Greek Sororities recruited new members under “no frills” guidelines days before the beginning of classes.

Traditionally, each chapter decorates its room in an effort to woo potential new members, but this year Tommy Ponson, director of student life, announced the Pan-Hellenic Committee’s decision to create a “no frills” environment, which resulted in the chapters taking new approaches to increase bids.

Abby Blanchard, senior and Pan-Hellenic vice president for recruitment said, “The reason we made the no frills policy was to ensure a values-based recruitment.”

This no frills policy included no recruitment signs, no decorations in the party rooms and forced the chapters to personalize their rooms through verbal communication. With visual sugarcoating at minimum, potential new members could plainly see the personality and ideals of each chapter.

Sydni Faucheaux, senior and Tri Sigma’s recruitment director said, “We decided to share some of our own sisters’ stories of how they found their way into Tri-Sigma through recruitment.”

Bethany Falgoust, senior and Phi Mu’s recruitment director expressed a new obstacle for active members during recruitment. She said, “In previous years if a conversation became dry, you could always fall back on talking about the decorations in the room, but this year we were challenged to break through those communication barriers to create bonds with new members.”

Potential new members go to parties that have a particular theme each day. The parties consist of slideshows, and conversations to display their respective philanthropies, socials, and rituals. In previous years, those parties were at night after classes during the first week of school. As part of the changes in recruitment this year, the chapters hosted the parties during the day on the last week of summer.

“I think everyone can agree that the first week of school is hectic all around so us having recruitment before was less stressful for active members as well as potential new members,” Faucheaux said.

In addition to the relief of being able to focus on recruitment outside of the semester, the “no frills” policy took stress of decoration to perfection off of the active members.

“Honestly, the potential new members did not even realize that the decorations were missing because their focus was naturally more on which organization they could see themselves grow in over the next four years,” Blanchard said.

“It was a very rewarding experience especially because I’m a senior getting to know the girls replacing me one day and seeing all their potential,” Briana Berthelot, senior and Delta Zeta’s Vice President of membership, said.

Both Faucheaux and Olivia Robichaux, senior Pan-Hellenic delegate, said that there were approximately 200 potential new members, evening out to a fair pledge class for each chapter.

Recruiters said that the recruitment numbers suffered in part due to the recent floods in the Baton Rouge area as well as conflicts with summertime obligations.

Fall recruitment was not only a bonding experience for potential new members but also for active members and recruitment counselors.
“The girls going through really liked seeing our group of 15 counselors made of members from each chapter so close because it helped them understand what it means to be Pan-Hellenic,” Robichaux said.

In explaining Pan-Hellenic, she said, “You don’t have to join a sorority and only hang out with the girls from your chapter.”

The consensus from a sample of recruitment officials was that although going “no frills” was at first an obstacle, it proved to be fruitful.
“If I had gone through recruitment judging solely off of what the room looked like, I wouldn’t be where I am now,” Faucheaux said.