FYI Disappointed Moms

[Lightning Bug!]

Dear disappointed moms,

Your daughter is the whole package, and you do not understand why she didn't get a bid. Other posters remind you that pretty much all the girls going through recruitment are the whole package and then some. They also remind you that your daughter should have (if she didn't) maximized her options in terms of being open to joining any chapter at a competitive school.

I see a common thread in your posts, or perhaps what I see is lack of a common realization. Especially at state schools, there is a great deal of networking going on that you aren't seeing. If you look at the Facebook pages of active members, often they are friends with PNMs months, if not years, before they go through recruitment. They know them from camp, church, school, or family. Their moms may know each other. Or some super helpful alumna calls up her friends who are close to the actives in XYZ house at Big SEC School and puts in a good word. You must also keep in mind that, at some chapters, a good portion of the new member class spent several weekends their senior year going to College Town and hanging out with girls from their high schools in part so they could meet girls in sororities or going as dates to their older (college aged) boyfriend's fraternity formal, where they meet sorority members.

Now many girls go through recruitment successfully without networking, but for every girl at a big SEC school who does this, there are two more who happen to know, at least casually, 25% of the chapter before recruitment even begins. Sometimes this works against them, if they are prone to really trashy or bitchy shenanigans, but often it works for them. But the point is, if your daughter is coming from a small town or out of state to a state school, and she doesn't know a bunch of people in sororities already, then that may have been a factor in her recruitment results. And that isn't something to beat yourself up about. She probably was the total package, but networking worked against her.

Now this doesn't get her a bid, but hopefully it will give you perspective. Again, many girls do go through recruitment successfully without the benefit of networking. I did it as an out-of-stater at a state school. It was hard. I didn't know anybody at my school. Not a soul. My mother just didn't know anybody connected with my school, so all she could do was make sure I had recs to every house possible. I still got heavy cuts after the second round, including at one house where I was a double legacy AND the great grand-daughter of a member who had founded a chapter. I had the whole package to boot. I got cut, because even with recs, nobody knew me, and those actives already knew enough girls coming through to fill four pledge classes. Yes, that's right. A majority of the girls at that chapter went to one of three big high schools and were counselors at one of four major camps, and they knew enough girls from school and camp to fill FOUR pledge classes. At another house, I only got asked back to pref because it turned out that a girl from my high school, older than I, had transferred there and fought for me. At the house I pledged, I was a legacy through my mother, I had a rec from a member of the top leadership at the sorority's national level, and it was a house that took a lot of out of state girls. Now I could have gone to my state's big flagship school and had a much easier time with rush, since I had friends in about half the houses there, but I wanted to go to Out-of-State U, and I never regretted that decision.

It is hard going through recruitment. Nobody here can tell you why your daughter got cut from a certain house. And this is not a call for you to become creepy helimom and start friending random girls from XYZ house on Facebook or get your daughter to do so, unless she is in a position to do so (knows a bunch from camp or something) and just hasn't bothered to friend them; then it would be time to clue her in to the power of networking. Nor is this post meant to discourage moms of girls who don't have connections in sororities already - there are plenty of girls who successfully go through recruitment without the benefit of networking. But know that at some super-competitive state schools, networking is a big part of recruitment.

Best wishes.