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Every year, right before the jitters of the first day of school set in, young women across the country get butterflies for something else, possibly more stressful than the first day of college: the first day of sorority recruitment, or rush.

They show up in TikTok-ready fashions prepared to gab, smile and clap their way through the process.

At LSU, women stand in line on the sidewalks of "the row" on campus in the August heat. The 12 traditional Panhellenic sorority houses are decked out in themed decorations looking out over University Lake.

Throughout the recruitment process, potential new members are sorted into different schedules and visit an array of sorority houses for parties. The women mingle in line with other potential members, helping each other keep their makeup pristine or chatting about shared experiences at other houses. 

Sometimes it's those little moments in between parties that stick, with people they meet by chance who become lifelong friends. Other times, memorable moments are made once the parties start with the other young women who eventually become "sisters." 

The sorority experience runs the gamut, and recruitment is vastly different than what it was even five years ago. The SEC has more eyes on it than ever, and the phenomenon of RushTok continues to take over social media feeds. In 2023, HBO chronicled the rush experience at the University of Alabama with its documentary "Bama Rush."

There are people who have made entire careers out of preparing young women for rush. Trisha Addicks, who owns a national rush consultancy, was featured in "Bama Rush," and she released a new book with Simon & Schuster this year, "The Rush Bible: Secrets to Crush Sorority Recruitment and Find Your Forever Greek Home." 

But one thing reigns true in the sorority recruitment experience in 2016 and 2026: Many people learn lifelong lessons amidst the bouncing and clapping.

In 2019, Olivia Vercher went through recruitment at LSU. She says her rush week was far from perfect, adding that she even considered withdrawing from the process altogether multiple times. 

At the start of the week, recruitment counselors emphasize "maximizing your options," or ranking as many houses as possible each round. 

"Most rounds, I didn't even have enough houses to fill out my preference card, so I simply ranked every house I had left and hoped I would make it to the next day," Vercher wrote in an email. 

When it was time for the last round, which is called preference, Vercher did the one thing she was told not to do. She ranked one house. At the time, she said she felt like she made a mistake.

But her risk came with reward, and she was accepted into Delta Zeta. 

"I had gone against all the advice I had been given," Vercher wrote. "Looking back, though, that decision became one of the best lessons I could have learned. It gave me the confidence to trust myself and reminded me that sometimes going for what you truly want involves taking a risk." 

When Mary Ellen Hart rushed at LSU in August 1972, she veered from her Lake Charles high school classmates, who stayed in the city to attend McNeese State University. 

"I had to figure things out on my own," Hart said. 

At the time, there were 16 sororities at LSU, and the first round, ice water, was held on one day.

"So I drank water from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.," Hart said. "There was no time to go back to my dorm to change clothes/freshen up — so I looked pretty haggard, and my face hurt from smiling by the end of the day." 

The same year, Nancy Theisen Bennett rushed at LSU. The night before preference, she went out with friends to get ice cream. As the group returned to Miller Hall on campus, a "scrawny white kitten" appeared in the parking lot. 

Bennett snuck the kitten into the dorm, thinking she could find it a home the next day. 

"The kitten spent the night, and early the next morning, myself and a couple of new friends headed into a nice neighborhood just south of campus off Highland Road where we went door to door looking for a home for the kitten — so naive!" Bennett said. "After many rejections, the kitten jumped out of our arms and raced away, never to be seen again." 

After the kitten kerfuffle, she mixed up her first and third parties for recruitment. But her second party was correct, and that's where she became a member.

"All of this because of attempting to rescue a cat," Bennett wrote. "In today's world, maybe a phone would have saved me on the scheduling."

Bennett has been a "proud and active" member of Alpha Phi for nearly 54 years since. She and other sisters gather every year for a girls weekend, and Bennett organized a 50-year reunion for her initiation class in St. Francisville in 2023. 

The friendships made through sororities can have lasting impact, but the experience can also enhance existing relationships as well. 

Hart, who pledged Kappa Delta at LSU, says her daughter joined the same sorority in 2007.

"Her pledging KD was really special for me," Hart wrote. "Neither of us has a biological sister, so I think being a member of KD filled that void."