active sister ama

I actually did post some of the more dominant mechanics, mainly cutting and ranking. But each individual house cuts and ranks based on its own criteria and, depending on the house, the typical sister might not even understand how her house ranks and cuts. I could explain how my house does it, but that only applies to 1/10 of the houses. Personally, I do feel like a veil exists around Greek life, especially around sorority recruitment. That is the main reason why I made this thread. I definitely posted secretive things I probably should not have, but did it in a manner that kept me and my house anonymous. To address the unfortunate case of girls dropping, from what I have seen, that is mainly driven by 'stereotypes' and social pressure. If you have concrete feedback with examples, I am sure Greek Life would appreciate feedback, especially in regards to the new Sisterhood Round.

Secret Sister has truly gone as far as she is able without 'giving away the store' explaining common sorority recruitment practices. She is def not saying things are too complicated to understand, she just cannot say anything further about recruitment because there are uninitiated people reading these posts. There are no special secrets to understand other than the secret each pnm holds in her own heart and mind as to how she personally acts and reacts to people and events around her. There also are no set 'odds' to recruitment. Some campuses have 90% bid day acceptance, others have 67%. And happily sometimes a campus will move from one year having 67% acceptance to 90% acceptance the next! The only certain 'odds' are that if you do not go thru one or more of the recruitment processes (formal, informal, COB) then 100% you won't be asked to join.

^^^^^AMEN!!!!^^^^

If the overall top tier NPC houses nationwide desire to break-away from the NPCs middle and lower tier houses, form a new organization and be allowed unrestricted build-up their chapter and new members numbers, I guess they have that right.

They won't, but that would be one way for @done to see more coddled, weeping, angry great ladies who intentionally dropped from rush join THE best possible top tier (in their opinions) collegiate sorority groups.

@done states many fab women are disregarded and dismissed by these top tier sororities in the first place. What on earth, other than POSSIBLY a numbers game, would cause these top tier sororities to choose these same fab women IF they had the chance SINCE they were previously voted unworthy and disregarded/dismissed? Somehow @done believes there were NOT LEGITIMATE REASONS for top tier groups to dismiss/disregard allegedly fab women OTHER THAN strictly numbers.

Top tier groups understand many PNMs want to join their orgs. They also acknowledge EVERY NPC group offers legitimate and worthy values, teachings, activities and standards for young women. By unanimously agreeing to NM parity, all NPC groups hope PNMs will take advantage of a Greek system that can and has been promoting women for over 165 years.

Brava "Actually"! Well said and I completely agree. I wish the conspiracy theorists such as 'pete and repeat' would take a breath. I think a lot of people are talking about the same issues because so many people did experience the same things in terms of quick and severe cuts. I think that 'Secret Sister' did her best to explain the basic mechanics of cuts but I am not so sure it really sunk in to the heads of many PNMs. On my floor at least what hit hard was getting cut almost immediately from what at least 4 people thought were their top 5 picks and this seemed to turn their worlds upside down. This quick cut for lack of a better term seemed to make it hard to focus on the other houses as people were so demoralized. You can throw the derogatory 'snowflake' term around all day long but even though I don't know the people on my floor really well, my sense is that they were so upset that they dropped before finishing. I am not certain whether it was because they had their hearts set on a specific house (don't think this was the case across the board) or that they just felt totally rejected by the system. People can advise PNMs all day long to keep an open mind but when you are feeling totally rejected/dejected it takes a fair amount of courage and maturity to keep on going with no certain outcome. I don't know why what happened this year did in fact happen, just sharing what I saw on my floor.

Thank you @ Actually, this was very well put. I appreciate your insight. You are the type of sorority woman I was hoping to connect with PNM's through the hectic recruitment process.

Recruitment has been quick-cut/heavy since 2003's RFM introduction. Why blame quick-cut for PNMs deciding to drop?

Have recruitment guides and the internet failed to inform PNMs they may only join ONE NPC sorority? What causes the freak-out if said persons still have ONE OR MORE party invitations?

Some college age students (and those younger than they) have been raised to believe everyone gets a wonderful prize no matter who they are, or in what place their team finished. What they want will they get, no questions and no argument. If they complain loudly enough and cry continuously, they WILL have their way.

Would that our recruitment system revert to a 125-years-ago system when a sorority bid was NOT obtained by an open party method, it was by invitation only from the sorority to the women. Even if you WANTED to be in a sorority, no invite=no bid=no joining.

@Itisbetternow. Question. Can you explain what you meant when you said, "What causes the freak-out if said persons still have one or more party invitations?" I think I get that you might be saying that most people had at least one option at the end of the process and that this fact is better than the way things used to be 125 years ago. I agree with this statement if that is what you meant. But where I think people had issues this year was that they might have had 5 names in their minds as options and then when those 5 options were no more and they were left with options they hadn't even considered then that is when things deteriorated for them and they quit. I don't know what the reasons behind all this drama is but it seemed that so many people seem to care more about what other people think of the letters on their clothes versus having a positive individual greek experience here at Vandy. But, I wonder if these perceptions of what is 'socially acceptable' are the result of the way we treat each other and speak about each others houses? That is why I applaud @Actually as I think that comment nailed at least part of this issue. I don't get why people cant recognize that we have super people in all houses and that a fantastic greek experience can be had at any house in our system. I am trying to get why people/PNMs didn't buy this idea this year? Just trying to understand....

Interesting that last month's mention of repeated identical greekrank "great, fabulous women becoming disregarded, crying pnms with no greek homes" posts made those posts quietly disappear. GC had a similar incident with a similar poster during the same month. Hey, money can buy happiness in some places.

@itisbetternow. Thanks for reply. I think I get what you are saying. I agree about the fragility of so many PNMs and how they seemed to drop at the first experience of rejection. It seems like so many things (like school) are all based around rewarding people mainly for simply showing up. Sure you need to have good grades but the issue is at a strong academic school most of us have the grades. Maybe recruitment was the first time for many PNMs that they have experienced a very clear and undebatable and unappealable rejection from their peers. This is just a guess on my part but it seems like people were crushed when their self view wasnt the same as the peer view and they were dropped and dismissed. I get that rejection is rough and hurts. But to eliminate the greek experience in its entirety based on hard feelings that last a few days seems a bit immature, self centered and short term in focus. These people will wake up and realize that the greek option no longer exists for most of them and honestly this is sad for the people that dropped and sad for our system as no doubt there were some strong candidates that dropped out way too soon. I simply dont understand at least finishing the process and pledging and see where things shake out before initiation. Not sure why more people wouldnt take this risk of at least trying. I hate the snowflake term but perhaps its relevant to describe what happened here. I'm honestly not sure....

mmkay betch, not quite sure why you felt the need to add that.

There's a sophomore quota but the focus is more on freshman and sophomore transfers in the more competitive sororities, so the key is to go in knowing as many people as possible and being very open minded. In less competitive sororities, the rounds matter more than connections. But for the more competitive, you need people pulling for you so connections, new or old, are very important. The latter is also relevant to freshman. The most competitive houses are those with the highest return rates, Kappa, KD, Theta, Tridelt and Pi Phi. Chi O can also be very selective for a specific type. Take the "we're so exclusive we're done before rush" talk with a grain of salt. It is mutual selection. More than one sorority might rush the same PNMs, so they would also have to be on that PNMs list. A very competitive sorority lost face on that claim this past year.