<p>Hi! I was wondering what the general reputations are for the different sororities on campus? Also, is it better to wait until after school has started and we have gotten acquainted to ask for sorority recommendation letters?</p>
<p>There’s no reason to wait, might as well give people a headsup that you’re going to ask for one.</p>
<p>You’ll get a feel for the reputations of each sorority during your first semester on campus. Everyone online has a different and biased opinion, it’s really not worth answering.</p>
<p>At Vanderbilt during the first round of rush you must visit every sorority house, regardless of your pre-rush/first semester perceptions of which sorority is the best fit for you so you might as well start now lining up recommendation letters for every house on campus. As pancaked said^, everyone has a different opinion and reputations vary greatly from one college campus to the next; you are better off waiting and forming your own opinions which very well may change during the course of rush as you get into the houses and meet more of the sisters. Good luck!</p>
<p>Hi!</p>
<p>Yes, go ahead and get one letter of recommendation for each house. Before you can be initiated, you have to produce one. It also introduces you to each house so that we can be on the lookout for you! Although, I should say that we are more interested in meeting you and forming an opinion of you ourselves then we are in hearing what others have to say. Yes, you are required to visit each house at least 2x (fall rounds in November and Display Round in January) before you can begin cutting houses and they can cut you. Just meet as many girls as you can during the fall and see who you click with and know that we’re excited to meet you, too!</p>
<p>Great, thanks! Are recommendations required to get into a sorority? My mom said that she knows very few people that were in sororities so I wouldn’t know who to ask.</p>
<p>Recommendations are not required but they do help you get through the first rounds of rush. Ask everyone you know–friends’ mothers, teachers, people your parents work with. Most people are happy to help.</p>
<p>lenny2^ is correct–you can get letters of recommendation from women who are not personally acquainted with you (or have not known you for years) unlike the letters of recommendation that you needed for college applications. You can provide the women with a little resume about you/your accomplishments & interests and they can say they “know of” you or know your family…</p>
<p>My D had friends in sororities at Vandy who got in without letters of recommendation. I wouldn’t worry about it. Do remember that you may also decide not to join a sorority, and that is okay, too (my D and her roommate never even rushed, and they liked Vandy - in other words, don’t feel that you must be in a sorority - you may not like it, or you may not get a bid - you will survive either way).</p>
<p>My daughter also joined a sorority without any letters of recommendation, and she didn’t feel the lack of recs was a significant hindrance - more that they would have been nice to have. She eventually was VP of recruitment for Panhellenic (several years ago), and I don’t think she’d agree with post 4:
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<p>I don’t know if each chapter might have its own informal preferences as far as recs are concerned, but unless something has changed, recommendation letters are not required. Nor are fall rounds, according to Vandy’s Panhellenic website [Panhellenic</a> Sorority Recruitment | Greek Life @ Vanderbilt University | Vanderbilt University](<a href=“http://www.vanderbilt.edu/greek_life/prospective-members/recruitment:]Panhellenic”>Recruitment Counselor Program | Office for Greek Life | Vanderbilt University)
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<p>If you’re interested in recruitment, I’d encourage you to read the Vandy Greek Life website linked above, where you’ll find a schedule, recruitment guidelines, and extensive additional information.</p>
<p>I agree with the post above, but I do think that recs are helpful in getting through the first rounds, especially at the more in-demand houses. Hundreds of girls are going through each house, and the current sisters see you for only a few minutes at each. If you don’t already know someone in the house, it’s tough (but not impossible) to get a second look. My D didn’t know anyone in any of the houses, but she did have quite a few recs from family friends. We think (but can’t be sure) that it helped her survive the first couple of rounds of cuts at the house that she ultimately joined. But, if you can’t get any recs, just don’t worry about it. Participate fully in rush with an open mind and you’ll find that you end up in a great place.</p>
<p>And, btw, my D was out-of-town during the fall preview, so she did not attend. That didn’t hurt her at all during spring rush.</p>
<p>Let me clarify-- as a current Greek female at Vanderbilt, I can tell you that yes, recommendations are required for most, if not all, sororities to initiate you, but not to give you a bid. And yes, Fall Rounds (Panhellenic Preview Day) is indeed a required event, unless The Office of Greek Life approves your absence. Failure to attend even one house for Fall Rounds will result in you being removed from the process by the Office of Greek Life. That is how the rush rules at Vandy worked when I was rushing. Also, recs are especially important since you need to have sent one in or know a girl in the house to be discussed in recruitment meetings.</p>
<p>Thanks for the info! Is your sister allowed to write you a rec if she’s still in college? Also, when do recs have to be sent in by?</p>
<p>I don’t know what vandyvandy000 is talking about. My D is a rising junior, and no recommendations were required of her. As I said before, she also had to miss fall rounds, and didn’t have to get permission for that. She ended up joining one of the more in-demand houses.</p>
