Should we change the way PNMs think of Recruitment?

[28StGreek]

Hey y'all! Sorry for being missing in the wilderness but school/life has been seriously busy for me. The curse of the upperclassman as graduation approaches!

Caveat: Forgive me if this idea has been covered ad nauseaum/is a fire starter, I do not mean to tread on any toes or upset anyone!

I was just watching re-runs of Next Top Model the other day and I had a thought. If you take out the shallow perceptions, the process for entry into both are pretty similar. You have a whole bunch of girls who are very similarly qualified. A few who absolutely stand out and a few who just won't make it for one reason or another.

But at the end of the day even though all the girls want to be part of the top model competition its the Judges that make the decisions as to who gets into the top model house.

The term 'mutual selection' may give the PNMs the impression that their choices are equally important. However the reality is that the GLO chooses you, and if your preferences match then that's the mutual selection part
I know PNMs should be more rational about these things, but we all know
that Recruitment can bring out the most irrational thought processes in some of these young women.

As harsh, and non-egalitarian as it sounds, perhaps there needs to be more emphasis on the fact that dozens to a 100+ girls are the ones choosing the PNM rather than the other way around?

Well thats my rambling, feel free to add your two-cents!

I hope all the GCers are well and especially my Trojan family

Panhellenic Love,
28StGreek

[princessamy]

What if the PNM doesn't like the house that chooses her? Plus what determines a PNM's qualification?

[28StGreek]

Well the PNM's preferences would still have to match the bid list etc.

I was just wondering whether PNMs thought they had more of a influencing factor in the whole process that they do in practice.

A PNM's qualifications: GPA, extra-curricular involvement, and lets be honest, their looks, or at least how well put together they are.

That really was getting at the point that while Little Miss High School Star thinks she definitely has all the qualities which make her an obvious candidate for Greek Life, almost every other girl going through recruitment is also a Little Miss High School Star. Nowadays, just like applicants for college itself, so many young women, have enviable resumes.

Hope that answers your questions princessamy

[28StGreek]

Originally Posted by Jen

They do seem to feel as if they have more of a choice than they do, and in many cases it's detrimental when they keep seeing a house they "cut" show up on their schedule.

I think the explanations need to be improved so PNMs aren't getting an skewed sense of where the "power" lies when it comes to choosing. It's only mutual when you have more invites than you can accept.

Yes thats what I was trying to get at. You did a better job explaining my thoughts! If only I always had you to translate myself to my classmates :-)

[carnation]

I agree but I fear that political correctness--i.e., not wanting to hurt anyone's feelings--will keep Panhellenic Councils from doing this. I really wish that they would be blunter about it, especially at highly competitive schools.

[28StGreek]

Well I was speaking from the perspective of a school with highly competitive recruitment, they seem to be the ones which produce the most sob stories on GC. I guess its either because of the ultra competitive atmosphere, or rather its the PNMs at those schools that take Greek Life more 'seriously' (not to slight smaller/less competitive schools).

[KSUViolet06]

Originally Posted by 28StGreek

I was just wondering whether PNMs thought they had more of a influencing factor in the whole process that they do in practice.

Yes, they do.

I've been saying forever that selection is a lot less mutual than I think Panhellenics lead PNMs to believe. It tips considerably in the chapter's favor.

This goes along with PNMs consistently saying "I cut XYZ this round" not fully understanding that they aren't cutting anyone.

I think I had to make a thread about that once because I got sick of PNMs thinking that.

That's why there's so much "OMGWTFBBQ" when a chapter shows up on their list that they ranked low or they end up with a bid from their 2nd choice. They aren't aware that selection isn't as mututal as it is portrayed. There'd be a lot less of that if the process were presented realistically.

[33girl]

Originally Posted by carnation

I agree but I fear that political correctness--i.e., not wanting to hurt anyone's feelings--will keep Panhellenic Councils from doing this. I really wish that they would be blunter about it, especially at highly competitive schools.

Absolutely. This is the same ridiculousness that keeps college Panhellenics from being able to say "you don't have a snowball's chance in hell if you don't have recs/know people from Foofoo High/go to Roundup etc." Which is stupid, because the TRULY politically correct thing to do would be to make sure EVERYONE is informed of this, not just the "old girl network" who knows you have to have recs/Foofoo/Roundup etc - and who therefore keeps tight rein on the membership of the groups.

And if this means that chapters at less competitive schools get recs that they really don't need, well, that's not that big of a deal. Seriously.

[amIblue?]

When I went through rush back in the dark ages, I was able to cut invites because I'd received more invites than I had parties to attend. I also was under no illusion where the power was. However, I also believe that I received more invites back then than a woman with similar recs and qualifications would now due to the larger groups having to make larger cuts earlier.

