Pref Round, still get cut?

Here’s the deal- if you attend pref at a chapter, you are automatically on their bid list- chapters do NOT cut after pref. What they do is rank the PNMs who preffed their house in the order of how badly they want them to be a part of the chapter. Chapters only get to extend a certain number of bids (quota) and the goal is to fill quota with the PNMs who are highest on their lists. If you rank a chapter as 1st on your card, and you fall on that chapter’s list before they reach the quota cutoff, Congrats! You have a bid! If your first choice chapter has you ranked lower on their list, and they reach quota before they get to you, then it goes to your 2nd choice and whether you are high enough on their list to be included in their quota. If you rank every chapter you pref on your MRABA, and you STILL don’t get a bid, then you are eligible for a snap bid from any chapter (even if you didn’t pref there!!) which is when a chapter who didn’t fill their quota off their pref list can offer you a bid in order to reach their full quota. If you “suicide bid” you would be INELIGIBLE for snap bids, so it’s a good idea to rank both houses if you could reasonably see yourself being happy in either. If there’s a chapter you pref and you feel that you’d rather NOT be in a sorority at all than be in that chapter, then (and only then) should you consider not listing them on your MRABA.

Here’s an example: let’s say you pref two chapters: AAA and BBB. After pref, your first choice is BBB, so you rank them 1st on your MRABA and you rank AAA 2nd. Let’s pretend quota is 15, and you end up being ranked 17th on BBB’s bid list… you might think you are out of luck, but if two or more of the PNMs ranked higher than you put a different chapter first, and they were high enough up on that chapter’s list, then they match with that chapter and not BBB, which means they continue down the list and BOOM! Bid day, baby! Let’s play this out. Let’s say you weren’t 17th on BBB’s list, you were 126th, and you were maybe 75th on AAA’s list, and both of the chapters are able to fill their quota before they get to you, that means you’re eligible for a snap bid… maybe chapter ZZZ brought you through to sisterhood, and you made a good impression but not as good as the PNMs who got invited back to pref, but ZZZ got all the way through their pref list and still didn’t reach quota- they can say, Hey! I remember this PNM- they were pretty cool- let’s snap bid them! That means you would still get a bid, even though you didn’t pref that house. Obviously the more “prestigious” and “in demand” a chapter is, the less likely they will have to give bids to PNMs lower down their bid lists, and even less likely they would be in a position to snap bid, but it could happen. That’s how the sausage is made.

Thanks for your answer. I had no idea this was possible! Is it pretty rare where you end up with a bid from a house you didn’t go to for pref? I assume my rho gamma would call me if that happened?

My sister rushed at Bama and she told me that there, you are guaranteed a bid from one of your pref houses as long as you don’t suicide bid (or get kicked out of rush for a violation). I wish it was like that here!

Anyone someone who got a bid from house they didn’t pref? Not people who drop out and then get a snap bid, but girls who went through pref, ranked both houses, but got a bid somewhere else the next day???

That would ONLY happen if the chapter was doing snap bids- they don’t rank PNMs on the final bid list if they didn’t attend their pref parties. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen or heard it happen… I just know it hypothetically could.