one for the guys...
 

okay. i like everybody else have been hanging on every word of these rush threads. however. i thought the guys might feel a little left out. soooooooo...since my fiance is rushing right now, i figured i'd pump him for info every night and share it with ya'll. so guys. here ya go.

i decided to number the fraternities so that no individual house would feel bad. there are only five houses so they have a formal recruitment (kinda like the girls!!!) first rounds were last night and the guys rotated to all of the houses for 45 minutes each. they weren't allowed to have girls or alcohol and they WERE allowed to feed them.

Fraternity #1 - He actually didn't go to this house. He got paged into work for 'bout a half hour last night and didn't get back to the school in time for the first rotation. But he'll see them tonight.

Fraternity #2 - Overall, he wasn't really impressed with these guys. They mostly sat around and watched a football game and ate pizza. Not that he hates those things, but he really wanted to actually get some info 'bout the fraternity. Also - one of the brothers thought it would be a good idea to keep the pizza warm by puting in the oven...in the box...at 350 degrees! So that house managed to start a small fire in the kitchen. Lovely.

Fraternity #3 - A suprise out of left field. Traditionally these guys are known as being "hicks". But he said that house was defintely at the top of his list. He had great conversations and truly enjoyed the fact that all of the guys dressed up for the first rounds. He also said that this house was immaculate (cleanliness wise). All of the houses are regular houses off campus, so he was impressed that the guys managed to clean. He thinks that he could definetely fit in here. The guy that led his group around was from this house and he really liked him.

Fraternity #4 - Another house that he didn't really like. He said that he felt they were a little "fake". They only wanted to talk about themselves, how much they were spending on rush, and they had pictures of famous alumni all over their house. Only the alumni didn't graduate from this school - it was just famous "national" alumni. :confused:

Fraternity #5 - Whew. He said everybody was getting kinda tired right 'bout now. I laughed cause I rushed at a school with 14 sororities! But, overall, he's got a great impression of this house. The guys were really knowledgable 'bout the fraternity (national and local stuff), really into their grades (after all...it is college), and really into learning more 'bout the guys that were rushing. I think it helps a little that he's already done a couple of things with this house but still, he liked em.


Done for now I guess. I should have some more updates tonight when he gets home from second rounds. Also - Wednesday is open night (pick the houses you wanna go to), Thursday is Pref dinner (lol - guys with a pref dinner), Friday is another open night, and Saturday, the guys can receive theirs bids (is that what guys call em?!?!) And - they can receive two bids on Saturday and simply pick from those.

Lemme know if this is boring or if there's anything else that you wanna know.

marissa

Hey! We do a pref dinner and its very nice thank you very much. lol.

Hell with guys, you can get 3 or more bids...but I dont know how a guy could make a good impression on that many houses, enough to get more than 3 bids (we generally dont bid someone unless they have been to at LEAST 2 functions and they meet our pre-established critera).

Keep us up to date. us guys need to exert some control up in here. Come on boys...represent... lol

I am interested in how its all going.

Another question.. Why is he rushing? Were you an influence? Just curious. If we can understand whay a guy rushes, them we can market towards that.

lifesaver,

lol. yah i was a little bit of an influence. he never really had a great opinion of greek life until i joined Alpha Gamma Delta!!!!!! even after i moved, i've still managed to get way involved. he thinks that he'd like something like that too. plus he had three brothers growing up and kind of misses that whole guy thing. also, he likes the networking possiblities and already knew a few of the guys from one of the houses. so several reasons i guess.

other than that, i think the pref dinner is a great idea. it's so nice to see and hear 'bout fraternities doing "nice, formal" things. i'm sooooooo looking forward to seeing how tonight went for him.

marissa

hahah. The upshot for you is that now, you get to get back into the swing of things, new member ceremony dinners, date dashes, formals...see you thought you left all that behind at your home chapter...or was this a ruse to get back into it all, hummmmm. Just kidding. lol Kinda cool tho. Anyway, fill us in on it all.

I love this, thanks so much Marissa for sharing his story! Good for him!

Is the Pref dinner invite only? Can he only attend one Pref dinner or a couple of them? Is the entire week no girls no alcohol or just the opening night? How does he like the process so far?

I know fraternity recruitment is a totally different beast than sorority recruitment, but I like seeing how they have to meet all the fraternities on his campus, wherever it may be :) Nothing wrong with meeting them all, I think it's cool.

