<p>You would be shocked at what I am wearing now.:)</p>
<p>Wow, the guy in the wheel chair in college with spina bifida that we laughed
with through our business class, pretty sure he didn’t follow any kind old
decorum although he was always showered, shave, nicely dressed and mostly he was
fun, friendly, kind and helpful and I was glad to call him my friend.</p>
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<p>This is where I guess my personal experience with greek life differs from so many who post here. One of my good friends had some type of disability & was in a wheelchair … not sure if he had spina bifida, CP, MD, or whatever as it never came up … but he was in a fraternity. He came to all the fraternity parties, and the girls danced with him at the parties. No one ever thought twice, and when I say no one … I mean no one who was in a fraternity, in a sorority, or in neither (all attended fraternity parties at this school).</p>
<p>So for me … I didn’t experience the negatives others have. Every school is different. Every group is different. Every student who chooses to rush or not rush is different. Are there negatives? Sure looks like it, sometimes. But if a girl thinks she might be interested, she can rush & judge for herself. And yes, mom can forewarn her, just in case.</p>
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<p>That pretty much describes the kind of clothes I had. Still, I had to buy them myself. Whether or not my wardrobe would have been appropriate to sorority life at UT in the 80’s is debatable. I probably would have felt out of place whether or not that feeling was imposed upon me by the sorority itself. Anyway, a moot point as I could not afford the dues (roughly $150.00 a month PLUS all the extras-party pictures, special occasion dresses, meal plan, etc.). As I said, before, nothing unfair about that. If you can’t afford an activity, that doesn’t mean it’s unfair, it just means you can’t afford it. I couldn’t join the ski club either, because they took ski trips several times a year-I couldn’t afford it.</p>
<p>Sorority dues at my daughter’s school are approx. $2300 per year, plus meal plan, and extras. That’s going to eliminate a lot of girls. That’s no different than a lot of things in life.</p>
<p>I agree with some other posters here. One of the biggest disadvantages of being in a sorority is the harsh judgment imposed by others-people who will assume without even getting to know you that you are simply a cariacture, the stereotypcial mean, superficial, rich, elitist, arrogant sorority girl. She definitely exists, but obviously there are a whole lot of wonderful girls out there who are members of sororities. You simply can’t make assumptions about people without getting to know them as individuals. You can’t reduce them to only one thing-sorority girl or independent. There is a whole lot more to me than my non-Greek status, and the same goes for girls who do choose that option.</p>
<p>Sorry, I did think the email went to the girls who were going through rush. I still think it is a good idea for all the houses to honestly describe their values and priorities before recruitment, so girls can have a really good idea of which houses fit them.</p>
<p>CCsurfer’s daughter seems to be very grounded and is having a great experience which probably represents that had by most girls. But the sorority culture seems to vary enormously from school to school and chapter to chapter. Prospective members should be made aware of that by the houses themselves.</p>
<p>I thought the Pi Phi email was hilarious. We didn’t receive anything like that from my sorority rush-chairman in the 80’s, but I wish we had, and that I had saved it, because it would have been like a fashion time-capsule. It probably would have gone something like this: Make sure your hair is big, and don’t forget the hairspray, lots of it; shoulder pads make the outfit; Laura Ashley dresses are a must, as are stirrup pants; as for the dress-up night, taffeta looks good on everybody …</p>
<p>Several caveats:
- I haven’t read the whole thread, 2) I didn’t go to a school with a greek system/life and 3) I have boys, so my input here is limited. So why am I posting? Because if I were attending rush, I would appreciate a fair warning of what clothes would be seriously declasse. If studnents fret so much over what to wear to an interview, I can only imagine the worry over what to/not to wear to a rush party. While some of the things on that email list fall under “well, DUH”, none the less, I think, all things considered, it was likely with good intent and more helpful than not. JMO</p>
<p>depends how interested your daughter is in having a diverse college experience. If diversity isn’t important, then socially she would probably find value. </p>
<p>I too have trouble getting over early exposure to the greek system. My daughter isn’t applying to any school where “greeks” dominate the social scene.</p>
<p>Also, there is an assumption that your daughter would be easily accepted by a sorority, so no issue about having her feelings hurt, etc. For the vast majority of girls who don’t fit into the system, joining isn’t always their choice.</p>
<p>Frankly, I think we could find better ways of finding common ground with one another to create a community and social network.</p>
<p>I too found the Cornell Pi Phi email hilarious. I would not be surprised if it was a hoax.</p>
<p>I had to repost after reading more of the comments above.</p>
<p>Is this really the message of success we want to transmit to young women? It’s about a collective view of fashion and style? Really?</p>
<p>I am a successful business owner in a creative industry in a large city. I hire young people all the time. I’m looking for smarts, diversity, social skills, creativity, not clones.</p>
<p>This sounds very stepford wives to me, and frankly, a little scary.</p>
