Grad Students Rush?

[amIblue?]

Originally Posted by Old_Row

Sorry, but the idea of any chapter at Bama pledging or affiliating a grad student makes me giggle.

I know, right?

To the OP - you mentioned that the reason why you didn't pursue sorority membership earlier in your undergraduate career is that you had lots of friends at your university. It seems to me that perhaps you're considering pursuing sorority membership because you'll be moving to a place where you don't know anyone, which is fine and the reason why many people seek membership, but I don't know if that's the best reason to do so at this point in your academic career. You're going to meet people in your graduate program who will have common interests (field of study) and a clear understanding of the responsibilities of a graduate student. If you do receive a bid, you're most likely going to be in a pledge class that is majority freshmen students, who are really at a different place in life than you will be.

Someone upthread mentioned the service organizations. Another group that you may want to consider would be Beta Sigma Phi. There seem to be many happy members who have posted here on GC.

Whatever you decide, best of luck to you.

[33girl]

Originally Posted by Tess_DreamBig

This brings me to my next question, would it be better to go through informal recruitment at ASU and try to get a bid in a sorority that has a chapter at the school I end up going to so I can attempt to simply transfer over to that chapter when I move?

Even if you got a bid at ASU now, even if it was a sorority that also has a chapter at either Bama or UCA, and even if that sorority did allow grad students as active members...it's no guarantee that you will have anything in common with the chapter at the school where you do your grad work, that you will like them or that they will like you, or that you will want to affiliate/they will invite you to do so. Even if their org's policies said they had to admit you, you might not feel comfortable there/they might not want you there.

This applies to ANYONE transferring from school to school, not just someone in your situation.

[DubaiSis]

You will have plenty of opportunities to make friends and get involved, but NPC sorority membership isn't going to be on that list. As a person who has up and moved several times in her life to places where she knew almost nobody, you're just scared of starting over. You'll get through it. The difference here is instead of meeting friends organically as you do when you're younger, you have to go about building friendships with a bit more purpose.

It is too bad you didn't take advantage of the opportunity you had through Greek life at ASU because a lot of those moves I've made were a lot easier because of my sorority membership, but my life now, for instance, doesn't include sorority involvement at all, except for chatting here on GC. But especially when I was new here I went to "coffees" 3 and 4 times a week with different groups to start to make connections.

Once you're accepted, you can start researching what the school has to offer by way of activities and I would jump in with both feet. As you get yourself established you can start to whittle away the stuff that isn't as much fun or feels too time consuming.