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NewsvineThe first round of housing hell is finally upon the class of 2010. We thought spring quarter would be filled with sunshine, fountain-hopping and bronzed Stanford students cavorting in the Oval — but oh, how wrong we were. While the housed Greeks among us may relax, secure in their knowledge of their home for next year, the rest of us don’t sleep so soundly. To distract my peers from their anxiety, I offer some history on the buzzwords surround the Greek system and housing.
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Rush
Like most of Greek-speak, the word itself is rooted in tradition. Earlier in their history — when fraternities were far more secretive — the process was called tapping. A brother would approach a potential new member in private, tap him in the shoulder, and offer him an invitation.
As fraternities became more open, so did new member recruitment. The term rush emerged in the 1870s: At the start of the school year, when the trains pulled into the station, fraternities would “rush” to meet the new freshmen. While helping to carry their bags — the equivalent of a Sigma Nu Super Shuttle — the brothers would mark the freshmen they wanted. If a young man had been pinned with the colors of a certain fraternity, he was off-limits to all others.
A Mutual Selection Process
With our knack for abbreviations here at Stanford, it’s surprising that this mouthful of a phrase still hasn’t been shortened. During recruitment, rushees will hear this term at least a dozen times. Recruitment, the word maintains, works both ways: Both the fraternity and its rushees are just trying to find other people with whom they’ll feel comfortable. Yet, no matter how many times they hear it, not a single rushee — from the heartbroken Theta Delt reject to the most enthusiastic new Pi Phi — truly believes it. “When they say ‘mutual selection process,’” a Kappa pledge told me, “it’s like when a college says they’re looking for students who will be a ‘good fit.’” Expect to hear this term thrown around with a good deal of sarcasm and/or bitterness.
The Draw
The Draw, as most know, gets its name from the paper slips students used to “draw” in the old housing lottery. No one is quite sure just when this single-syllable word became capitalized so ominously.
Draw-ma
This Stanford-ism perfectly captures the destruction of freshmen friendships by the clique-forming mandated by the Draw. Though it describes a serious issue, the word itself is still lightly mocking in its tone. Draw-ma entails pettiness and tears, and it can leave freshmen feeling isolated and hurt after an otherwise amazing year. Softly jabbing at the silliness of our housing fears, the term offers a gentle reality slap. It reassures us that it’s no big deal, that we’ll maintain our old friends and that, wherever we might end up — Roble or Bob, EBF or (God help you) Roth — we’ll make new ones along the way, too.
Marissa pledged an unhoused sorority and is drawing with all of her roommates. They plan to get a draw number of 5 and live in Bob. Contact her at marissamiller10 at stanford.edu.