My daughter’s pledge class is 160- too many in my opinion, though at least there’s no chance girls will not find friends! I think 60-80 sounds great. For them, it is also very competitive to be able to live in the house and they have to earn points by doing programs to earn a spot. That said, 50 total across all 4 grades is way too small and I can see girls not wanting to join it if they don’t feel a connection.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just a reminder that we are not all just talking about UVA here.

What other schools just finished rush with lots of DMV students?

Tulane, Umich, Indiana.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is this a thread on UVA or the big southern school sororities and rush?

I mean sure far out h and Penn and uva have some Greek life but it’s not SEC, Big 10 or Duke greek life vibes.

I think it’s a general sorority rush thread.
Some are using examples from UVA, but others are speaking more generally.

Right. When I posted about pledging a house with 12 members vs 150/200, that wasn't about particular chapters at a particular university. When and where I rushed there were two houses with around a dozen members.

Coincidentally, my sorority newsletter just arrived in the mail. There were more than 100 new initiates in 2024. In my day quota was between 50 and 60. I just can't imagine the scale. 400 women or more with current members and pledges. This is SEC.

Anonymous wrote:Is this a thread on UVA or the big southern school sororities and rush?

I mean sure far out h and Penn and uva have some Greek life but it’s not SEC, Big 10 or Duke greek life vibes.

I think it’s a general sorority rush thread.
Some are using examples from UVA, but others are speaking more generally.

* Dartmouth

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

My advice is always to be yourself during rush. If they accept you as you are, you’ll be happy there. The people who are unhappy are the ones who overdid it during rush and wound up somewhere that was not a fit with their genuine self.

This is verbatim the advice DD's Pi Chi gave her last week.

It’s very safe advice. But how does anyone really get to know another person in 20 minute shifts with 150 people? I think we can all stop pretending that they actually get know each other.

Correct. But there’s a vibe. And there’s conversation that either goes or doesn’t.
It’s the same way people of DCUM talk about college tours. You go on a campus visit, hear a PR pitch, go on a tour and you get a vibe whether this is a fit or not. Does it mean that will determine the perfect one-and-only school for you?—of course not. But it’s usually enough to lean in or lean out. And that’s all this is.

Bid Day is really the start of the friendships. After that it’s up to the new members and the existing members to continue to foster and nurture the connection.

Is this a thread on UVA or the big southern school sororities and rush?

I mean sure far out h and Penn and uva have some Greek life but it’s not SEC, Big 10 or Duke greek life vibes.

Anonymous wrote:To be fair, joining a house with a dozen or so members is a very different sorority experience than joining one with 150 or 200 members.

+1
The numbers are not exactly the case in this circumstance, but it can sure feel like it if the disparity is close to 50 or more. Or even if your PC is 8 when everyone else’s PC is 45 (just to choose a generic example).
And that’s hard to bounce back from, but not impossible.
The struggle for those who join the group at that point is that 60% of your membership experience becomes heavily focused on continuing to recruit new members informally so that they can close the gap as much as possible before the next recruitment in 12 months, while the experience for other groups is just to enjoy their sisterhood and focus on their existing programming for the next 11 months until it’s time for recruitment again. It’s definitely a different experience. By having been a member of a chapter that utilized continuous open bidding to narrow the membership gap, I cab attest that there are positives to this experience too. I made lots of non-Greek friends that I was encouraged to bring to things, and some of them ended up joining my sorority as result of that as well. And even girls who either decided not to join or weren’t asked to join still had a fun time hanging out together with my sisters and get to know what actual Greek life was like in a real-life setting instead of within the curated and carefully rehearsed formal recruitment process.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My dd at uva said it looks like tri sig got six pledges, which is better than last year at least. I hope some girls COB and get them back to a decent size.

It was like 3-4.

Honestly, I put those girls up. It takes a lot more courage and independence to join a sorority like that than follow the herd to some cookie cutter top tier house.

I do too, I give them a lot of credit and I hope they stick it out.

+1
And the 3-4 happened because every PNM thinks they belong in a mid to top tier “cookie cutter” chapter and when they get to the last night and have only a mid tier and “lower tier” left, they will ISP (only put the mid tier on their pref card at the end) because most girls are very insecure and don’t have the strength of esteem to join a sorority that they are told is lower tier. In reality, the girls in every house are great—but there is just a stigma about joining a “less popular” house that makes girls decide they’d rather not join at all because they just don’t want to deal with that.
But the reality is that when you have 10 chapters to choose from, there are going to be groups that people consider to be on the top , in the middle, and on the bottom. But it’s all superficial because in the end every group has women who are amazing and will make great friends and incredible leaders, philanthropists, and support system for anyone looking for sisterhood.
So I hope those girls hang in there and thrive!

Yes and frankly many of those who had tri sig left, should’ve gone tri sig, meaning they would fit there beautifully. But it’s the rumors and negative talk that kept them away.

+1
Take as old as time, tbh.
And it’s often not only the other group members who perpetuate the stigma. The men’s groups are notorious for telling the girls who are rushing which houses they shouldn’t join! And ironically, it’s often the 2-3 houses nearest to the smallest house rather than the most “popular” houses that engage in the negative talk in an effort to boost their own reputations as “not the bottom.” But what they don’t realize is that the negative talk actually hurts the whole system. Not just in VA, but everywhere. When your Greek culture negative-talks a house to the point where girls will choose not to go Greek at all rather than pledge a perfectly fine group that happens to be smaller, it eventually sets that chapter up to be in danger of closing due to low membership. And if that happens, then they aren’t the bottom house anymore, are they? And the cycle continues.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just a reminder that we are not all just talking about UVA here.

What other schools just finished rush with lots of DMV students?

Virginia Tech

Anonymous wrote:Just a reminder that we are not all just talking about UVA here.

What other schools just finished rush with lots of DMV students?

Just a reminder that we are not all just talking about UVA here.

dp, dunno I feel like I have more current info?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To be fair, joining a house with a dozen or so members is a very different sorority experience than joining one with 150 or 200 members.

+1 It’s also a different experience to be a member of a house that gets called names like a PP mentioned. And then wear letters on your body that might subject you to mean comments. You have to be a Pollyanna or mean to not understand this.

You're missing the point, this sorority was a perfectly acceptable place to be until last years' rush. Social media (Aka yikyak) took them down and it's sad to see. I don't blame girls for not joining, I just hope that some do join and see it as an opportunity not an embarrassment.

That is not true at all. I rushed at UVA 12+ years ago (pre yik yak). I received a bid from this sorority (no idea why as I didn’t really connect with the house during rush) and turned it down. Even at that point there were very few people in it and it was better to just save your money and stay independent.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To be fair, joining a house with a dozen or so members is a very different sorority experience than joining one with 150 or 200 members.

+1 It’s also a different experience to be a member of a house that gets called names like a PP mentioned. And then wear letters on your body that might subject you to mean comments. You have to be a Pollyanna or mean to not understand this.

You're missing the point, this sorority was a perfectly acceptable place to be until last years' rush. Social media (Aka yikyak) took them down and it's sad to see. I don't blame girls for not joining, I just hope that some do join and see it as an opportunity not an embarrassment.