[AGDee]

It really changed with quota additions, didn't it? If they don't "maximize" their options, they aren't eligible for quota additions but that also means they have to go to some parties that they don't really want to attend. In my day, if you didn't want to go to a party, you just didn't go and there were no repercussions.

[WCsweet<3]

Originally Posted by Jen

I actually liked how it worked in the past. When I went through, I was told all of my invites and had to choose between them if there was more than there were parties - so I got the experience of having to cut a group or two. I also could hear and see straight up that a group I liked didn't invite me back. There was some transparency there that appealed to me.

Now that happens automatically because of the rankings done after parties, so even if they DO have to cut, they never participate in it in the moment because it's already been done. I definitely see the benefit to having it done so automatically now (a definite time saver), but I think the explanations need to be improved so PNMs aren't getting an skewed sense of where the "power" lies when it comes to choosing. It's only mutual when you have more invites than you can accept.

I really like the idea of seeing the invites and then choosing. Two questions though:

1. How does it work? The chapters on my campus are matched with a specific PNM who comes to a party. Basically Patty PNM is matched with Sorority Sue at XYZ during party one. Would the PNM see her invites, choose and come back later for her schedule or what?

2. Does tent talk play more in these situations? I'm imagining all the PNMs sitting in a dorm room chatting. On the other hand, having more time to think on the interactions at each chapter aka sleeping on it might help.

I remember going through recruitment a second time and someone in my group asked how our invites were chosen. They were amazed that members would vote/rank/judge the pnms. I don't know how she thought it was before, but she was amazed that her invites depended on what the members thought of her.

[KSUViolet06]

^^^We used to do things the way Jen described.

You would see all chapters that invited you back and depending on how many you got back, you would need to drop some. Ex: If you got 5 back, and the max number of parties was 4, you needed to drop 1.

If I recall, you would make your selections and receive your schedule shortly after, so you don't actually leave the area. You would show up, see your invites, make any selections you needed to make (if you were over the max number), get your schedule, then wait in the student center to go to your parties (later in the afternoon.)

Tent talk is probably about the same. There were girls who made the decision of who to drop based on who other PNMs in their group were dropping, but I don't think it was any worse then than it is now.

[LAblondeGPhi]

Originally Posted by WCsweet<3

I really like the idea of seeing the invites and then choosing. Two questions though:

1. How does it work? The chapters on my campus are matched with a specific PNM who comes to a party. Basically Patty PNM is matched with Sorority Sue at XYZ during party one. Would the PNM see her invites, choose and come back later for her schedule or what?

It was my understanding that some campuses still do this, and yes - basically just like that. The PNMs meet with their Rho Whatevers in the morning, sit down at a computer and see their invitations for that day and decide who to go back to, and who to regret. In that case, they truly are 'cutting' a chapter because they've already received invitations. My concern with this is two-fold: 1) logistically, it seems like such a waste of time to do this the day of parties (which means a potential time crunch in determining party schedules, and less time for chapters to prepare for the returning PNMs) when they could have PNMs rank while the chapters are ranking. and 2) Yes, I would expect that tent talk would play a greater role when the PNMs have an entire evening back at the dorms to gossip before they have to make their final decisions.

I think it shouldn't be too hard for Panhellenics to take 5 minutes to explain that chapters decide who to invite back, while PNMs are ranking their preferred returns. Chapters have limited numbers of invitations, so not everyone can be invited back to every chapter. You will be matched for the next round with chapters that have invited you back, in order of your preference. Now, whether the PNMs understand and choose to hear it is another issue.

Something that might help the whole situation is an additional print-out showing the results of the previous day's matching, in addition to their party schedule, for example:

Ranks:
#1 - ABC - Invitation / Return
#1 - BCD - Invitation / Return
#1 - CDE - No Invitation
#1 - DEF - Invitation / Return
#2 - FGH - Invitation / Return
#3 - GHI - Invitation / No Return

Party Schedule:
BCD
FGH
DEF
ABC

[SLAM<3 Always]

I think the mutual selection comes more from the PNMs ability to not rank a particular organization. I see it very often at my university where girls will not rank all of the organization available to them.

However, I have always wondered this and maybe someone can explain this better to me. A guy can go through multiple rush's on campus and actually receive more than one bid. It's his choice than to accept one of those bids. What caused or was the reasoning behind a girl only being able to receive on bid at the end of formal recruitment?

[DeltaBetaBaby]

Mathematically, the PRUSH (PNM's make their selections immediately after their parties) makes more sense than SORUSH (PNM's get a list of invites and choose which to accept). In PRUSH with RFM, both the PNM's and the chapters have flexlists, so the right number of women end up at each chapter during each round. If a campus used RFM and SORUSH, they could end up with too few women, and couldn't go back and add via the flexlist.