I was asked (25 years ago). Where I summered

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is the draw of the sorority?

Is it to find friends and a peer group?

We have highly encouraged our DD to not rush and to find peers through clubs and other activities. Neither one of us were in Greek life when we were in college, and we had a fun college experience with friends who we still periodically are in touch with today.

My perspective on Greek life is that it appears to me like you're paying for your friends, like you have to rush and then pay a fee to stay in this social club.

My small interaction with some in frats when I was in college, reminded me of the social "clicks" in high school. It gave me the impression of immature folks who seemed insecure and never grew out of high school social clicks. Seemingly wanting to constantly compare and rack and stack others.

But our lovely DD chooses not to listen to parents encouragement, and is currently rushing. She's a grown-up now, and as long as she works or comes up w/ the money for it... she's free to do as she pleases.

So are we wrong in our perspective of greek life? What is the draw?

You are acting judgmental. Why does your daughter want to join? Probably because it’s a fun social club that you get to eat with, live with, enjoy life with. Most clubs aren’t as involved. For my daughter, some of the fees are her meal plan and rent. Some is for social activities, but of the “clubs” that you feel are better had the same amenities, you’d have to pay for them.

Every sorority has girls that like to party, girls who don’t like to party, girls who are judgmental and girls who are super open minded. There are republicans and democrats and those who don’t care at all about politics. Within each sorority is a friend group for everyone.

Rush is hard because girls come in with preconceived notions of each house, but most girls enjoy it (obviously not all).

Stop shaming girls, including your daughter, when you don’t even seem to understand what it is.

Anonymous wrote:What is the draw of the sorority?

Is it to find friends and a peer group?

We have highly encouraged our DD to not rush and to find peers through clubs and other activities. Neither one of us were in Greek life when we were in college, and we had a fun college experience with friends who we still periodically are in touch with today.

My perspective on Greek life is that it appears to me like you're paying for your friends, like you have to rush and then pay a fee to stay in this social club.

My small interaction with some in frats when I was in college, reminded me of the social "clicks" in high school. It gave me the impression of immature folks who seemed insecure and never grew out of high school social clicks. Seemingly wanting to constantly compare and rack and stack others.

But our lovely DD chooses not to listen to parents encouragement, and is currently rushing. She's a grown-up now, and as long as she works or comes up w/ the money for it... she's free to do as she pleases.

So are we wrong in our perspective of greek life? What is the draw?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Ge[b wrote:[/b]ed]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Went through sorority rush back in the 90s at an Ivy. The process was crushing to some of my friends who didn’t match at their preferred house. I got into my top choice house, but I found it remarkably unfulfilling. Many of my “sisters” are still friends and I see them getting together for wine tours and things on FB. I will encourage my DC to avoid schools with Greek Life or at least look for a low percentage who rush/pledge, because there can be a perception that you will be left out socially if it seems most of your friends are rushing. My friend group ended up being centered around a shared interest rather than just the alcohol and hook-up culture of Greek Life, so I spent less and less time at the sorority house until I deactivated entirely. I’d rather have my kid attend college and live at home than pay huge dollars to be on their own in that setting. The girls I met were smart and high achievers, but I realized I’m not a “joiner” just for a social scene. I’d rather get to know people in a more organic way. Good luck to your DC. Certain personality types are better cut out for Greek Life than others.

I have an almost identical story but my DD has her heart set on schools with big Greek systems and rushing so sometimes the kids don’t listen to their parents!

I think back and regret my Greek time. Yes, I had fun and made friends, but I wonder what I would have accomplished if I hadn't been focused on getting drunk at parties almost every night. My niece joined a sorority and promptly failed out of school. I won't be encouraging my kids to rush, I just think it is a fast ticket to wasting your time at college.

This is how I feel too. I did use it for leadership stuff, but also drank heavily Thursday-Saturday at a minimum. Have a kid at at T10 and she’s done more in her first semester it feels like than I did in 4 years. I went to a good school and I wasted a lot of it.

Stop sororities and fraternities tend to have higher GPA than rest of schools. If you were a pattern you would have partied. I had plenty of wild non greek friends and they partied more than me.
Just not my thing to drink. Those kids didn’t want to have to go to meetings and do extra philanthropy and grade pressure. My guess is you would have done worse because that is how you rolled.