Christin

Best of luck to your fiance!

My boyfriend is going through rush in the spring (school policy), but right now he's "getting the feel" for all of the fraternities, which is just his excuse for attending their parities.

Again, my very best wishes to your fiance!

XOXO,
Annie.

I'm really interested in your posts too! Thanks to you and your BF for sharing!

Lifesaver,

I know that on my campus, women have a lot to do with fraternity rush, especially because we have deferred rush for both IFC and Panhel. We meet and make friends with freshman guys and introduce them to our pals in the fraternities. I like to say that we dump 'em on the doorstep and the members take it from there.

For example, my bestest friend is a year behind me in school. I became great friends my freshman year with the gentlemen of FKT, who are a lot like this bestest friend. When springtime rolled around and he made his decision on colleges, that he would be coming to LU with me, I pulled out a picture of him over at the house and said, "Okay, boys, this is my bestest friend and he'd fit in great here. He'll be a comsci major and on the swim team and playing in orchestra and jazz. Keep an eye out for him." When he got there in the fall, I introduced him to a few of the guys, one of whom became his big. They took it from there, and he rushed only because of the Phi Tau boys.

So encourage your ladies to send boys your way, and by all means, return the favour. That's my 400 lire.

~KKC

okay ya'll. round two. last night was still a rotation round, so he actually got to visit all five houses. However, it was only for 30 minutes this time.

Fraternity #1 - This is the house he didn't get to visit monday night. Here, he had some subs/hoagies and played some ping-pong with the brothers. He said they had a great house, but the guys were pretty young (my fiance is 24 now) and that they really reminded him of his youngest brother. :confused: He also said that they had a lot of members and that it felt kinda like an assembly line when he was meeting all of them. He said he thought that he'd like a smaller chapter where he could get to know all of the guys really well.

Fraternity #2 - This is the house that caused the pizza fire last time. He said that this house was just okay. They had a couple of alums from '69 and '71 over there who made short little speeches. My fiance is former military and he didn't like the idea of "draft dodgers" speaking to everybody. I tried to explain to him that all fraternities had members during the Vietnam years, but he said "those guys aren't my hero's and I don't respect them, so I didn't really want to hear them speak". Other than that, no fires tonight and the guys, overall, weren't bad.

Fraternity #3 - Still in his top two! He had some more great conversations. These guys remind him of his best friend in high school. Would feel at home here even though most of their majors are Ag science and Ag business. Wonders if he can get a bid if he's a bio major and chem minor? Other than that, he helped one of the brothers with his chemistry homework and had a great time. After all of the rounds were over, he went back to this house (to get his car) but ended up talking and hanging out for 'bout a half-hour.

Fraternity #4 - I wish that I could find something nice to say 'bout this house, but he hated it. Apparently, two of the guys in the house were badmouthing other houses on the first night (he didn't tell me that originally). So he spent a lot of time avoiding those guys, cause he thought it was really rude. They also had an alum speaker who spoke about how great the chapter is, how they're building a new house, how great their GPA is, and how they NEVER talk bad 'bout other fraternities. Well, being the outspoken individual that my fiance is (kinda like me actually), he went up to the alum after the speech and told him that his boys DO speak bad 'bout other fraternities, pointed out the guys, and said he really didn't think it was appropriate for them to make the alum look like a liar. Those guys apologized after the alum got done speaking to him but all my fiance could say was - "last year 'bout this time, one of your brothers invited my fiance to a party. when she told him that she wanted to bring me, her fiance, that guy told her that it was 'invitation only' and that he was sorry". Apparently the brother that he was talking to could only be like "man i'm sorry, sometimes you get a couple of bad apples". Well, my fiance told him that he didn't want to associate with bad apples and that his fiance prolly didn't either. He doesn't think he'll get invited back to this house. Ah well. He didn't like them, but he said he felt better once he left the house.

Fraternity #5 - Still a top also. Tonight they had some subs and played poker at the house. These guys are "pretty cool" and he thinks he'd fit in here. One of the guys gave him his cell number to get in touch with him. He really hit it off with this guy. He said it's kinda weird going through a house where you already know a a lot of people. Cause the conversations are a little different and it's a little relaxed but a little tense too. Fun fun.


