When is your campus' Rush period?

[lifesaver]

I was just wondering when is your school's rush/recruitment period? What are some of the traditions at your campus associated with this time period?

At my campus IFC rush is going on now. For the first two weeks of school we have Fraternity Forum. All the fraternities set up their rush tables on the quad and distribuite info to prospects. It's the big deal to get the best spots by the doors to the lecture halls. it's a big pissing contest. Anyway, then we have fraternity Orientation on the second Tuesday of the semester. The prospects show up to the Banquet Hall in the Student Union and meet for an hour with the IFC and watch a NIC video on fraternities and the IFC answers their questions. Then an hour later the fraternity members come in to the room and stand at their pre-set up tables in the banquet hall. Each fraternity gets 10 minutes to make a boring presentation on their fraternity and then it is a free for all on the prospective members.

Rush evens last the rest of the week until Sunday. Each fraternity pretty much does their own thing. (dry, of couse) After that is silence until 1PM monday. On sunday night all the houses vote to extend bids and turn them into the IFC office by 9AM on Monday morning. IFC alphabetises them, and prospects can come get their bids between 10AM and 12 noon. AT 1PM we have STEPS. (Completely stolen from Southwest Texas State University, where our former Greek advisor came from).

The STEPS program is where the new "signees" publicly declare which organisation they have joined. It happen on the steps outside the Library, the physical/emotional center point of our campus. All the greeks gathewr there and all the prospects who signed bids are brought up on the stps one by one and over the PA they say their names and who they signed with then run down the stairs to meet their brothers who are cheering for them. No one but the IFC knows who signed what bid, and since the fraternities are on "silence" we are not allowed to talk to the prospects to find out. The lists are under lock and key until STEPS.

Anyway, it's pretty cool, but like everyone else, you are totally sick of recruitment after.

Our Panhellenic Rush is pretty standard, thanks to the "big green book". Three days of rush parties for four sororities and then bid day. It is done over a Friday, Saturday and Sunday and Bid Day is the following Monday Morning. We don't have houses so the sorority Rush Parties are held on campus. The girls are all into themes and the rooms look great. All the fraternities show up to help the girls decorate and tear down/set up after the events are over. kinda like a really informal mixer and maxes HUGE points with the ladies.

So what are some of ya'lls traditions? Just wondering.

[LXAAlum]

This isn't regarding traditions, but timing, and I was wondering if other campuses had better results than what happened on the local campus here:

Rush was the first week of classes, and enrollment is over 10,500 this year. However, just over 50 men registered to rush seven fraternities. This is not good for the greek system.

I believe holding the rush during the first week of class is counter-productive - freshmen have just moved into the dorms, they are still learning the campus and town layout, they have roomate(s) to get to know, they have books and supplies to get, they have the first week of class jitters, and probably many other adjustment issues to deal with as well.

If rush were to be held the third or even fourth week, I imagine results would be much better - freshmen and other interested prospective Greeks would have more time to get acclimated, and, learn about some of the houses more prior to the rush experience, which, let's face it, doesn't give a "true" representation of chapters - it's too staged.

Thoughts?

[ZChi4Life]

I don't know all the traditions and so forth w/ the IFC/NPC groups on my campus b/c I'm a new greek

But about Rush starting later...I do know that they have moved the IFC/NPC rush until the third week of class. I think this is good. It does give the freshmen time to move in, get settled, go to classes for a while, THEN they can find out about greek life.

My sorority is not in the NPC/Panhel or whatever. We are independent. But we do have Rush that only lasts a week (in comparison to the NPC which lasts 3 weeks! Whew!). Anyway, our Rush Week starts on the 17th! I can't wait! Since we just established our chapter in Nov of 99, we haven't really established our own chapter traditions outside of the sorority traditions. But our Rush is pretty simple though. There are 3 days of just programs: an informational, a time management workshop and a self defense workshop. Then the next 3 days are actual Rush programs where we do fun activities and stuff. Our last day is a formal event (which I can't go into detail about just in case ) and then we vote and give bids after that event. It's pretty cool and to the point.


[This message has been edited by ZChi4Life (edited September 07, 2000).]

[SilverTurtle]

My school was small. Fall rush was optional and wasn't until several weeks into school. Freshman are not allowed to rush their first semester. (Only transfer students and upperclassmen). So a lot of the orgs. don't participate in fall rush.

Everyone participates in Spring rush, which starts almost right after Christmas break. And everyone on campus is eligible.

The school wants freshman to have an idea of what school is about, time management, etc. before getting involved in greek life. Of course, they do learn the reputations of various GLOs before rush. But they also have the opportunity to speak with any members and get to know them for an entire semester before hand. It seems to be an okay system.

I should mention, we don't have any NPC or IFC GLOs on campus. While the local sororities rush structure is similar to that of the NPC, it's still a lot different from the big formal rushes I've learned about here.

As far as traditions go, there really isn't any. Rush is 3 weeks long. Bids are turned in by prospectives on a Friday afternoon. Some of the sororities would have brunch with their new members on Sat. morning and then go to a school basketball game. Everyone had their induction (or whatever they called it) ceremony on the following Sunday night (this is when new member ed, or pledging, begins). Other than that, rush traditions just depend on each individual chapter.

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SilverTurtle@greekchat.com
Phi Beta Fraternity
Phi chapter

[Siobhan]

Damn that "Green Book". Between Panhel and the IFC UBC's Rush is a Greek extravaganza. Rush kicks off with the Panhel/IFC Rush booth at Imagine UBC (1st Year Orientation). After that Panhel has a booth and the fraternities set up individual booths alongside the IFC booth.
Panhel Rush kicks off this Monday with the Panhel Picnic. This is an opportunity for the Rushees to meet all Panhellenic members and find out a bit about sorority life in general. Wednesday (sept 13th) is 1st tours when all rushees meet all 7 sororities. Sept 16th is our 1st invitationals where the rushees are invited back to up to 5 sororities. The following Wednesday is 2nd invites where the rushees return to up to 3, and then the saturday is Pref Parties (or Final D's). And sunday sept 24 is bids day

The Fraternities start about a week later; I was a rush hostess for Sigma Chi last year so I got to experience the IFC rush (which was a neat opportunity). Each fraternity is allowed up to 5 girls to help out (anymore is considered a Rush infraction). The 1st rush is dry, and is fairly casual (actually all of them seem casual compared to panhel rush). I can't remeber if the second day is wet or dry. The 3rd day is wet, and after the rush party is over (about 10pm) all the sororities are invited to each house party. This is a lot of fun because this Wednesday is the 1st sorority meeting with our new members. The fourth day they have a formal dinner at someone's house or a country club. Their bids day is held at the SUB and afterwards is the Bids Day Bzzr Garden for all Greek Members. That night is probably one of the best nights I have experienced as a Greek Member - Serenade!! This is were all the sororities go to eacyh fraternity house and sing to each other and socialize. At the end of the night the entire Greek system gathers in one fraternity for a big party.

So there you have it UBC's Rush, commencing with the Panhel Picnic Sept 11th, and ending with the iFC bids day and serenade on Oct 11th.

[This message has been edited by Siobhan (edited September 07, 2000).]

[mwedzi]

Siobahn and Ariesrising, are you two talking about the same school?