That’s not accurate. Some fraternities do well academically and some do poorly academically. It all depends. Fraternities are not all alike. Certain fraternities have massive alcohol and date rape problems. Others don’t.

The saddest sororities are the Southern ones that aren’t allowed to have the same freedoms as the fraternities. Men can’t go in their bedrooms. No alcohol allowed. They need to dress up at all times. Pink is a preferred color. They are segregated by race. The rigidity. It’s like they are setting themselves up to be a perfect hostess for their successful husbands who may or may not be faithful.

Do you know how averages work?

The AVERAGE fraternity man's GPA is higher than the AVERAGE geed's GPA.

On almost every campus.

That is a fact.

It's just a proxy for income level. This is also a fact. I'd rather my dd date from a pool with a lower average GPA and not get raped or deal with toxic masculinity. It's douchey. Period.

Someone Who Didn't Get a Bid wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Ge[b wrote:[/b]ed]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Went through sorority rush back in the 90s at an Ivy. The process was crushing to some of my friends who didn’t match at their preferred house. I got into my top choice house, but I found it remarkably unfulfilling. Many of my “sisters” are still friends and I see them getting together for wine tours and things on FB. I will encourage my DC to avoid schools with Greek Life or at least look for a low percentage who rush/pledge, because there can be a perception that you will be left out socially if it seems most of your friends are rushing. My friend group ended up being centered around a shared interest rather than just the alcohol and hook-up culture of Greek Life, so I spent less and less time at the sorority house until I deactivated entirely. I’d rather have my kid attend college and live at home than pay huge dollars to be on their own in that setting. The girls I met were smart and high achievers, but I realized I’m not a “joiner” just for a social scene. I’d rather get to know people in a more organic way. Good luck to your DC. Certain personality types are better cut out for Greek Life than others.

I have an almost identical story but my DD has her heart set on schools with big Greek systems and rushing so sometimes the kids don’t listen to their parents!

I think back and regret my Greek time. Yes, I had fun and made friends, but I wonder what I would have accomplished if I hadn't been focused on getting drunk at parties almost every night. My niece joined a sorority and promptly failed out of school. I won't be encouraging my kids to rush, I just think it is a fast ticket to wasting your time at college.

This is how I feel too. I did use it for leadership stuff, but also drank heavily Thursday-Saturday at a minimum. Have a kid at at T10 and she’s done more in her first semester it feels like than I did in 4 years. I went to a good school and I wasted a lot of it.

Stop sororities and fraternities tend to have higher GPA than rest of schools. If you were a pattern you would have partied. I had plenty of wild non greek friends and they partied more than me.
Just not my thing to drink. Those kids didn’t want to have to go to meetings and do extra philanthropy and grade pressure. My guess is you would have done worse because that is how you rolled.

That’s not accurate. Some fraternities do well academically and some do poorly academically. It all depends. Fraternities are not all alike. Certain fraternities have massive alcohol and date rape problems. Others don’t.

The saddest sororities are the Southern ones that aren’t allowed to have the same freedoms as the fraternities. Men can’t go in their bedrooms. No alcohol allowed. They need to dress up at all times. Pink is a preferred color. They are segregated by race. The rigidity. It’s like they are setting themselves up to be a perfect hostess for their successful husbands who may or may not be faithful.

Do you know how averages work?

The AVERAGE fraternity man's GPA is higher than the AVERAGE geed's GPA.

On almost every campus.

That is a fact.

It's just a proxy for income level. This is also a fact. I'd rather my dd date from a pool with a lower average GPA and not get raped or deal with toxic masculinity. It's douchey. Period.

Anonymous wrote:

Ge[b wrote:[/b]ed]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Went through sorority rush back in the 90s at an Ivy. The process was crushing to some of my friends who didn’t match at their preferred house. I got into my top choice house, but I found it remarkably unfulfilling. Many of my “sisters” are still friends and I see them getting together for wine tours and things on FB. I will encourage my DC to avoid schools with Greek Life or at least look for a low percentage who rush/pledge, because there can be a perception that you will be left out socially if it seems most of your friends are rushing. My friend group ended up being centered around a shared interest rather than just the alcohol and hook-up culture of Greek Life, so I spent less and less time at the sorority house until I deactivated entirely. I’d rather have my kid attend college and live at home than pay huge dollars to be on their own in that setting. The girls I met were smart and high achievers, but I realized I’m not a “joiner” just for a social scene. I’d rather get to know people in a more organic way. Good luck to your DC. Certain personality types are better cut out for Greek Life than others.

