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A New Bedlam 2015 Recruitment

Some background:

I apologize for the break since announcing that I would share my daughter’s (we will call her Libby) recruitment story at Oklahoma State University. I am sharing the university because “Bedlam” makes it evident, and because she is an active new member of an amazing chapter that is the perfect place for her.

For the record, like all moms, I think Libby is a pretty “special snowflake”. She attended a very competitive high school, had a very high GPA, and was involved in many activities (athletic, academic, service, and church-oriented). She was selected for several wonderful organizations at OSU before arriving on campus, and was very excited to begin recruitment. I think one of the most wonderful things about Libby is that she does not see herself as a “special snowflake”. She sees herself as an average 18 year old who likes music and crafting. She was just thrilled to be starting a new adventure at OSU.

Libby is a cute girl and had put together a recruitment wardrobe that consisted of clothes and jewelry ranging from a $20 romper (cute and appropriate) to some higher end designer clothes and shoes that SHE liked and SHE felt confident wearing. She wanted to be herself during recruitment and wear things that represented her style (not necessarily mine, but it’s not my recruitment!). So, word to future PNMs: be appropriate - and if Lilly and Tory aren’t you…don’t wear it! We were careful to make sure that everything she planned to wear fit her appropriately and was tasteful – designer or not.

Libby is a legacy to two chapters that are not on OSU’s campus, and a direct legacy to a chapter that is on OSU’s campus. Her cousin was also in a chapter at OSU, so she went into recruitment knowing quite a bit about the chapters in which she had relatives. She was raised around and by several generations of sorority women and knows that NOTHING is ever a sure thing, and that there is beauty in the differences (lots of aunts, cousins, and friends in different sororities). She approached recruitment with happiness, energy, and a very open mind. We had discussed possible cuts, potential disappointments, how the legacy chapter may or may not be the perfect place for her, and that she needed to try to find something about every single chapter that she liked. We also discussed “tent talk” and she promised that she would try to keep an open mind, ignore the “tiers”, and find a place that she could call home.

I will preface this story by saying that I am completely impressed with OSU Panhellenic. Libby truly had a wonderful time and would have been very happy in several of the houses on campus. Decisions were very hard for her to make as recruitment continued.

Libby kept a Google doc that she shared with me through the first two rounds of recruitment. She then became so busy that I was left to piece together the rest of the story. Because we love 30A in Florida, the 13 chapters at OSU will be coded by the names of the Beaches of South Walton:

Perdido Key
Navarre
Ft. Walton
Miramar
Grayton
Rosemary
Seaside
Blue Mountain
Dune Allen
Alys
Santa Rosa
Watercolor
Seagrove Beach

Round 1 (Open house) was divided into 2 days. They would visit 7 houses one day, and six the next.

Coming up (today!): Open Houses: Day 1