Last week I visited a friend and caught up on about six month’s worth of life. I hadn’t really talked to her since I left my position as Executive Director of a local non-profit organization. It was a great job and I loved the people for whom I worked. However, coordinating the same three conferences a year made me feel like I was living the movie Groundhog Day. My passion is writing and talking about the history of Greek-letter Organizations (GLOs) and how that history connects with the present and future of these organizations. It was time to follow my passion. Luckily, I have a very understanding husband and family who encouraged me to take this leap of faith.
Telling my computer illiterate friend what I am now doing was a bit challenging (a blog? what’s a blog?). In response, she told me about her sorority experience. She is a charter member of a National Panhellenic Conference (NPC) sorority chapter, but she admitted she hadn’t done much with the organization since graduating in the 1950s. My friend told me how her 70+ year-old sister recently confided in her that one of her life’s most devastating moments was not getting an invitation to join her sister’s/my friend’s sorority.
I did not ask if her sister had her heart set on joining only that sorority and did not consider any other. The hurt was deep and nothing was going to change it, even though the event took place more than half-a-century ago.
In the ensuing decades, “rush” has become “recruitment.” Excitement for recruitment season is beginning to grow at colleges and universities all over the country and Canada. I think it’s inevitable that a few women will be as disappointed as my friend’s sister; it would be wonderful if I am proven wrong.
My advice to those who are going through recruitment this year.
Be open to all organizations. Believe me when I tell you that you will have the same experiences in any of the 26 NPC organizations. When you strip away the colors, badges, symbols, songs, flowers, etc. you will see that we have much more in common than we have differences. The values and basic tenets of the organizations are very similar.
Be yourself and be true to yourself. Don’t try to be someone you’re not. Be the very best version of yourself that you can be. That said, remember that just because your mom, sister, grandmother, or cousin twice removed belonged to XYZ, it doesn’t mean that you need to follow in her footsteps. While there may have been a time long ago when being a legacy meant an automatic bid, now some chapters have two, three and four times the amount of legacies going through recruitment than the number of women (quota) to whom they can offer bids.
Be hospitable and gracious. Do not talk up or down any organization with the other women going through recruitment. When talk turns to gossip, be the one who stops it. Remember that golden rule; if you can’t say something nice, then don’t say anything at all.
Be at Bid Day. See the process to the end. If you are not invited back to the chapter you had your heart set on, pick yourself up, dust yourself off and visit the chapters which invited you back. Don’t just drop out because the scenario did not play out the way you wanted it to. Sometimes things work out for the better despite the fact that they aren’t as we had anticipated them. I could fill a book with stories of women who could never have envisioned themselves in VWX chapter and yet, on graduation day, they couldn’t imagine being anywhere else.
(c) Fran Becque, www.fraternityhistory.com, 2014. All Rights Reserved. If you enjoyed this post, please sign up for updates. Also follow me on twitter @GLOHistory and Pinterest www.pinterest.com/glohistory/