I have an almost identical story but my DD has her heart set on schools with big Greek systems and rushing so sometimes the kids don’t listen to their parents!

I think back and regret my Greek time. Yes, I had fun and made friends, but I wonder what I would have accomplished if I hadn't been focused on getting drunk at parties almost every night. My niece joined a sorority and promptly failed out of school. I won't be encouraging my kids to rush, I just think it is a fast ticket to wasting your time at college.

This is how I feel too. I did use it for leadership stuff, but also drank heavily Thursday-Saturday at a minimum. Have a kid at at T10 and she’s done more in her first semester it feels like than I did in 4 years. I went to a good school and I wasted a lot of it.

Stop sororities and fraternities tend to have higher GPA than rest of schools. If you were a pattern you would have partied. I had plenty of wild non greek friends and they partied more than me.
Just not my thing to drink. Those kids didn’t want to have to go to meetings and do extra philanthropy and grade pressure. My guess is you would have done worse because that is how you rolled.

That’s not accurate. Some fraternities do well academically and some do poorly academically. It all depends. Fraternities are not all alike. Certain fraternities have massive alcohol and date rape problems. Others don’t.

The saddest sororities are the Southern ones that aren’t allowed to have the same freedoms as the fraternities. Men can’t go in their bedrooms. No alcohol allowed. They need to dress up at all times. Pink is a preferred color. They are segregated by race. The rigidity. It’s like they are setting themselves up to be a perfect hostess for their successful husbands who may or may not be faithful.

Do you know how averages work?

The AVERAGE fraternity man's GPA is higher than the AVERAGE geed's GPA.

On almost every campus.

That is a fact.

Anonymous wrote:okay so why are you on this thread? This was asking about how rush went?

Ge[b wrote:[/b]ed]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Went through sorority rush back in the 90s at an Ivy. The process was crushing to some of my friends who didn’t match at their preferred house. I got into my top choice house, but I found it remarkably unfulfilling. Many of my “sisters” are still friends and I see them getting together for wine tours and things on FB. I will encourage my DC to avoid schools with Greek Life or at least look for a low percentage who rush/pledge, because there can be a perception that you will be left out socially if it seems most of your friends are rushing. My friend group ended up being centered around a shared interest rather than just the alcohol and hook-up culture of Greek Life, so I spent less and less time at the sorority house until I deactivated entirely. I’d rather have my kid attend college and live at home than pay huge dollars to be on their own in that setting. The girls I met were smart and high achievers, but I realized I’m not a “joiner” just for a social scene. I’d rather get to know people in a more organic way. Good luck to your DC. Certain personality types are better cut out for Greek Life than others.

I have an almost identical story but my DD has her heart set on schools with big Greek systems and rushing so sometimes the kids don’t listen to their parents!

I think back and regret my Greek time. Yes, I had fun and made friends, but I wonder what I would have accomplished if I hadn't been focused on getting drunk at parties almost every night. My niece joined a sorority and promptly failed out of school. I won't be encouraging my kids to rush, I just think it is a fast ticket to wasting your time at college.

This is how I feel too. I did use it for leadership stuff, but also drank heavily Thursday-Saturday at a minimum. Have a kid at at T10 and she’s done more in her first semester it feels like than I did in 4 years. I went to a good school and I wasted a lot of it.

Stop sororities and fraternities tend to have higher GPA than rest of schools. If you were a pattern you would have partied. I had plenty of wild non greek friends and they partied more than me.
Just not my thing to drink. Those kids didn’t want to have to go to meetings and do extra philanthropy and grade pressure. My guess is you would have done worse because that is how you rolled.

That’s not accurate. Some fraternities do well academically and some do poorly academically. It all depends. Fraternities are not all alike. Certain fraternities have massive alcohol and date rape problems. Others don’t.

The saddest sororities are the Southern ones that aren’t allowed to have the same freedoms as the fraternities. Men can’t go in their bedrooms. No alcohol allowed. They need to dress up at all times. Pink is a preferred color. They are segregated by race. The rigidity. It’s like they are setting themselves up to be a perfect hostess for their successful husbands who may or may not be faithful.