In the days leading up to recruitment, I began questioning whether being in a sorority was worth losing a week of winter break. I was worried that the process was going to be superficial and judgemental and, because it was out of my control, scary. Greek life and college in general were not a focal point for my family, so I grew up buying into the stereotypes and thinking I wouldn’t want to be in one. Before I came to Tulane I pictured something along the lines of this:
While this brand of “sisterhood” may work well at other schools, they do not resemble sororities at Tulane. Going through the recruitment process completely changed the way I saw Greek life. Although it consisted of long days spent walking from house to house and lining up alphabetically, I really enjoyed the conversations I had with older girls at every house. Each of them consistently said that their sorority didn’t define their experience at Tulane, but merely made it feel more full. I also found it comforting to hear that many of their best friends were spread across sororities or hadn’t rushed at all. I tried not to go into the process with my mind set on any house and honestly, that made it so much harder to eventually have to choose between them.
Recruitment enabled me to meet so many people and was a much more positive experience than I had expected. Throughout the process, our Recruitment Counselors encouraged us to “trust the process.” As annoying as that was to hear at the time, everyone seemed to end up in the house that was right for them. Looking back, I’m glad I didn’t choose the seven extra days of break over three years of exploring new communities at Tulane.