Bid day is a special day for anybody that has gone through formal or informal recruitment. After a long week of remembering names, answering questions, and trying to learn the Greek alphabet, it is the perfect way to wind down and get to know your new life long best friends. There are two different sides to recruitment, the recruiter or the recruit. While you may think that these are two very different rolls, they have a lot more in common than you would think. One of those being the excitement that everybody feels on bid day.
When going through recruitment for the first time, it is a very foreign experience. You have long days that consist of running around Greek row and being interviewed and sung to at every stop. Correction, it’s more like being screamed at than singing. While in each house, not only are you being asked questions, but you are also trying to engage and be able to read the personalities of the girls you are talking to. At least one time during this week you think to yourself “is this all worth it?”. You fight through the heat, tight schedule, and blisters for the remaining days and finally the day has come. The day you have worked so hard for. Bid day.
Bid day is basically the closing ceremony for recruitment. This is where you find out what house you will be getting a bid from, and then have the opportunity to go and spend the day with your chapter. You run with your pledge class through campus, onto Greek row, and all the way to your new home. Waiting for you on the front lawn, are girls decked out in their letters just as excited and nervous as you are. When you reach the lawn, you’re searching the sea of girls trying to find the one holding your name on a sign. Once found, you are greeted by a big hug and then swept into the mansion you now call home to change into a matching shirt and name tag. You then mosey out onto the lawn and try to remember everybody’s names that you meet. There is always one big activity that you will do with them as well like ice skating or going swimming. It is just a day to hang out and get to know new people.
For the women, already in chapters recruiting the new pledge class, we are just as excited as these ladies are. We had many long days of singing songs, learning how to talk to a stranger, and running through a minute by minute off each day. It was just as long and tiring for us as it is for them. By the end of the week, we are all so excited to see all of our hard work pay off and meet all of the new members. We stand on the edge of the lawn watching all of the men and women run to their new-found homes. It makes every one of us feel amazing looking at the smile across everybody’s faces. When the girls start to tinkle onto the lawn, we are all so eager to meet everyone and maybe even find our littles in the process! We all sit and bask at all of the new members that we can proudly claim as our chapters new legacy.
While It may be tiring and challenging work, one day of hell week makes it well worth it. Bringing in a new pledge class always calls for a celebration and we call this Bid day. Weather this is you first time running home, or you’re watching from your chapter house hundreds of girls flood the streets wondering which ones are coming to your house, this is an experience that will always be in your heart as one of the best college memories you will have.
