Potential New Members This Is Important

[ComradesTrue]

I agree that it may be regional.

I grew up in Texas and attended a Texas school with a competitive recruitment. Recs were an absolute must, girls were dressed to impress, yada, yada. West Texas, namely the Abilene/Midland/Odessa area, had (has? unsure...) a high school sorority called Tri-Hi-Y. To be honest, we found the whole thing humorous and at least for my chapter this was not anything that scored a PNM any extra consideration.

[beeish]

Quick question about photos. I have naturally curly hair but in all the photos I have of me (well the ones I would consider sending in) its flat ironed/blow dried straight. Is it still okay to send one of those in even though I don't think my hair will be flat ironed for rush cause of the humidity and time involved?

[Alumiyum]

Originally Posted by beeish

Quick question about photos. I have naturally curly hair but in all the photos I have of me (well the ones I would consider sending in) its flat ironed/blow dried straight. Is it still okay to send one of those in even though I don't think my hair will be flat ironed for rush cause of the humidity and time involved?

I think it would be fine to send in a picture with straight hair. You'll have name tags on during recruitment, so they'll figure it out.

I know sometimes PNM's say, "Well I just didn't join any clubs or anything in high school." What about church, camp, volunteer activities, hobbies you're passionate about, etc.?

[Alumiyum]

Originally Posted by carnation

Watch your spelling. I'm thinking of an application we got at MS State in which the girl had won all kinds of Baptist honors so the word was all over the page but she spelled it "Babtist" every time. So we're thinking that if she was such a big deal in the church, why can't she spell it and of course it became a running joke in the PH office.

*For GC oldtimers who may remember this: this was also the girl whom people were calling "Bubbles" because her application picture had her in a feathery pink wrap with bubbles behind her. For that matter, y'all, don't be the girl with the really weird feature (like a pit bull or a huge hat) in your photo that people remember so well that you pick up a nickname.

Somewhere on GC there's a thread that discusses odd recruitment applications.

We had one girl send in a picture of her lying on a purple shag carpet in this fuzzy pink jacket, with loud, caked on make up. It really truly looked like it might be from the set of a porn right before the clothes started coming off. She was famous for that picture before she stepped on campus, and in real life she was very cute, very sweet, and very conservative. No fuzzy pink sweaters or ridiculous make up. Fortunately her first choice laughed off the pictures and she became a great member but...what in the world was she thinking?

We've also had PNM's send in what appears to be their entire modeling portfolio. Really we only need one picture. REALLY.

[AXOrushadvisor]

I think the picture you send in is really important. I have seen it all in 20+ years. A couple of memorable ones: the girl who sent the picture in that we called the "negative" super, super tan and white blonde hair the photo actually looked like a negative (for all you young gals that is what cameras used before being digital! ha!), girls drinking in their pictures, yes! I guess they have bought into the only thing sororities do is drink and party I'll show them I can hang The best ones are the 8x10 glamour shots that have been airbrushed and look NOTHING like the girl walking through the door. Ditto on the sending of 10 different pictures. Send us one quality picture that looks like you.

[Alumiyum]

Originally Posted by AXOrushadvisor

I think the picture you send in is really important. I have seen it all in 20+ years. A couple of memorable ones: the girl who sent the picture in that we called the "negative" super, super tan and white blonde hair the photo actually looked like a negative (for all you young gals that is what cameras used before being digital! ha!), girls drinking in their pictures, yes! I guess they have bought into the only thing sororities do is drink and party I'll show them I can hang The best ones are the 8x10 glamour shots that have been airbrushed and look NOTHING like the girl walking through the door. Ditto on the sending of 10 different pictures. Send us one quality picture that looks like you.

We've gotten a few "negatives", which confuses me since they all appeared to be senior portraits and whoever took the pictures should've done something to tone down the contrast. Eesh. One year a girl sent in a picture of herself that had obviously been taken several years before because not only did she appear to be about 13, after looking at it we saw there was one of those little gold stamps in the corner with the studio's name and the year it was taken. She was actually 13 in the photo! Of course, she looked very different when she walked through the door.