<p>Your sister should ask her chapter whether she is allowed to write a rec for you. There is no deadline (except rush, of course) but you should be trying to gather recs now. That way, the sisters can be keeping an eye out for you.</p>
<p>Typically active members can’t write recommendation letters.</p>
<p>Trying to reconcile vandyvandy000 in # 11 with lenny2 in #13 – is is possible that if a sorority really wants to pledge a girl and she doesn’t have a recommendation, the sorority will find an alum/adviser who will write a rec on the spot, so to speak, in order to satisfy the chapter’s requirement for a recommendation letter without putting the burden on the girl to find her own rec. I do not speak of this from personal experience but think I have heard of such practices.</p>
<p>FYI - even though you “think” your daughter never needed / had recs - please read - As a sorority alumni who as held a local office as “rec chair”, with two daughters in a local high school, I occasionally got phone calls during rush at some far-off school to provide a rec for a student that I did not know who graduated from our high school. I would call around to other moms, teachers and have even asked my daughter’s opinion of the student on occasion. And only once did I write a poor rec based on past behavior during high school…, so your daughter may have had recs done on her you know nothing about, by someone like me, who may not have known her or happened to speak to someone who shared unpleasant information. SOOOO, please help her get the recs before she heads off to campus!</p>
<p>I want to make sure I understand this because I’m an east coast mother with a daughter who is interested in Vanderbilt and a strong candidate. She’s a very friendly, social girl and would probably be interested in joining a sorority if she attended Vanderbilt. But she knows absolutely no one who has ever been in a sorority so she wouldn’t have anyone to write her a letter. Does that mean she will be excluded or at a disadvantage? I’m concerned because as a mother I’m trying to figure out whether Vanderbilt really is what it now markets itself to be–a national school with a southern flavor–or if it’s a school where students from other regions or backgrounds are sidelined. I would really appreciate some honest perspectives. Thanks!</p>
<p>rockingchair, I feel confident saying that your daughter would not be sidelined at Vanderbilt. My d, a 2009 alum from upstate NY with no connections to Greek life at all before arriving on campus, now considers her decision to attend Vandy one of the best she ever made. I would caution against seeing Vanderbilt primarily through the Greek life filter in any case. Yes, it is a factor on campus, as it is at schools in areas other than the South. But the primary benefit of attending Vanderbilt is its academic excellence and the outstanding opportunities it provides its students. There are a lot of very happy, successful Vandy students who choose not to be involved in Greek life.</p>
<p>As I stated previously, my d had no recs going into the recruitment process. We literally were not aware of knowing ONE person who had been in a sorority when she decided to rush. She never mentioned needing a letter for initiation, and I don’t see a reference to that on the Vanderbilt Greek Life site. Initiation follows selection and a training process; perhaps the chapter assists new members in obtaining letters at that point?</p>
<p>My d learned a lot from her Greek life involvement - many opportunities for public speaking, planning service events, and finally responsibility for a complicated, high-profile process like recruitment. I think having that on her resume was a factor in being selected for a competitive position after graduation. But she had friends both in and out of Greek Life who were campus leaders in many other ways. Greek life at Vanderbilt is terrific for the people who participate; Vanderbilt itself is terrific for those people and many others.</p>
<p>Greek life is full of students from all over the country, not just students from the South. Recommendations generally come from women who are their mother’s age. As FLA422 said, sororities that require recommendations will find a rec for a girl that they want to place high on their bid list. It makes things go more smoothly for girls who are going through recruitment to already have the recommendations in place, particularly if there is some kind of legacy affiliation. For example, D was a legacy to one house through her stepmom. They were required to invite her back for a second round because of that.</p>
<p>D served as a Greek Ambassador her senior year which meant disassociating from the recruitment activities of her house and guiding a group of freshmen through the rush process. I know that the process can be stressful for young women who enter the process thinking they will be making all the choices regarding what house they join. However, if a young woman wants to join a sorority and enters recruitment with an open mind, she will be matched with a house if she is open to all the possibilities available.</p>
<p>One of the nice things about Vanderbilt is that formal recruitment occurs at the beginning of the semester, instead of at the beginning of the freshman year, as at so many other southern schools. Young women have a chance to evaluate their desire to participate through informal recruitment and they have a chance to establish an academic routine prior to the additional time commitment required for pledging. BTW, academic performance during the first semester is very important for rush. Many houses value their higher than average GPAs.</p>
<p>D lives in Nashville and has served as an alumni advisor to her house for the last 2 years. I’ve heard her observe that Greek life seems to be a little less important as the freshmen who live in The Commons bond in different ways and as the popularity of the school has drawn a student body that is more diverse in many ways. Each time one of these threads comes up, there are those who correctly say that young women can be happy without pledging a sorority. The nice thing is that each young woman can choose for herself.</p>