posted by happilyanchored

I'm relatively new at this but just to butt my head in, during recruitment at a school without houses (so obviously our dues are not anywhere near what they would be at an SEC school) we PNMs were consistently told that should paying dues be a problem, that no sorority would turn them down and they would be glad to work out a payment plan with a new member and/or look for dues "scholarship" money they said was available. I'm lucky that I never had to look into either of those options, but are those unique to my school? Could you maybe look and see if those options might be available to you too?

My school is definitely not SEC, though we do have houses. I can't say all chapters, but the majority had financial help available be it through payment plans or what have you. We were always encouraged to try for scholarships as well. Our panhellenic council required every chapter to have financial information available to anyone who asked including a board which laid out the costs and the PNM recruitment booklet had the information as well.