<p>College should be about opening your social world, not closing it. Taking risks, not looking for a tiny community that will keep you from recognizing the larger one.</p>
<p>Actually, for my D, who joined a sorrority, it WAS an opening up of her social world, since she is artsy and very free-spirited but shy and has spent most of her life up til college in the theater world. She wanted more and she wanted to just be able to have fun and go to some parties. Some of you are making this into a life altering thing, and it isn’t really any different than joining the library board, or the museum board, honestly, as adults.</p>
<p>As for girls who don’t have clothes, I know in my D’s hall during rush, the girls who had clothes and were good with make-up and hair were helping the other girls find things to wear in other people’s closets. I know my D did at least four girls’ outfits for them…and she’s a big vintage shopper. But, she calls the kind of make-up you wear to rush “debate make-up” from her years on the debate team.</p>
<p>So, would you judge a debate team for having a dress code? You know, for a lot of people, getting outside thier comfort zone actually IS doing something like rush. fwiw.</p>
<p>LOL to the comment about fashion in the 80s. Did someone paint over all the mirrors that decade? We could have put “no one looks good in” in front of everything.</p>
<p>Yes. And now they actually have parties, “come dressed from the 80’s” which the kids think are hillarious, but I just don’t think they get the hair quite right. ;)</p>
<p>80’s fashions were the nastiest :eek: I think we can all agree on that!</p>
<p>First of all, to send your child off to college without the proper clothing is doing them a disservice. And lest you think that I’m also being uppity let me proffer this conundrum. You find fault with providing your child with khakis and a button down shirt because, perhaps it is an elitist clothing. Is it also elitist to teach your children (whatever your background) table manners? Now, I don’t mean the close your mouth when you chew stuff, it’s the what fork to use when you go out to a professor’s home.</p>
<p>My father, who grew up deadly poor (like the parents didn’t eat dinner so that the kids could eat kind of poor) told me this when I was a child. He was at a professor’s home for dinner with another student. They were served chicken on the bone. The other kid didn’t know how to cut the chicken and didn’t want to embaress himself. My father may not have known what a fish fork was (at that time) but conducting yourself correctly (be it with clothing or manners) is importent.</p>
<p>As for the Pi Phis, in recruitment pnms wear clothes so that they are memorable in a good (hopefully) way. The sorority also wants to be remembered in a way that they perceive is a good thing. Sort of like a job interview… </p>
<p>You prepare your child for the world with all its permutations. That is your job. Clothing is part of the package. </p>
<p>As for shopping with friends, if asked what you feel about a plasticy looking purse, you can say, politely, “Perhaps not your best look.” If you are not asked, keep your mouth shut (unless it is a good friend and you can say whatever you like.) If the item is purchased and you are asked what you think of the new purchase, “I have never seen anything like it!”</p>
<p>(also works for ugly babies…not that there are any)</p>
<p>I certainly agree that each student should go to college with a decent “interview” outfit and one more dressy alternative. But within those very general boundaries that clothing should reflect the student’s personal taste. D has a more quirky and colorful style than that expressed in the now infamous memo, but she’s always clean, neat and tasteful. </p>
<p>If some of a sorority’s members sisters like to wear revealing necklines or short skirts or wooden bracelets, what is the point of forcing them into clothes they wouldn’t normally wear? Why do they need to put up a fake persona? Apparently sorority members are allowed to wear clothes of their personal choice every other week of the year. So how does having the members virtually in costume during rush week help a freshman decide what sorority truly suits her? I don’t doubt that sorority membership can offer a lot to many women, but the whole culture of rush seems to exude so much phoniness and shallowness.</p>
<p>To follow up on oldfort and ellebud’s comments, there is a young woman asking on a thread what to wear to a decent dinner out (not the Ritz, but apparently something that’s a bit more special than everyday). She doesn’t know what to wear / what’s appropriate, and her boyfriend doesn’t have shoes other than sneakers. Sorry, I think both sets of parents didn’t do their jobs if these young people are going away to college and don’t have a sense of what to wear for an occasion that calls for something more than everyday jeans and t-shirts, and the boyfriend’s parents certainly didn’t do him any good by not ensuring that he had <em>one</em> pair of non-sneaker shoes. And it’s a shame, because the poster in question appears to be a lovely girl – but no one has modeled for her that there are life occasions beyond jeans and t-shirts. </p>
<p>Look, it’s pulling teeth to get my 17 yo S out of jeans and t-shirts … But hopefully through enough repetition he’s at least gotten the clue that at certain occasions, you put yourself together a bit more than everyday, and hopefully that will serve him at college if he’s taking a girl out to a special date, going to a prof’s house for a reception, etc. That’s part of basic life preparation and skills, just like learning how to change the lightbulb and do the laundry. Forget the Greek system – I don’t get why you (generic you) wouldn’t send your kid off to college with at least one or two non-jeans-and-sneakers outfits. Wouldn’t you want your kid to be prepared? Or is life so beaten-down that there’s never anything that calls for anything nicer?</p>
