Effects of the New Release Figures

[carnation]

Two things I've noticed that have happened with many, many PNMs we know as a result of the new release figures:

1. If you get cut by several of your favorites after first parties, you can very well end up pledging a "stronger" group than if you get your major cuts after second parties, when you had already cut a bunch yourself. We've known of far more people to drop out after heavy cuts after second parties because they didn't like their returns. Moral of the story: hang in there if you get dropped by a bunch after first parties.

2. At the really competitive schools, legacies have a hard time. Due to the numbers that many groups have to release, they very often release legacies of other houses (especially in-house) after first parties and if the legacy group releases the PNM, she's not left with many choices. I've personally seen this happen to about a dozen great girls in the last 2 years.

What are your observations?

[alum]

My D's Panhel does new release figures. It is definitely a detriment to be a legacy at the non-legacy houses. I remember reading on GC last year that Panhel registration asks the girls if they are legacies and only releasing the info to the legacy house. However, actual rec forms from the individual sororities ask which specific NPC groups with which the girl is a legacy. So the anonymity is gone.

At the school where I advise (VERY different school), Panhel lets girls re-add groups if the later rounds don't go well. So if a girl has to cut for Round 2 because she has too many invites and eliminates XYZ, and then has less than the max number of invites for round 3, she can put XYZ back on her list. I'm not sure how XYZ feels about that, but that's the rule.

[carnation]

Two years ago, I realized that legacy status was a definite problem when I saw a girl who would have been in demand anywhere else get cut from everywhere but 2 houses after first parties because she was an in-house legacy. Actually, she wanted to explore all the other groups but never got a chance. She had top grades, great activities, pretty, the whole thing, but everyone assumed she wanted her sister's group. She had a pretty lousy time during recruitment sitting in her room and waiting for everyone else to return from their 12 or so parties and go to her 2.

She pledged her sister's house and was okay with that but her mom says she will never forget the crummy time she had when she rushed.

[UGAalum94]

I always try to imagine this in terms of UGA, but it's hard to think of going from 18 to two if you have great grades, etc.

Don't some groups get to invite almost everyone back because their returns are lower? Wouldn't that mean that some groups would keep other groups' legacies too?

Well, in addition to discouraging girls from listing legacies on the rush application, maybe we should keep in mind the harm of listing legacies or rec. forms since we always want the girls we write recs for to have a great experience.

What are the highest percentages that "weaker" groups get to invite back?

[KSUViolet06]

The biggeest groups had to make substantial cuts of sometimes HALF or more of the women after first party. That was rough for recruitment in general because alot of women dropped out because they had their hearts set on being invited back there (not knowing the cuts the group had to make). Yes, they had to let go of substantial #'s of legacies too. That was rough too because girls are more likely to drop if they get cut by their legacy house.

Alphagamuga- The smallest group on our campus did not have to release anyone according to the figures. They released a few women anyway though I think.

[carnation]

I swear that when the rest of my daughters rush, we're leaving out the names of all the sororities they're legacies to. We'll make sure the legacy groups get several recs.

If they rush at Birmingham Southern, though, we might have to list the names of the legacy sororities for a laugh. I would really like to see the looks on the faces of the Panhellenic reps when they open the application and see that here's a girl who's a legacy to 4 of the 6 sororities, lol.

Anyway, lots of PNMs come over here for rush advice and I'm trying to think of a way to tell them--especially if there's a good chance they won't make the groups considered A-1 (and I know that ticks off some GCers but many PNMs here go into rush with a list of those) that they should hang onto some of the solid middle-of the road chapters for second parties. After the massive cuts after second parties, they may wish they could still go back to those but too late, they cut them after first because they wanted to go back to the "name" groups. I just can't think of how to phrase it because every rushee in the world starts out recruitment thinking that she'll have her choice of sororities.

[honeychile]

Originally Posted by carnation

Two years ago, I realized that legacy status was a definite problem when I saw a girl who would have been in demand anywhere else get cut from everywhere but 2 houses after first parties because she was an in-house legacy. Actually, she wanted to explore all the other groups but never got a chance. She had top grades, great activities, pretty, the whole thing, but everyone assumed she wanted her sister's group. She had a pretty lousy time during recruitment sitting in her room and waiting for everyone else to return from their 12 or so parties and go to her 2.

