NPC Recruitment and Chapter Listing: Fall 2022-Spring 2023

[FSUZeta]

Yes, Carnation and ChioLu!! You both make excellent points about PNMs-they hold the ultimate rush decisions in their hands-they can accept or turn down a bid or drop out of recruitment. We are seeing more and more PNMs dropping out of recruitment when their favorite(s) don’t ask them back. Unfortunately, many have been led down a primrose path where they are certain their desired will pick them up as a COB right after formal recruitment. When that doesn’t happen, they hope against hope that their faves will be participating in informal and refuse to explore other COB opportunities. They are used to getting their own way, having grown up in a generation where everyone is a winner and they all get a trophy. And then, they( and their parents) find out the world doesn’t function that way.

[ZTA72]

I had no idea how lucky I was to get my first choice. To read that 50% drop out of recruitment because of the houses they have left is beyond me.
I would have gratefully joined any group that I received a bid to. Things were apparently different back in the "Stone Ages"!

[SuzyInMD]

Originally Posted by FSUZeta

Yes, Carnation and ChioLu!! You both make excellent points about PNMs-they hold the ultimate rush decisions in their hands-they can accept or turn down a bid or drop out of recruitment. We are seeing more and more PNMs dropping out of recruitment when their favorite(s) don’t ask them back. Unfortunately, many have been led down a primrose path where they are certain their desired will pick them up as a COB right after formal recruitment. When that doesn’t happen, they hope against hope that their faves will be participating in informal and refuse to explore other COB opportunities. They are used to getting their own way, having grown up in a generation where everyone is a winner and they all get a trophy. And then, they( and their parents) find out the world doesn’t function that way.

This is harsh. The parents you are referring to are ME and others who were in sororities in the 80s and 90s. My daughter went through recruitment on her campus last year (Spring 2022) and was cut by 5 of 9 houses after Round 1. I don't know if you have experienced this yourself, but it feels crappy to be cut by over half the houses, including all the houses considered to be "top tier." My daughter called me crying, not because she loved those houses, but because it made her feel ugly. Fortunately, my daughter decided to continue and received a bid from her favorite of the 4 she had left. PNMs do not hold the "ultimate rush decision." Yes, they decide whether to continue after being dropped by the "top tier" and "mid-tier" houses and take a bid at all, but unless a PNM has a full schedule she is not deciding where that bid is from. I warned my daughter that there would be cuts, but even I was surprised when she was cut by 5 of 9 houses. Ultimately this is an exclusive system, with the "top tier" houses deciding which PNMs they want, and the "bottom tier" getting the women who decide to continue after they have been cut by the "top tier." Everyone knows the tiers of houses, they existed in the 80s when I was an active and they exist today. (I've lurked here but I joined today to post this.)

[carnation]

It does hurt to be cut so harshly. Panhellenic often leads PNMs down a primrose path by using language that makes them think they are in the driver's seat during recruitment. A very small number of PNMs are but for the huge majority, this is not true.

What many of us who have worked with sororities for years see is that a university may have, say, 16 sororities and a woman is cut by 4, so she drops. Or she is cut by all the "top tier" groups and doesn't want middle-tier so she drops. The thing is, a lot of these women who get deeply cut might have expected it if forewarned. They had lower grades (sometimes under a 3.5) or didn't know anyone in the sororities beforehand or are from out of state. Yes, these things may matter and so may others.

There's always some clueless idiot in online groups who's telling other moms, "Sure your daughter can get a top tier bid without knowing anyone, mine did!" (Often we know where that daughter is Greek and no, she did not.) Or she'll tell other moms that a low GPA is not the kiss of death and on some campuses, it may be.