To the Editor:
As a member of a local sorority, I was pleased to read Tuesday's editorial by The Dartmouth editorial board [Sororities Dedicated to Women's Strength Should Eliminate Rush Contradiction]. All last week during rush I thought about its inherent paradox. We pride ourselves on being places for all women yet we ultimately accept or reject them during a sometimes stressful process.
I would like to see the system change.
Since I am not familiar with the regulations the national houses must follow I can only recommend changes for the local houses.
Last winter the former Panhellenic Council president and a former sorority president suggested a lottery-type rush. But this system would give the rushees no control over where they end up.
Under my system, sophomore women who want to be in a local house would rank the three locals in order of their preference. From the pool of women, names would be chosen at random and placed according to their rankings until each house is full. If a woman's name is one of the last to be chosen and her first choice is already full, she would become a member of her second-choice house provided it is still open. This way, if a woman did not get into her first-choice house, she would know it was a result of bad luck and nothing else.
A system like this seems to be the only way to rectify a process that makes some people uncomfortable.