The point of the photos is for face recognition, so there's no point in sending in something that isn't what you look like day to day.

[ladybug12]

One of my favs from a few years ago...PNM stretched out on top of a grand piano in a formal dress. Turns out she was very musically gifted, but she was known as Piano Girl during recruitment.

Also hate when there are 3 girls in a photo...unless you circle your head how do we know who is the PNM?

[Loyally Kappa]

This may be off topic, but PNMs and their mothers ought to think carefully about who they ask to write a rec for them.

For example, when my oldest daughter was a senior in high school, she was in charge of decorating for the back-to-school dance. During the decorating, she called me to see if it would be okay for Miss X to spend the night after the dance rather than driving back home. (Private school ... Miss X lived about 45 miles away.)

Well, Miss X apparently imbibed a bit at the dance, and when it came time to follow my daughter home in her car, coming into my neighborhood, she swerved off the road and hit a brick mailbox. Said mailbox was splayed all across the victim's front yard. But rather than stopping (her car was badly damaged and the right, front wheel could no longer rotate), Miss X continued to follow my daughter (who was unaware of what was going on behind her) to my house, leaving an 8 inch black skid all the way from the victim's house and which eventually ended in my driveway.

There is much more to this tale ... and it gets downright humorous when I recount how this was the only night in my entire life when I have slept with a drunk chick. Suffice to say that it took all my powers of zen to not allow my eyebrows to shoot up over the top of my hairline when her mother approached me for a rec the following spring.

Sigh ...

[Alumiyum]

Originally Posted by Loyally Kappa

This may be off topic, but PNMs and their mothers ought to think carefully about who they ask to write a rec for them.

For example, when my oldest daughter was a senior in high school, she was in charge of decorating for the back-to-school dance. During the decorating, she called me to see if it would be okay for Miss X to spend the night after the dance rather than driving back home. (Private school ... Miss X lived about 45 miles away.)

Well, Miss X apparently imbibed a bit at the dance, and when it came time to follow my daughter home in her car, coming into my neighborhood, she swerved off the road and hit a brick mailbox. Said mailbox was splayed all across the victim's front yard. But rather than stopping (her car was badly damaged and the right, front wheel could no longer rotate), Miss X continued to follow my daughter (who was unaware of what was going on behind her) to my house, leaving an 8 inch black skid all the way from the victim's house and which eventually ended in my driveway.

There is much more to this tale ... and it gets downright humorous when I recount how this was the only night in my entire life when I have slept with a drunk chick, but suffice to say that it took all my powers of zen to not allow my eyebrows to shoot up over the top of my hairline when her mother approached me for a rec the following spring.

Sigh ...

Awkwarrrdddd....

[Low C Sharp]

LK, what did you do? Did you no-rec her?
________

[Loyally Kappa]

Originally Posted by Low C Sharp

LK, what did you do? Did you no-rec her?

What do you think?

[ree-Xi]

About photos - I would suggest the same thing that actors are told when getting head shots - make sure that it looks just like the person who is walking through the door at an audition. If you follow this suggestion, it should prevent you from doing anything crazy in the photo, or in making some big change to your appearance "just for recruitment". Enhancements, yes, complete makeover, no. Just be the best version of "you" that you can.

[33girl]

What about black & white? One of my friends is a photographer who works primarily in black & white - and her pictures are gorgeous and make everyone in them look gorgeous. If you have pictures from an "arty" setting like this, are they acceptable? Or should you skip them and put a plain old color photo by Mom in your packet instead?

[AXOrushadvisor]

I just got done going through applications that have been processed so far for recruitment. I am amazed at the amount of sophomores going through recruitment. I am, however, more astonished that the majority of them have listed no college activities, leadership or community service. Sophomores wonder why they get cut so hard on this board all the time? I think next time I'll ask what they had on their applications and resumes.

[BAMA2]

All the girls from my kids school just use a smaller version of their senior pictures. They do them in regular clothes (no gowns) so they just look like very nice, tasteful pictures. It really never occurred to me to use anything else.