UF Panhellenic and UF Interfraternity Council announced a record-breaking Fall recruitment season on Instagram, with 1,761 and over 1,300 registrations, respectively.
Recruitment for the Panhellenic Council was from Aug. 15 to Aug. 23, and those involved had the opportunity to visit and speak with all the chapters in rounds to mutually match with one. The Interfraternity Council recruitment began Aug. 24 and ended Aug. 30. Interfraternity chapters hosted house tours and individual events.
Mary Jane Peddy, an 18-year-old UF health science freshman, joined Sigma Kappa during recruitment, one of the 18 National Panhellenic Conference chapters at UF. Peddy suspects the number of people participating in recruitment impacted the wait times to enter each house, she added.
“Each day, we were put under tents outside of the house, and girls were sitting outside,” Peddy said. “Before each house, [we were] in a certain order, because they had a specific girl in the house to talk to you… that just took so long, and it was so hot. It just took a lot of time.”
Peddy said she enjoyed the whole process. Participating students are known as Potential New Members, or PNMs, and go through three rounds and then a final round called a preferential, interacting with all chapters.
The first day of recruitment, orientation, gives PNMs a rundown of what the weeklong process looks like. During the first few days, PNMs visit each house to learn about each group’s values and philanthropic goals. Later in the week, Peddy said she got to know the houses on a deeper level to figure out where she felt the most connection.
Peddy said she wanted to join a sorority to meet people who positively challenged her growth.
“It’s interesting coming from home to here,” Peddy said. “I've learned being in the sorority now if you think you’re alone, you’re not. You can literally text anyone in a sorority that would drop anything to do something for you.”
Raegan Kelly, a 17-year-old UF biology freshman, joined Chi Omega. As an out-of-state student from Pennsylvania, Kelly said she wanted a solid group of friends to start off her first year at UF.
“I really wanted a solid group of friends because I’m out of state. So I was looking for a place like home,” Kelly said. “I wanted a warm, big and good school, and [UF] checked all those boxes.”
According to Kelly, there were 84 girls in her sorority class. Overall, the experience was fun, she said. There were about 60 people filing in and out of each of the 18 sorority houses, she said.
“There were so many girls — it was a little overwhelming,” Kelly said. “But honestly, I loved that you can meet so many people. When you're sitting under the tent, you talk to a lot of girls. I didn’t mind there were so many because it meant more opportunities to make friends.”
Andy Brantmeyer, a 20-year-old UF agricultural operations management junior, is a member of Alpha Gamma Rho, a social and professional agricultural fraternity. Currently, he helps manage AGR’s finances, but he served as rush president last spring semester.
“When I was rush president, pretty much what I served as was a liaison between the proposed executive team for the president and vice president and coordinated to make sure people were comfortable and happy with everything going on,” Brantmeyer said. “In Alpha Gamma Rho, we have eliminated pledging. Essentially you come to a week of events, and following that you’re initiated.”
Brantmeyer said he thinks it is great for the record number of individuals to be interested in Greek life this semester.
“For us, that’s good because it's just a bigger pool we can pull from. It gives us more options for guys that we might want to bring in,” he said. “But the process is pretty much the same, we look for the same qualities. [We want] guys who we think represent our organization well, and for guys to exhibit strong character.”
Contact Ella Dorfman at edorfman@alligator.org. Follow her on X @dorfman_ella.
