Special | 9/22/08

Media Credit: Blake Savadow [Click to enlarge]

Media Credit: Blake Savadow [Click to enlarge]

Media Credit: Blake Savadow [Click to enlarge]

Media Credit: Blake Savadow [Click to enlarge]

As the Panhellenic Association closed the book on an old tradition, eight sororities took to Burdick Field Sunday morning for a more subdued Bid Day celebration.Rather than a welcome "tackle," the executive board of the Panhellenic Association altered the tradition to nonviolent rip-away banners.

"A couple women got injured. It was becoming a safety issue. There were minor injuries, including a sprained ankle and a minor knee injury," Towson Fraternity and Sorority Life coordinator Christian Miele said.

Sorority members have embraced the new tradition, calling it "a more sisterhood-based event."

"Sometimes traditions just need to be reinvented," Miele said. This was a year of unprecedented change for the Panhellenic Association sororities.

Sunday's event marked the largest recruitment class in 31 years, according to members of Kappa Delta.

"Two hundred and fifty-one women went through the rush process this semester. That is the largest number in Panhellenic's history," Miele said.

New members picked up their bid invitation Sunday morning along with a T-shirt from the corresponding sorority.

"That's how they reveal themselves to us. They have the sorority shirt underneath the rush shirt and when their group is called they take off the rush shirt. That's when we know who accepted our bid," junior Kappa Delta member Crystal Lilly said.During the week, the students were split into groups of 15 to 20 and were accompanied by recruitment counselors, who guided them through the weeks activites.

The prospective members revealed their chosen sorority in these groups Sunday morning.

"The purpose of it is to make new members feel welcome and the running towards the banner gives them an appreciation of the sorority they're going into and gets them excited about being new members and we're really excited to see them all," Kimi Herzog, a Zeta Tau Alpha member, said.

"It was a lot of fun. I [will] get to meet new people and have fun and do some charity work around campus," freshman Courtenay O'Connor said. Overall, the sororities said they were pleased with the new adjustments made to the Panhellenic Association rush process.

"They changed it because it was too intense for the new members. This is more welcoming than it was last year," Herzog said. "It was crazy last year, it was hard to tell what was going on."

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