<p>I live in jeans and long-sleeved t-shirts, myself, LOL. I work at home and in a casual office setting where jeans are fine. But I know how to do better as the occasion calls for it. Why wouldn’t I want my kids to know the same? </p>
<p>If someone doesn’t like the Greek system, cool. But to be all discombobulated by clothing beyond jeans and t-shirts?</p>
<p>Pizzagirl, I was getting angry that you insisted on repeatedly insulting me, my mother, my sister, my sister-in-law and many of my friends by saying that we are failures as mothers because we have not trained our children to live up to your sartorial standards. But then I realized how ridiculous your idea is:</p>
<p>“Oh my god, look at your son’s tie. You’re a failure as a mother, Mrs. Son-Cured-Cancer!”</p>
<p>“Those pants? Too short, and why is she wearing socks with them? Failure as a mom, Ms. Daughter-Saved-Child-From-Drowning.”</p>
<p>“A statement necklace AND statement earrings? Call the fashion police and admit your total maternal failure, Mrs. Daughter-Figured-Out-How-To-Get-Carbon-Dioxide-Out-Of-The-Atmosphere-And-Saved-Us-All-From-Frying!”</p>
<p>Nevertheless, I point out that insulting other posters is hardly the way to make people believe your story about how sorority women are so warm and accepting of people not like them.</p>
<p>Cardinal Fang, I wasn’t talking about sartorial standards. No one said anyone “had” to be a fashionista – I certainly am not nor (since this was about the Greek system) were we a collection of '80’s fashionistas. </p>
<p>What I’m talking about, however, is a mentality of sending your kid out to take on the world at age 18 … and not have even clued your kid in that it might be a good idea to have a-pair-of-black-pants-and-a-nice-sweater / khakis-and-a-buttondown for those occasions that call for something nicer than jeans and t-shirts? Let me repeat. I’m not talking about fancy sartorial standards or the latest in fashion. I’m talking about the knowledge that not every occasion in life is jeans and t-shirts. If you’re sending your kid off at 18 without that knowledge, then, yes, I think you’ve done your kid a major disservice and you’ve cut your kid off at the knees. It would be akin to sending your kid off without knowing that you tip the waiter in a restaurant or that you put your napkin on your lap at the dinner table. Basic life knowledge.</p>
<p>Which is why I find it really hard to believe that most parents are sending their kids off to college without <em>one</em> halfway decent non-jeans-and-t-shirt outfit. Because most people have occasions in their lives where they spruce it up a bit – the Thanksgiving dinner table, the holiday party, whatever, so why wouldn’t their kids have the same?</p>
<p>This has nothing to do with money. This has nothing to do with fashion. This has to do with an attitude towards life – that there are great occasions / events out there where sometimes it’s appropriate and fun to polish it up a little bit, versus an attitude that, well, any event that calls for something beyond jeans is just too chi-chi and I’ll never participate anyway, I’ll just stay in my own little world because no one’s bothered to show me anything nicer.</p>
<p>LOL, I saw this comment on a blog discussing the Cornell Pi Phi rules, and I enjoyed this comment:</p>
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<p>Wow, Pizzagirl. I think that girl’s comment is really snobby.</p>
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<p>Those comments are from someone who really doesn’t appreciate individual style and diversity. For her, like so many it seems, only the preppy, “classy” style defined by Pi Phi is acceptable for dressing up. It is a totally separate issue whether a person is prepared to dress up for a certain occasion, from how they choose to do so. I don’t have boys, but aren’t there other ways for a guy to dress up a bit other than khakis and a button down shirt?</p>
<p>I feel those that think this Pi Phi advice is reasonable for ALL, have a really narrow mindset, as to what is acceptable taste. If I were shopping with a friend, I would absolutely tell them when something doesn’t fit right and doesn’t flatter them, I would also give my opinion on whether I liked a certain gaudy plastic purse or not, but I would certainly hope for them to be strong and independent enough that if they liked it, they’d go for it. After all, the clothes and accessories that some find gaudy and trashy are in stores because other people like them.</p>
<p>Back in post #45 when I described my rush experience, I said how I was wearing a jean skirt and Dr. Scholls for the second round. I can only guess in retrospect that the rush counselor just told us that the 2nd round would be more formal and to dress nicely. (The third round I know was formal). When I decided to drop out right then seeing the other women, it was not because I couldn’t go and change and put on my “wedding clothes” to go through this round, it was because I really didn’t feel like conforming to that standard of “dressing up”. I certainly would have gone to a professor’s house dressed like I was, and I sincerely doubt that I would leave a worse impression for it. During college, I had plenty of male attention, a couple longish-term bfs, and plenty of friends in and outside of sororities. I don’t think my comfortable style of dress (you wouldn’t have caught me in heels back then even for a wedding) has ever hindered me, in friendships or jobs or with men. </p>
<p>It is this implication I find through out this thread that if you don’t know how to dress in this particular way, then you don’t know how to “pull it together” and will suffer consequences, that really bothers me. An alternative dresser may very well be ignored or criticized by women who feel this way but really, there is a whole bigger world out there of people who don’t think like that.</p>