She pledged her sister's house and was okay with that but her mom says she will never forget the crummy time she had when she rushed.

That happened this year at one school, too, only it was a direct legacy, not in-house. Part of me understands that, with the Release figures, a chapter needs to make their best guess as to who would accept the invitations, yet the part of me who didn't go with her legacy chapter says, Give the PNM a chance to be her own person!

All that, and I think the Release Figures are wonderful!


Edited to avoid a double post:

Originally Posted by carnation

Anyway, lots of PNMs come over here for rush advice and I'm trying to think of a way to tell them--especially if there's a good chance they won't make the groups considered A-1 (and I know that ticks off some GCers but many PNMs here go into rush with a list of those) that they should hang onto some of the solid middle-of the road chapters for second parties. After the massive cuts after second parties, they may wish they could still go back to those but too late, they cut them after first because they wanted to go back to the "name" groups. I just can't think of how to phrase it because every rushee in the world starts out recruitment thinking that she'll have her choice of sororities.

Actually, prior to even going to college, it was so highly stressed to me that the sororities select the PNM, not the other way around, that I naively thought that anyone who wasn't in a sorority or fraternity had tried to get a bid, but didn't succeed!

[NUBlue&Blue]

Originally Posted by carnation

Two years ago, I realized that legacy status was a definite problem when I saw a girl who would have been in demand anywhere else get cut from everywhere but 2 houses after first parties because she was an in-house legacy. Actually, she wanted to explore all the other groups but never got a chance. She had top grades, great activities, pretty, the whole thing, but everyone assumed she wanted her sister's group. She had a pretty lousy time during recruitment sitting in her room and waiting for everyone else to return from their 12 or so parties and go to her 2.

She pledged her sister's house and was okay with that but her mom says she will never forget the crummy time she had when she rushed.

My daughter is going to the same school as her older sister and I hope this doesn't happen to her, too. They are two different people, but when you have to make cuts, unfortunately in-house legacies seem to be the first on the chopping block. I sure hope she gets the same chance to find the right place for her that her sister did...so while it's nice to have somebody pulling for you, there's also the negative side as well.

When I was in college we had two sisters in our house who were also legacies through their mother, and when their baby sister went through rush she went DG--it was such a SCANDAL!

[UGAalum94]

We should probably all point out any chance we get that maybe the girls should leave legacy information off the little resumes they often make for rec writers. You can't list on the recommendation what you don't know.

And maybe we should mention to the folks who we know write recs that it may not be helpful to pass along the information that we know about legacy status in other groups. I know I would try to avoid giving any information that would be harmful to the girl.

If for any reason you didn't think a girl was right for a particular chapter, noting her legacy status alone would seem like a weird way to make that clear.

NUBlue and Blue, will you list her status on the application or hope that people don't figure it out?

[NUBlue&Blue]

Actually, she is not going to UGA. Many of her friends are, though.

[UGAalum94]

I don't have any significant insight into how the releases play out, but is it true that groups are giving more snap bids now than they used to be?

If so, maybe it's time to revive the idea of regret with interest, so that girls can pick back up groups they had to cut and the groups can recover from unexpected no shows or drop outs faster.

I know that someone tried to explain to me that return rates and release numbers get messed up if the groups invite back people that didn't attend that round, but maybe they could be statistically carried though somehow, so that girls would have full parties again.

I always have to remind myself that the outcome for the girls probably isn't that different than it ever was. A group that releases a girl today after first or second round probably didn't actually give similar girls bids in the past.

It may be very true that things play out differently for legacies though. Maybe not revealing legacy status to anyone other than the legacy house is the way to go.

[Football Fan]

Alpha,
This is from an alumna of a California university. Chapters there are old and established. It may be just as competitive as at large SEC colleges. I really like the idea of Regret With Interest. I also like the practice mentioned in the thread of a pnm being able to pick up a chapter later.
Releasing 50% of the pnms after one meeting must be extremely difficult both on the houses and the girls who came with unrealistic expectations.

