Prefrosh: Tiers > Rankings. Here’s Why.

To any prefrosh wondering about rankings... Individual rankings are subjective— tiers are not. Tiers are based on the majority presence of sorority tiers (top, upper, mid, etc) in a house’s mixing schedule, but the actual POSITION in that tier (the single top house or second, etc) is entirely subjective to the houses they mix with. Here’s why.

I think anyone can agree that Sig Chi, AD, DU, Sig Pi and Sig Phi are top tier fraternities. That’s pretty indisputable (except maybe Sig Pi).

However, within that tier, Theta, Kappa and APhi love DU, and DG doesn’t as much. Theta, Kappa, and APhi are likely to rank them higher than DG. However, with AD, it’s different: DG and Kappa are big fans—APhi likes them a bit too, but Theta refuses to mix with them. Sig Pi has major groupies in APhi, a few in Kappa too, but DG and Theta couldn’t really care less about them. Sig Chi is loved by DG, and APhi and Kappa feel meh/alright about them, and Theta rarely mixes with them. With Sig Phi, DG and Kappa have strong relations, APhi semi-strong, theta morning as much. So, if you ask the people who ranking matters to— the sororities mixing with them— what the exact order is, they’re likely to disagree in a few spots (except kappa and APhi, they’d probably have similar lists). Likewise, there are houses from lower tiers that C4 mix with that they’d probably bump up a tier on a ranking as well, even though no one else would agree (for DG/Theta, Chi Psi, for Kappa ZBT, for APhi TDX).

So, anyone wondering what the ACTUAL “undisputed top house” is, or what the true order of the tiers is, it varies from sorority to sorority. If your aim is to join a house that mixes mainly with DG or mainly with Kappa or mainly with APhi or even Theta, do your research about that specific house’s preferences. The same thing goes for literally all other tiers too.