The commencement of fraternity rush on Thursday evoked strong emotions from the potential new members participating. Last night, the men only had two hours to visit all eleven Interfraternity Council chapters. Luckily, the fraternity chapters and potential new members had received plenty of advice from their friends and sorority counterparts who had recently completed Formal recruitment. The Spoke had the opportunity to interview several PNMs and fraternity men to hear about their recruitment experience.
First-year Lucas Lafayette was concerned about his timing strategy entering the night.
“Oh my god, frat rush is so stressful. I heard that how much time you spend in each house seriously affects whether you get a bid, but no one told me that you had to time yourself. Even though I’ve only been two frat parties in total, I’m thinking that I’m ‘ATO or no go,’ but I just spent 30 minutes awkwardly standing around at Pike because I had no idea when I was supposed to leave. Now my entire night is totally off. How am I supposed to stay on schedule without a watch?” Lucas said.
Sophomore Jordan Ortiz told the Spoke that he struggled to plan his wardrobe for the upcoming week’s rush events. “First of all, I nearly panicked when I couldn’t find the shirt we all have to wear on the first night in my pile of wrinkled clothes, but luckily I found it in time for tonight. Now I’m worried about which pair of blue jeans I should wear. I don’t want to repeat outfits, but how much variation can I create with pants and a shirt?”
Jordan is ‘AEPi or die,’ a term which which means that he would be pretty bummed if he didn’t get invited back next round. “I really liked their tumblr page. They seem to enjoy weed and holding flags on the beach, so we have shared interests” said Jordan.
Walking out of SAE’s house, first-year Frank Fretata confided to the Spoke that he might be released from recruitment.
“Shit, I accidentally talked about girls, one of the five Gs. You know, the five Gs kind of precludes literally all normal conversation topics. What conversation doesn’t cover girls, gin, god, gold, or Newt Gingrich?” said Frank. “What am I supposed to do, tell them my major and what my hobbies are? That would be so lame,” said Frank.
Frank is ‘Kappa Sig, or no thanks I’m good.’ “I really like their colors, red, white and green. As an Italian American, their flag seems familiar. Plus, I know like two of the brothers, so I’m practically guaranteed a bid,” reported Frank. “I hope the Greek Neutral guys let that mention slide, I’m really looking forward to everyone calling me Frittata. Frat life is going to be great.”
Recruitment is also an ordeal for the fraternities participating. Each organization has to spend considerable time and money differentiating themselves from other houses during each round.
SAE reportedly expends significant effort on their decor during rush. “We’re really worried that our twinkly lights aren’t going to come in time for the last round,” said rush chair Jason Schwartz. “Between hanging 100 strands of lights and spray painting the lion black, we’ve got a lot to do.”
Twinkly lights are apparently an integral component of decor for every house. “Pref round just wouldn’t be the same without them. Nothing says commitment to brotherhood like twinkly lights,” said PIKE president Lawrence Brown.
However, some houses are more confident about their success. Sig Chi president Robert Canton feels assured that they’ll have ‘a badass pledge class,’ no matter what. Explaining his confidence, Robert reports that while at Maggie’s last week, “all the girls were telling me that ‘all the guys want a bid from Sig Chi,’ so we have this in the bag. Now all we have to really worry about is the weather during Run the Row and what pose we’re going to do in our pictures in front of the house with the new bros.”
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