[UGAalum94]

I suspect it's terrible to have to release that many after first round and cut again by almost half after the second.

Someone who is the panhellenic advisor someplace really did walk me through how inviting back girls who weren't at your last party messes everything up (it's probably in one of the old recruitment threads from August or September), but maybe it could almost be like a waiting list for both sides: when girls who did go to second round indicate they aren’t coming back for third, either because they prefer other groups or because they dropped out, then girls who regretted with sincere interest who don’t have full parties could get the chance to go. Maybe this could happen for any group, regardless of previous return rates. Maybe there could be a way to "snap invite" back someone the group released if the group's returns failed to match previous projections and the girl had ranked the group high on her list. (Why do we let people snap bid girls they cut at the end of the process but not in the middle?)

I don’t think the girls should have to pick up groups they don’t want: I think that would hurt the groups. It’s nice for a girl to have full parties, but the groups need to be able to tell who is really interested too.

But that rare girl who gets invited back to second round everyplace at UGA cuts six houses after first party. She might not be at all interested in her bottom two or three, but I bet there wasn’t much difference between the chapter ranked 12 and the chapters ranked 13 and 14.

It’s one of the reasons why Carnation pointed out that it might be better to be cut hard after first because you don’t have to worry about accidentally cutting a chapter that you realize in hindsight you might have joined.

[TxGirl]

The idea is that each chapter has to release a percentage that should get them to the ideal number of PNM's to have back for that round.

So say there are 100 PNMs, 4 chapters on campus, 3 rounds (open, 1st invitational and pref) and quota is usually about 18, PNMs go to 4 3 2. Chapter total is 100

This is what we know from historicall data (meaning the last three years - just like old release figures):

For the 1st invited the historical return rate is: ABC- 98%. XYZ - 93%, MNO - 80% and TUV - 35%.

For Pref we know that the historical return rate is: ABC - 90%, XYZ - 97%; MNO - 90% and TUV - 15%

Historically - ABC and XYZ always make quota; MNO makes quota or misses by a couple and TUV never makes quota and is usually matches in the single digits. ABC, XYZ and MNO are all at total after bid match and only if they have women that don't accept their bid or they miss quota can they extend any bids. TUV is never at total and is continuously COBing throughout the year.

***This is not a specific campus. Actually, I can think of 4 campuses that I've worked with that would fit into this scenerio! : )***

Old release figures might say that ABC get to invite back 80 women. Do they to invite 80 to their second round when we know they have 98% of women accept? Of course not. Do they need to invite 70? I'd say no to that too.

Even if you go with the 2x quota for pref knowning that quota is about 18 that means they only need 36 invited to pref. If you go backwards using their returns that means that you need to invite 40 to pref to get 36. So they would probably be able to invite 45. This means that they have at least that many at the 1st invitational, but they probably have more like 50 at the round. So to get 50 at their round they would have need to invite 51 PNMs. This means that they had to release 49 PNMs after the open house round or 49%. So ABC starts with 100 releases to 49 releases to 40 and gets quota.

Problem with this scenario is that it still figures in the "old school" 2x quota at your pref events. With RFM you don't get that. We know that ABC always makes quota. We also know that they historically match quota within the first 25 PNM's on their bid lists. This means that they don't really need to have 36 at their events to get quota, they really only need 25. Giving them 28 (25 + a little cushion) and going backwards gets you a completely different set of numbers.

So ABC starts with 100 releases to 43 releases to 31 and usually still gets quota.

This is a 57% release of PNM's for the top chapter after the open house round of events and is not unusual for a chapter with this type of historical data. It also means that 9 women (or HALF a new member class) were release that probably wouldn't have been using the old release figures.

Someone wanted to know if snap bids were higher. I can't say for sure, but I would say that with the campuses I worked with they weren't any higher than normal. I think it's more WHO is snap bidding (meaning they didn't make quota) then how many are being snapped.

It's like 33girl said. PNM's need to think of sorority recruitment the same way they think of college recruitment. You need to apply to a variety of colleges to make sure that you have choices.

[UGAalum94]

So is a 60% after first round now normal for the top chapters at a campus?

And the case is now that groups don't get to invite quota times the number of events at all the rounds?