rec letters

It may not seem fair to you, but that is the way the system works for sororities everywhere, not just at UT. Many sororities are required by their national membership policies to have a rec on a girl before they offer a bid. Even if a rec is not required by a particular sorority, recs help the girls who have them to stand out from the crowd. All of the sororities looked at hundreds of resumes over the summer. A formula is used by panhellenic and each sorority is told how many girls they can invite to each round, (and this number is not the same for all of the groups). They had to do the best they could to narrow down the pool of pnms in advance before they issued their limited number of invitations. Each sorority has a private system for doing this and they take lots of things into consideration- grades, activities, legacy status, recs, friends, etc. They do hold some party slots back for that fantastic out of stater who is off the radar, but if she has done her homework and read the information on the panhellenic website, she will know that, in most cases, she needs recs. Please stop assuming that some chapters are "snobby" or whatever- they are all just operating under the rules of the system. Those chapters did not choose to invite fewer girls than others- they were not allowed to. Wherever you pledged, have a great time, make lots of friends, and next year when you are on the other side you will have a clearer picture of how it actually works.

You say recs are meaningless and mean nothing, but you're complaining about how most sororities require them. Well, they mean something or they wouldn't be needed. Recs are the norm in competitive recruitments, so if a chapter says they're required, believe it. The UTK Panhellenic site stated who required them, and even the ones who didn't still said they were a good idea.

Just get them and cover your bases. Pictures just show us what you look like and resumes just give a run-down of your activities and all. Everybody has a good picture and good resume these days. When an alum sends in a rec, she's endorsing you for membership. She's saying that everything on your resume is true, that you have good character and that you'd be an asset and represent us in a good light. So yes, they mean something. Plenty of girls who get recs don't have any family members who belonged to sororities. They got them from teachers, coaches, ladies they babysat for, went to church with, neighbors, bosses, friend's parents, parent's co-workers. Any woman who went to a four year college might have a sorority connection or know people who do. One of the best ways to find alums? If your mom is on Facebook, have her post that you're needing them. I know SO many girls who found recs that way.

My case in point. So my Mom posts it on FB for me to get a rec...that person may not even know me. I am sure you get many letters from people who don't even know the PNM...so in reality, those letters are POINTLESS!

There are other ways recs can be a deciding factor in who gets a bid. Say a sorority is down to their very last bid and really trying to decide between two PNMs. They like both and think they'd make good sisters. GPAs, resumes, etc are pretty even, but there is literally only spot left. One girl has a rec and one doesn't. Well, in tight races like this, the girl with the rec will probably get the bid.

Another scenario: a few members are unsure about giving a bid to a certain PNM because they don't remember meeting her at all. Some other girls in the chapter really like this PNM, though, so they show the unsure members the good rec that was sent in on her. Those members are then comfortable voting her in because an alum vouched for her.

Just a couple of other things to keep in mind when deciding whether or not you want to risk it without recs.