So - he narrowed it down to number 3 and number 5. Tomorrow is open night and number three is going to a putt putt/batting cages/go cart place. Number 5 is having a bbq and bowling thingy. He's checking 'bout if he can go to both, cause he really likes 'em both. I told him to go with his heart and be happy. And pick a group that you would be proud to call your brothers. Soooooooo...we'll see how tonight goes and hopefully I'll have some more information for ya'll. Sorry that was so long. Gawd, I can't imagine if I'd known 'bout this place when I went through rush.


edited to answer these questions -

[Is the Pref dinner invite only? Can he only attend one Pref dinner or a couple of them? Is the entire week no girls no alcohol or just the opening night? How does he like the process so far? ]

Pref dinner is invite only - he can get more than one invite, but it would be difficult to do more than one. However, I think that it IS possible to do two. The entire week is girl and alcohol free. I thought that was nice. And - so far he doesn't mind the process. In his own words - "there's only five of em and this way I'm really sure about the ones I DON'T like." Lovely huh? Also, had they not had to visit all five houses - " I never would have met the _______ house (fraternity number 3), so that's cool".




marissa

Yep, ladies are strictly forbidden at our campus during the 5 days of formal recruitment. They are really strict about it too. Back in the day I used to enjoy haveing the ladies at our functions dressed up in cocktail dresses serving snacks, making out nametags, etc. Oh well.... They really enforce that stuff too now.

I cant begin to tell you HOW valueable a lady is in the informal recruitment process. I am sure a third of our our members are brothers because a female friend of the chapter has nuged them in our direction. Also, if we are unsure of what a PNM is thinging of our org, or where he stands in regards to recruitment, a female friend is an asset. They can find out for us and REPORT to us. MUCH THANKS TO THE LADIES WHO HELP OUT!!

As it gets closer for him to make a decision, PLEASE have him inquire about the chapters policies, risk management, academic standing withthe school, new member policies, etc. Because they can be a great group of guys he likes, and gets along with, but if they are a group that gets shut down next year for risk management violations, then it all was for naught.

I guess I am just saying that if all else is equal, or near so, then judge on the merits of the chapter.

sorry these take me so long to update. on to round three. round three for the guys was "open night" they still had an IFC liason but it was pretty much just go and do something. fraternity #3 decided to go play putt putt and go-carts, and fraternity #5 went bowling, had a BBQ, and watched a movie.

fraternity #3 - he went here first...and had a blast!!! i can't believe how much one fraternity has done to change his opinion of greek life. he said one of his favorite things 'bout this group is that they're hard-working AND they can let loose. he was gone for quite awhile last night and apparently they paid for everything. they went out and got something to eat afterwards and he was really impressed by their table manners (lol) and their overall politeness. one of the brothers let a cuss word slip at the table and another brother told him to knock it off cause there were families around. i'd go into more detail 'bout putt putt, but let's just say he had a great time. their pref dinner is tonight and he's really looking forward to it.

fraternity #5 - he actually spent so much time with #3 that he never made it back over to #5. i felt kinda bad 'bout that cause i wanted him to see as much as possible, but if he's happy, then i'm happy! he e-mailed one of the brothers apologizing and also apoligizing because he won't be able to make it to their pref dinner either (he has to work til 'bout 5.30 and their pref starts at 4.30)

so. . . oh well. i think he still likes this group a lot, but he likes #3 more. so in his own words, "if i don't get a bid from [#3], i'd pledge [#5] in a heartbeat...but i really want [#3].

so i'll let ya'll know how pref dinner goes sometime tonight or tomorrow.

marissa

Pref is tonight? Hope everything goes well for him!

I'm rooting for number 3 :D From the way it sounds, he's definitely going to get a bid.

You were a very good influence on him :)

squirrely girl,
Thank you so much for this terrific rush thread! You're a great writer and your boyfriend is being very open-minded and yet very careful in his decision. Good luck to him, and please keep us updated. Thanks again,
violets
Go #3! (no cursing at the table? how can you not love them?)

seriously! most people wrote off #3 because they're kinda hickish. he was actually the only rushee there last night (they do really well through COB and there are only 'bout 35 guys going through rush for five fraternities). but he went in there with an open mind and discovered that he liked them more than the other "traditional" groups because they were more people oriented than number oriented. i sooooooooo hope he enjoys himself tonight.

marissa